“When I’m 74"
And I hope there’s a lot more
I almost feel like it was yesterday that I bought the Sergeant Pepper’s Beatles album. Now more than 50 years later, I look back to recall my reaction to “When I’m 64.” I thought it was corny. Would I be like that in 45 years?
Then I blinked my eyes a few times and I was 64! Thankfully, I wasn’t as cornball as the song. Nor was it a momentous age to reach. “This is nothing,” I thought to myself. Why did the Beatles choose the number 64 for the title of their song?
The next year, I became 65 (if my memory serves me). That birthday was different. Half-price at the movies and on the buses and subways? A greatly reduced medical insurance bill thanks to Medicare? Now we’re talkin’. At least there was a benefit to getting so damn old.
There was another song about growing old I found much more appealing than the Beatles’. “Old Man” was sung and written by Neil Young. The words were juvenile, but the sentiment grabbed me. In his composition, Neil observed the similarities between his life and that of an old man he knew. The lyric “24 and there’s so much more” hooked me even though I was just 20 at the time.
On a movie set recently, I ran into a percussionist I used to employ on recording sessions. He is a brilliant musician who became a good friend. After I left the music…
