.
I don't like being 45 - really.
It's so… so… middle isn't it?
Us 45ers have a rough deal if you ask me:- We can't be excused for being old and cranky, and neither can we get away with being young and whimsical.
We're just stuck in the middle.
And 45 has really changed over the years, hasn't it. I clearly remember that when I was in my teens, 45 was absolutely ancient! When I was at school a friend of mine (I won't mention his name as his parole officer AND the proprietors of 'Harare Liquorama' are still looking for him) came to me, obviously quite upset.
“My Dad's had like a heart problem, like he's in hospital, China*!” he said, as we puffed away behind the bike sheds. (*Please note: His dad wasn't in hospital in China 'China' was the current slang for 'Mate' or Bro' - Methinks from the Cockney Rhyming Slang 'My Mate, my China Plate')
“Hey no, China!” I said, lighting up the third 'Mad Dog' (Madison Toasted cigarette) for that particular break time (I was EXCEPTIONALLY cool in those days) “Like, how old is he?”
“Cheesh, I dunno for sure, China, but he's quite an old top, I think my mom told the doc he was, like, 45.”
“Ahhhh,” I said, nodding knowingly in that professional-medical-practitioner sort of way. I put my arm around his shoulder, almost setting his felt school hat on fire with my cigarette end.
“Well China - at least he's had a good innings…But hey, it was so nice getting to know him… Do you think you'll get his Yamaha 350?”
That's how old 45 was then.
But now it certainly isn't an OLD sort of age at all, is it? It is more of, well, a non-age. Like being in no-mans land?
In fact if 45 has any memorable features at all, it will be recorded as the year your body forgets to communicate with itself. It is the year that your brain continues to believe you can do anything, but forgets to send that memo to the rest of your body.
Really.
For example: I KNOW I can skateboard. Of course I can! After all, in my late teens/ early twenties I used to skateboard to work and back EVERY DAY. I was the Skateboard KING. And of course it's like riding a bicycle (except it's much smaller and waaaaaay cooler);- Something I will always be able to do, right up until the day I 'tick tack' over the half-pipe of life into my grave (which I have estimated will be sometime in the latter half of this century).
Of course over the years I have proven this theory again and again. After a three year break from skateboarding at 24, I tried it again at 27, then at 32, at 36 and finally once again at 40. And each time, all those awesome moves came back to me, like old friends after a lottery win. I was still the Skateboard King. (Admittedly the last attempt was at three in the morning after a particularly good New years Eve, and there was a slight altercation with a step, a poorly placed rosebush and a wheel barrow, but even then the swelling went down fairly quickly, and Mrs Ed has almost full use of her left arm now)
But at 45?
Somehow… It…. Just… Doesn't…. Work!
I tried. The darn, stupid board just keeps going all over the place, and I end up on the floor with both my coccyx and pride more than a little bruised.
How scary is that? Somewhere between forty and forty five I lost my Skateboard Mojo.
And now, as if 45 hasn't done enough damage, it has gone one step worse. In fact 100 steps worse.
45 stole my 34.
Not my age 34 - I knew that went yonks ago. It's my …. Well, quite embarrassing really, but the waist size of my boxer shorts.
34 was my size! From high school onwards, I have always been a 34. (That's in inches, by the way, not feet as Mrs Ed has been inclined to suggest!) This has made life much easier for me, because, well, buying boxer shorts has never been an exciting prospect and, historically, has always been left until the situation becomes what my mother used to describe as 'a biological threat to the security of the nation'.
But this did not present a problem when I wore 34's, because I could just say to anyone who was going anywhere near a potential undergarment boutique:-
'Hey, pick me up a six-pack of boxers, any colour, just as long as they are 34s.' This was a double winner for me because
a) it wasn't ME having to do the shopping, and b) because I was 'buying in bulk' I was saving money. I'm a buy-in-bulk kinda guy.
But this year something changed.
Because I'm 45.
Let me tell you a story. A week or two ago we were in Cape town, taking the REE (Resident Expert on Everything) back to his 'digs' for the second term of his studies. We had three hours to kill before heading back so, at the request of the MCM (Money Consuming Machine), we went to 'China Town'.
At first I was most disappointed. It was not at all like the sort of China Town I had expected. There was absolutely no street carnival, no huge puppet dragons bustling through the crowds, nor fireworks exploding in the sky…. No food peddlers offering rare and exotic oriental delicacies from roadside carts….
It was just shops about thirty of them in one huge block. And worse yet, they all stocked almost exactly the same things. I was almost totally put off, ready to climb in the EDGE-mobile and head home, until the MCM made an observation:- Everything was cheap, and everything was in bulk!
Suddenly I was in seventh heaven!
We brought so much useful stuff! A box of 100 plasters (only R12!) A six dozen carton of small purple candles (you never know when you need an SPC) A full on moustache, fake nose, fake wart, fake eyebrow disguise kit ('Keep reaching out of Children, do not light, incinerate or swallow'). 720 clothes pegs. 18 pairs of lime green ankle socks (One size fits all. 100% pure xylithelene.)… I was just mentally sizing up the choice between a 96 pack of chicken and mushroom two-minute noodles and a case of fourteen bottles of liquid henna hair dye (not that I need it now, of course, but who knows what might happen to me in thirty years or so) when I heard the MCM calling from the other side of the shop
“Look dad, they've got boxer shorts!” she said.
Not believing my luck I rushed over and grabbed a 'ten pack', scanning it for a price..... R80!
“Eighty Rand for ten pairs of boxers?” I exclaimed to the shop- keeper in disbelief. “Is that right?”
She nodded tersely at me, and I immediately began to search for my size. This was not easy - there seemed to be absolutely no markings on the packets, or even the contents (I er… accidentally split one of the plastic packages and other than a 'Do not swallow, Keep away from fire' warning on the boxer shorts label, no other information was offered.)
“I need size 34, do you have?” I asked in desperation. She rummaged through and eventually handed me a pack.
“Thirty four” she said, in an uncanny mimic of my own voice.
I couldn't help smiling all the way home. A ten-pack of boxers would last me years!
The next morning I tried on the first pair. I am not delusional, I know I have put on a gram or two since I left school, so when I heard a slight tearing sound as I pulled them over my calves I was not alarmed. Getting them over my knees was more difficult but I eventually managed.
As I walked out to the car, Mrs Ed called after me, asking why I was walking with a stoop. I tried to turn round and scold her, but the pain stopped me half way. It took me 15 minutes to get into the car, and I took the long way to work, on account of being unable to turn left.
Later, sitting in the office, I found my breathing was laboured, despite the fact that I was doing nothing. Nothing was all I could do. My head was spinning, I was sweating profusely and my toes had developed an eerie, numbish tingle. Reaching down (in agony) I slid one trouser leg up and saw that my shin was a purple - blue colour. There was an ugly vein throbbing across my ankle….
That's when it suddenly got dark, until four hours later when I regained consciousness.
Mrs Ed was carrying me over her shoulder to the car at the time.
“I think …. I think… I might change to a 36… or even 38,” I whimpered.
I heard, or perhaps felt, the rumble of suppressed belly laughter as she answered…
“You'd be mad if you didn't!”
.
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