I have often referred to that portion of life that occurs after the first grandchild as the drooling years. These are the years gained by exercise, not smoking and eating right. You get to spend a whole lot more time sitting in the nursing home while they collect your Social Security and Medicare if you treat your body as a temple. If you take better care of yourself during middle age, old age lasts much longer. If you are in really good health, you can hang on with the aid of a respirator well into your 90s. Anyway…my first grandchild has arrived. As a matter of fact she arrived with her parents on my doorstep. Once again I get to buy diapers, formula and bottles and for my generosity I also get to put my daughter back on my car insurance, pay extra utilities and give up that well-earned craft room for a nursery. I guess I'm not actually losing a craft-room I am gaining 3 additional mouths to feed, clothe and support.

With the new baby in the house, mine isn't the only drool drifting lazily down to the front of my shirt. Plus, my TV isn't being wasted being off all day. The refrigerator gets a good workout as it is opened and emptied at all hours of the day and night. Getting “up there in years” isn't what it used to be. Retirement is just a reward for lotto winners. I am starting to stop daydreaming about all things I intend to do…someday. Someday was last week.

I went to my 30th High School Reunion up in Gainesville, Texas, this summer. I saw lots of people I haven't seen in a long time. I do go to all the reunions and it is good to see who is old, who is bald, who is gray and who hasn't aged a day (my category). There are several of the girls from the Class of '73 who look better than they did in high school and they were knocked out beautiful then. I won't mention any names, they know who they are. They could have made a deal with the devil and have a Dorian Gray type portrait in some hidden room growing old and wrinkled as they wreck marriages simply by standing there. They didn't marry in the class so I'm not the only man banging his head against the wall….like I had a shot.

When I was in high school I was 6'6” and weighed around 179 lbs. My nose was my most prominent feature. I looked like a zipper in profile. So I grew my hair long and went from zipper to a mop…with a nose. The closest I got to romance in high school was a pity kiss from the homecoming queen the night she was crowned. At this year's reunion I got to hold the hand of one of the perfect beauties during the memorial service. Both events were equally as thrilling. My wife doesn't go to the reunions but she needn't worry. All the girls from my class still have me pictured as the zipper or mop. Of course now, I am twice the man I was then. I did get to give away and sign copies of my first book. My book isn't exactly setting the world on fire so I might as well get some ego mileage out of it. Maybe for my 35th reunion I can hand out copies of the next one.