Who The Hell Are Old Guys?

Yesterday the family was touring the public parks in Riverside and Avondale, and as we were driving I saw an “old guy” in his car wearing a cardigan and smoking a pipe, like it was 1962. It didn’t shock me at first. My brain catalogued him as an old guy smoking a pipe, but then I started thinking about it. This guy wasn’t old. He was under sixty. He had a thick salt and pepper goatee and a frackin’ pipe. Even if he was sixty, that means he was born in 1948. He’s a baby boomer. Most likely a filthy worthless hippy. What baffles me is why he decided to cultivate this look? It’s not contemporary. It’s anachronistic. He might as well have been wearing a monocle and a stovepipe hat, or smoking a cigarette out of a cigarette holder. Did this guy want to be a professor that badly? At some point in his life this guy quit and said, “You know what, I’m old,” which is ridiculous. Old is out. Young is in. Christie Brinkley is fifty and sells exercise equipment. Jane Fonda is SEVENTY and apparently tried to fornicate her ex-husband to death. I don’t have a problem with this guy’s fashion statement. I just don’t understand it. Does he really want to be Fred MacMurray? Nobody knows who that is. Wouldn’t it be awkward to meet Bill Clinton and W at an evangelical whorehouse – something for everyone – and be the oldest guy in the room even though you’re the youngest guy in the room?

Side Note: I’ve stated before that I think W is going to replace his dad as Bill’s wingman and they’re going to win two or three Nobel Peace Prizes over the next twenty years. They’re not going to be sitting in high backed chairs in great rooms smoking pipes, and if they are smoking pipes they won’t be filled with tobacco.

Maybe this old guy got caught up in a joke. Yesterday I took the trash out wearing shorts, a white t-shirt, black socks pulled up to my knees and brown loafers. I wished I'd had some garters – damned elastic. It’s not the first time I’ve rocked this outfit, and it’s becoming less funny and more comfortable every time I do. Maybe I’ll be an old guy in twelve years. If for no other reason than to embarrass my daughter. Yeah, I have to go get a cardigan and a pipe.