Aging Loudly Embrace Your Wheezing Freight Train Self
Uncle Bobby, I just turned 50 and I’m already tired of all the “fit at any age” influencers trying to sell me on kale smoothies, cold plunges, and journaling about my gratitude. I’m not trying to be the best version of myself—I’m just trying to make it to bedtime without losing a contact or my will to live. Is it okay if I don’t age gracefully?
Geritol J. Deteriate
Of course it’s okay. In fact, I insist on it.
Let me tell you something, buttercup—aging gracefully is a scam. A con. A pyramid scheme built on collagen peptides and Instagram filters. You’re not obligated to jog into your golden years like some Lululemon-clad gazelle. You’re allowed—not entitled—to go down like a majestic, wheezing freight train full of orthopedic pillows and expired vitamins.
The world says you should fight the aging process. I say: join it. Befriend it. Offer it a Werther’s Original and a seat on the porch. You’ve earned the right to grunt every time you sit down, to have a favorite spoon, and to loudly declare that “food doesn’t taste like it used to” even if you can’t taste much at all anymore.
Look, we’ve spent decades trying to prove we’re still young. For what? So a 23-year-old life coach can sell us a vision board and call it “healing energy”? No, thank you. I’ll take my lower back pain, my thinning hair, and my cholesterol meds like a man—with a side of sarcasm and a remote I can never find.
So forget aging like a fine wine. Be a bad wine. A boxed wine. A screw-top bottle someone left open on the counter during a thunderstorm in 1997. Let your bitterness breathe. Let your notes of oak and apathy shine.
You want to wear socks with sandals? Do it. You want to complain about gas prices even though you don’t drive? That’s your birthright now. You want to ignore your phone after 7pm because you physically can’t see the screen? Welcome to the club, baby.
This ain’t decline. It’s evolution. And if the best part of your day is when you finally get your pants off and locate the one chair that doesn’t hurt your back—congratulations, you’re doing it right.
Let the young folks have their six-packs and their spin classes. You’ve got fiber supplements and a weather knee. You don’t need to age gracefully. Just age loudly — Uncle Bobby