How To Feel Old

If you still think you’re thirty years old, spend a week with your grandkids. But, frankly, it’s well worth it.

I’ve attached a couple of photos of two of our grandsons, Luke and Seth, on a quad. Manroop Singh is our friend and the owner of the vehicle. He’s the one bent over working on something and is the same age as Luke. The old guy in the background is me. One thing about being a grandfather is that you can let the teenagers work on their own machines while you oversee things and pretend that you know what they’re doing.

We took a couple of motorcycles and the quad up a dirt road traveling miles into the mountains and returned covered in dust. I looked like a 250 pound dirt clod. I had Seth (the youngest) on the back of my Triumph until he thought his ass fell off, at which point we put him on the quad for a more comfortable ride. Actually his rear end was still attached, but I guess it was numb.

The other photo is at a river just out of town, which was ice cold. Here you see brotherly love in action, with Luke pushing his unsuspecting little brother in the freezing water. My dog Dakota is also shown doing what he does best…looking for something gross to eat. Good photo by Grandma.

Daily hikes in the mountains off-set the kid’s obsessions with computerized games. An authentic Indian-style barbeque with curry and all the great flavors put a cap on the second day. This countered my version of a barbeque, where I offer parts of a cremated dead chicken to reluctant guests and the smoke from my culinary task as an offering to the ancestors of the unfortunate creature.  I think my kids tolerate my barbeque skills out of compassion.