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Those are lovely lyrics in the Romberg-Hammerstein song that say: “When I grow too old to dream, “I will have you to remember.” Pretty. But thank God we never get too old to dream. When you pass the marker of seven decades on earth, you definitely realize there is more time behind you than in front. The time has passed so quickly. It seems last year just started and now it’s over. When I was young, I heard my father say, “As you get older, the years get shorter and the days longer.” It didn’t make sense then. It does now. A young person can’t wait for time to pass. It seems an eternity until you’re old enough for a driver’s license, until you can get to stay out late at night, to have your own home. When we’re young we can’t imagine what it would be like to grow old. That prospect is so far in the distant future it is beyond our imagination. If we could only realize when we’re young how precious each passing moment is. Once that moment passes it’s gone and becomes a memory. We can’t bring it back. Sometimes the things that happened years ago are clearer in our minds than what happened yesterday. We remember the wee hours of the morning when that first baby girl was born, how it snowed the day we knew we had a son. There are happy times and sad times stamped on the tablet of our lives, never to be erased by time or care. The milestones of our lives are marked by people. Think back about the first time you met the woman who would become your wife, or the man who would become your husband. Remember the excitement in your mother’s voice when you called your mother to tell her she had a granddaughter. Despite the words of religion and the assurances, we all sometimes wonder in the darkness of night what heaven and hell are like. Who knows? Maybe it could be like our dreams. The pleasant dreams could be our heaven. The nightmares, our hell. But the dreams are ours, as long as our minds are clear. The fear of growing old is Alzheimer’s disease. How horrible it must be to have a sometimes functioning mind trapped in a body it doesn’t recognize anyone or anything, surrounded by faces tainted by memory that isn’t clear. Maybe even in the clouds of an Alzheimer’s mind there are dreams and an occasional memory. Youth will never listen to age. Each must make his or her own mistakes and learn their own lessons of life, which is a hard taskmaster. If someone young would listen for one comment, an older person would advise them to cherish each moment of life, the good and the bad. These moments will one day be their memories, their dreams. When you’re young, you may jump gingerly over a step or fence. As you get older, you are very careful with your movements, knowing that a mistake can bring a broken bone, one that may not heal. The aches and pains of age increase with each year. From the moment of your conception, Mother Nature begins fighting to destroy you. Bacteria, viruses, the elements of heat and cold are the weapons to destroy us, making us fight to become strong enough for life. The fight becomes harder with age, but we fight each minute for another day of life. Someone once asked my father if he didn’t hate to grow old. “As long as I’m growing old,” he said, “I’m still alive.” And as long as we’re alive we have our dreams. No matter how old the body becomes, the dreams are as youthful as ever.
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