It Was a Very Bad Year

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Let me tell you about being an octogenarian.

You can’t do the things you used to do, at the ripe old age of eighty. You can’t eat the things you like, because now it’s all bad for you. And what you can eat that is good for you is either grey or green.

The other thing is, you read the newspaper. Specifically, the obituaries. It’s always a good news/bad news thing. Good when your own name isn’t there, bad seeing all the familiar names.

One name that caught my attention was Floyd Patterson. At twenty-one, Patterson was the youngest heavyweight title holder in history. At seventy-one, he had succumbed to Alzheimer’s disease and prostate cancer.

‘What’s the matter? You look like you just lost your last friend.’

I looked up at Mark Hancock. Mark held in The Venetian Resort Hotel and Casino the job I once held in the Sands. The Venetian now stood where the Sands had existed until its implosion in 1996. That was one of the reasons I liked to take my breakfast there. It wasn’t the same place, but it was in the same place. If you get my meaning. I can’t explain it, but it was a comfort to me.

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