Taking the rockier road into the sunset

DEAR bald men. If you wonder where your missing hairs went, they’re on my chin.

They have been for a while, but as I become eligible to register for the vaccine, much consideration has been given to body age versus year age.

Sixty is not old anymore; it’s the new 40, “they” say.

Bah humbug.

It may be for some, but there are some for whom it seems like 80.

When the idea of body age first started becoming a “thing”, this cynic pooh-poohed it as a marketing tool for health products. Much of that scepticism remains and was reinforced when the subject was Googled for couch scientific research.

There is A LOT of stuff people want you to buy, so you can get your body age to be the same as your year age. Obviously, for those sellers, people’s body age is always eons over the year age because otherwise you wouldn’t need to lose weight, get a six-pack, eat their health foods or do their exercise.

Sometimes, however, having a geriatric body age is down to other health issues, and I say this with the disclaimer that I am not a doctor and this is my ageing opinion only. It is not backed by any Google search because all that is about product marketing. But us oldies can be quite smart, having been around a couple of blocks.

People who have chronic diseases, like diabetes, or in my case Addison’s disease, are told that with the correct regimes/drugs, they can live a normal life. Off they trot from the doc’s, armed with medicine and new diet plans, into the sunset which they have been told will be the usual distance away.

Of course, they are better off than people who get deadly diseases which leave them little time to care about or compare the two ages. Just helpless fury for them and their loved ones.

But the “reassurance” chronic patients get, in my experience, deals with the situation as it is “now”, in the doctor’s rooms. They do not advise you of that wonderful saying: getting old is not for sissies. You will get to the sunset, but the journey is a lot rockier, on roads of long-term medicine use that demand, and take, a toll on bodies.

But year age is remarkably liberating. If you are willing to be labelled a batty old person, you can wear what you want, plaster make-up on your face or wear none at all and say many things you would have been too embarrassed to say in your youth.

You may have learnt that all those things that kept you up and worrying at night don’t matter at all and your tolerance for BS is gone.

What you do worry about is living too long for your pension, or how you will afford all the drugs you need to keep you on the rocky road. Food, except for the dogs, not so much.

Knowing you have lived longer in the past than you will in the future is kind of a blessing. It resets your priorities.

Having learned to love solitude, the six-oh day will come and go with no big party or celebration.

Not by the hair on my chinnychin-chin.

HMMM! What story do I want to tell today ? I will obviously find a way to link it with current news and add a poetic twist; that is, after all, the basis of this #Poeticlicence column .

Okay, “Rabbie, we’re live”, or in the newspaper, on a screen, depending on where you are reading this.

I dare not attempt to insult your intelligence. This is under the assumption that you have seen the viral video where NBC Namibia news anchor, Jessica Kaimu, corrected her colleague, Elmarie Kapunda, while they were live on TV. And subsequently how SABC anchors Sakina Kamwendo and Vaylen Kirtley recreated their own spoof of the Namibian NBC News anchors. It was hilarious.

If you have not seen these, this is where you pause. If you are attuned to the scent of a newspaper, you will smell a combination of guaiacwood, cedar, musk and spice, with a velvet nuance, meant to mimic the aroma of black ink – or hear the rustle of newspaper pages, brushing together in the tips of your fingers, and palms of yours hands as you unfold them. This then is where you pick up your phone and Google #jessicawearelive.

But if you are already reading this on

IOL, simply open another tab.

I will make this line bold so you know where you left off.

Now that we are all up to date on the issue…

Welcome back to those who went to search. To those who stayed, thank you for reading on to those who stayed.

Many professionals live in and out of Zoom meetings, webinars, podcasts and so forth.

Our idea of “going live” or “we are live” is evolving. Why wouldnt it?

Who are we if not descendants of an Archangel carrying a lily, for beauty. A trumpet, for music. A shining lantern, for light. Let there be light!

A branch from Paradise, to remain grounded. A scroll, for knowledge – the receiving and passing down of it. And a sceptre, to blaze trails, or part seas if need be. But definitely to blaze trails.

The line between “we are live” and living life is getting blurry. Why wouldnt it?

Who are we if not guinea pigs of evolution?

When time takes us to a river, it doesn't have to make us drink. We are inherently thirsty, or curious. You know the semantic relation between cats and curiosity; how do we not die nine deaths for water?

Yes, water is life. But it can drown you.

Like how Jessica filled Elmarie’s lungs with water live on TV. Like how she could have spoken to her off air.

Perhaps it is not fair to crucify

Jessica. There exists an earlier video of her being referred to as “Janet” by another co-anchor at a different time at the same studios. And, in that instance as well, she corrected her co-worker while they were live. She was more polite with her rectification then. She may just have had enough.

But whatever the reason, the workplace is not your mother’s house.

Thank you all for reading this installment of #Poeticlicence. Don’t forget to like, share and subscribe!