Getting Better with Age
Sometimes people do get better with age while others getting older ain’t much fun. Look at Melville whose Moby Dick was published when he was 32 and that was about it. Or on the flip side, look at Clint Eastwood who has directed several masterpieces after the age of 60. Timothy Eagan, a political writer, has a piece in today’s NY Time that looks at people who blossom when they age like the Philadelphia Phillies pitcher Jamie Moyer who this week became the oldest pitcher to EVER beat the NY Yankees.
But then there is Jamie Moyer, the slow-throwing tosser for the Philadelphia Phillies who at 47 this year became the oldest pitcher ever to beat the Yankees. Almost 20 years ago, Moyer was told he was through — to get out of baseball. That was followed by 10 productive years in Seattle, where I watched the ageless Moyer befuddle the steroid-bulked behemoths of the performance-enhancing-drug age.
His advantages were experience, deception, guile — skills that usually come with added years on the odometer. He could be the athletic prototype for the kind of late-season bloomer that Malcolm Gladwell described in a New Yorker piece on great second acts. For endeavors that require knowledge of craft, and constant experimenting to get it right, age may actually be a benefit, Gladwell said.
It’s nice to see in our country where the pop culture is obsessed with being young that there are many who do something new, something great when they age.
Tags: Age
Blech. By 2030, 71 million Americans will be over 65 years old. Twice the number of old people scootering around today. And I’m already sick of “Golly, aren’t old people great!” stories.
I, for one, plan to resist the arbiters of culture and their attempts to make old people seem cool and happening. I’m no tool of Madison Avenue.
Side note to wRong Williams & Mike Castle – retire already.
Timothy Egan is older than Jamie Moyer. Just sayin’.
And Moby Dick, while today recognized as great, was a total flop at the time. He had built his readership through the South Seas adventure stories “Omoo” and “Typee,” which remained his best-known and best-selling works in his lifetime. “Moby Dick” broke the mold and was followed by a string of first-rate but generally ignored work, including “Pierre, or The Ambigueties,” the masterful story “Bartleby the Scriverner” and “The Confidence Man.”
Seriously, dude, if you think Melville was just “Moby Dick,” you’re missing a lot.
I enjoy the irony of “Geezer” being more put out by a clumsy Melville reference than me attacking his entire tribe of crabby-ass old complainers.
Jason, I think someone who calls himself “Geezer” has a sense of humor about age.
I had to stick up for Melville because he’s even older than me. And I felt compelled to correct the spelling of Egan’s last name (I met him once — smart guy and very humble for an author and journalist with a trunkful of awards).
It’s great when the things are as you describe them. But in the majority of cases we can see quite the opposite. Ageing is a depressing thing, turning many of us into vegetables.
I know you’re not suppose to admit hating Moby Dick, but for the life of me I just could not finish that book! True I was in high school when it was assigned, and maybe I could try again, but it is the only classic I ever found impossible to read. I have loved every classic, but I was able to read them without falling asleep, or contemplating giving up on academics! I have a feeling it will be one classic where reading the Cliff Notes will be as close as I ever come to reading the book. Even the Cliff Notes were painful!
dorks. 🙂 you managed to latch on the the moby dick reference rather than agree with how awesome Jamie is. I hope he gets his 300th win as a 50 year old.