The Old Man and the Vitamin C

You’ve heard me say (or perhaps, more correctly, read as I wrote) this before – I’m old. Which I attempted to illustrate in this post.

You may have also read my description of myself as an Ordinary Man.

Old and ordinary – not exactly what I had in mind for myself. Yet, nonetheless, that’s where I seem to be.

I got my haircut this past Saturday – nothing significant about that. I try to remember to do it once a month or so. I go to the local chain discount hair place. No fancy-schmanzy salon for me. My cut is so ‘ordinary’ I could probably to it myself.

The woman cutting my hair was using the electric clippers, and I happened to notice the preponderance of gray hair that was falling into my lap. The gray was mixed in with the dirty blond/light brown hair that I thought I still had. The percentage of gray seems to be increasing with each haircut. Some guys have 'salt and pepper' hair - it makes them look 'distinguished.' I guess I'm getting 'salt and sand.'

Yuck.

The ‘stylist,’ as she likes to be called, noticed me noticing the hair in my lap and suggested a hair coloring treatment. “Many of my older customers are finding this to be very effective,” she said. Noticing my scowl, she quickly added, “…not that you’re old, of course, but it will help you keep your youthful appearance!”

Nice try, lady. See what kind of a tip you get!

Of course I didn’t stiff the stylist, but I left in a rather dark mood.

The next day, Sunday, I sat at the breakfast table with Chris and Tommy, glumly staring at the pile of vitamins I consume each morning. The pile seems enormous, both in the quantity of pills and the size of some of them. Vitamin B, Vitamin C, Vitamin K, some fish oil pill, a large multi-vitamin, and various others. In particular, the orange Vitamin C tablet that is only slightly smaller than a tennis ball stands out amongst the others. They are almost a meal in themselves – something Chris happened to notice as well.

“Dad, why do you eat vitamins for breakfast?” he asked.

“So I can stay healthy,” I replied.

He pointed to his purple Flintstones vitamin. “I just have one vitamin,” he said, “and you have a whole pile of them! You have as many vitamins as I have cereal!”

Looking at his bowl of Cheerios, it did seem like the quantity of my pile of vitamins was equal to the small amount of cereal we can get them to eat each morning.

So Tommy joined in, and they both had a high time teasing me about eating vitamins for breakfast.

I go into work Monday morning, feeling old, gray, and grumpy from eating vitamins for breakfast. Washed down with V-8. Reporting to a boss who is younger than I am.

I got to wondering what happened to the 20-something year old TV news cameraman who could roll out of bed after four hours of sleep, get by on donuts and Diet Coke, go hard all day and still have something left in the tank to party into the night. The guy who would drive all night to go to a jeep rally, sleep for two hours sitting up in the drivers seat, crawl over rocks all day and drive home again, fueled by pop-tarts and Powerbars. The guy with the blond hair, blue eyes and broad shoulders who broke hearts all over the West.

Okay, that last sentence is a bit much. But the older I get, the better I remember myself being as a young man.

MBW and I married later in life than many of our peers. That’s both good and bad. It’s good in that we’re both more mature and more realistic when it comes to our expectations – of each other, of our kids, of our lives. It’s better because we’re more financially stable, more grounded in our careers and more certain of our long-tem goals. Chris and Tommy are growing up in a secure and stable environment, and I think that is helping them grow up with a sense of confidence.

It’s bad in that we don’t always have the energy to do all that we feel we should with the boys. And, occasionally, we’ve each had moments where we’re a bit short of patience.

Maybe that happens to all parents.

Personally, I’m finding that there are days when I don’t want to climb out of my car after a long day in my cubicle and play whatever game Chris and Tommy want to play the instant I walk in the door. Of course they’ve been waiting anxiously for me to get home and they want my attention. Sometimes it’s hard to deliver.

So I’m trying to stay on top of it. You’ve read my occasional posts about my workouts. I’m trying to keep in decent shape. I’m trying to eat a healthier diet, but deep down inside I’m a donuts and Diet Coke guy trying to gag down oatmeal and blueberry yogurt every day. Someday archeologists will make an astounding discovery – I did have six-pack abs! This discovery will be made after carefully excavating through the layer of chocolate chip cookies to find them.

Which brings me back to the vitamins. I do take a handful each morning. I don’t know, honestly, if they help. Maybe it’s all a placebo. But at least I feel like I’m doing something. I consider the stakes to be high. When it’s all said and done I want my kids to remember their dad as an active participant, not some guy who sat on the couch. I want the stories to be about what we did together, not what they did and told me about.

Last I crawled into bed after my post-workout shower. I took my vitamins that morning, gagged down my oatmeal and V-8, had my lean turkey sandwich on some kind of oat bread for lunch (no trans-fat!), and limited my snack to less than a hundred chocolate chip cookies. Played some combination football-frisbee-swingset game with the boys after work (the rules of which I still don’t understand), helped give them a bath, read them their nightly books, tucked them into bed and went to the gym. Not the toughest guy there, but did my full routine. Finally, the day over, pulled up the covers and sighed a great big sigh.

Just then I feel MBW snuggle up to me.

“How was your workout?” she asks.

“It was okay,” I reply.

She nuzzles my neck. “You smell nice,” she says.

“That’s what a shower will do for you,” I answer.

Her hand finds my bicep. “You’ve got hard muscles…for an old guy,” she says.

“Well, I do what I can,” I say.

Her hand moves. “This muscle is hard, too.”

Hmm?

“Are you up for another workout?” she whispers

It appears that I am, in fact, up for another workout.

Yes, I may take all kinds of vitamins. A, B, C, K, you name it. I take it.

But so far, luckily, I have no need to take Vitamin V!

It’s great to be The Family Man!