Thirty three, he said, its not such a bad age, got a nice sort of rhythm to it, still young enough to swing on a playground swing.
So every year when this day rolls around I ask the patient readers of From The Morgue to give me a small gift – to comment with a quote of some kind.
Last year put it nicely:
It can be a quote from a song or a poem or a movie or a conversation or an advertising brochure or a blog or a speech or a legal opinion or a sports commentary or a magazine article or a comic book or a novel or a motivational poster or the website you have open on the other browser tab.
Give me a quote that means something to you, or a quote that means nothing to you, or a quote that couldn’t mean anything to anybody even if they tried.
Every year, this collection of random bits of the world makes me happy, and I like to be happy on my birthday. C’mon and indulge me.
This is the sixth year I’ve done this! Previous Birthday Wisdoms: 2008, 2007, 2006, 2005, 2004
Also, best wishes to my newest birthday buddy: Arthur son of Chuckles, one year old today!
“No Mummy, Anakin and Darth Vader can’t be the same person because Anakin has a blue goodie light saber and Darth Vader has a red baddie one.”
“Little Rabbit Foo Foo,
Riding through the Forrest,
Scooping up the Goblins,
And bopping them on the Head!
Down came the good Fairy and said,
‘Little Rabbit Foo Foo,
I don’t like your attitude,
Scooping up those Goblins and,
Bopping them on the Head.
You’ve got NO chances to change,
So I’m going to turn you into a
GOONIE!'”
‘Little Rabbit Foo Foo’, by Michael Rosen, which is your birthday buddies equal favorite book (it keeps company with ‘We’re going on a bear hunt’).
So I’m rather late with my birthday quote for you, but better late than never. I’ve been reading a lot of TS Eliot lately, and have now realised that ‘The Love Song of J. Alfred Prufrock’ is probably the best poem ever. So, for you:
And indeed there will be time
To wonder, “Do I dare?” and, “Do I dare?”
Time to turn back and descend the stair,
With a bald spot in the middle of my hair—
(They will say: “How his hair is growing thin!”)
My morning coat, my collar mounting firmly to the chin,
My necktie rich and modest, but asserted by a simple pin—
(They will say: “But how his arms and legs are thin!”)
Do I dare
Disturb the universe?
In a minute there is time
For decisions and revisions which a minute will reverse.
That’s not late, Helen. This is late.
From Priam’s speech to the court in David Malouf’s Ransom:
It is true that the gods made me a king, but they also made me a man, and mortal. Gave me life and all that comes with it. All that is sweet. All that is terrible too, since only what we know we must lose is truly sweet to us. The gods themselves know nothing of this, and in this respect, perhaps, may envy us. But not in the end. Because in the end, what we come to is what time, with every heartbeat and in every moment of our lives, has been slowly working towards: the death we have been carrying in us from the very beginning, from our first breath. Only we humans can know, endowed as we are with mortality, but also with consciousness, what it is to be aware each day of the fading in us of freshness and youth; the falling away, as the muscles grow slack in our arms, the thigh grows hollow and the sight dims, of whatever manly vigour we were once endowed with. Well, all that happens. It is what it means to be a man and mortal, and as men we accept it. Less easy to accept is what follows from it.
Happy getting older, friend, and a belated welcome to 33.
J
You late peoples do rock the party.
(Got to go, my thigh is growing a bit hollow.)