A belated musing about old age and perhaps even death

I attended last night’s PR Week Power Book launch at the Rafayel Hotel in Battersea. The usual suspects were in attendance and we all talked merrily about matters of absolutely no consequence or substance. Looking around the room, however, I was struck by how few people I knew. Perhaps my old contemporaries have retired or (rather more worryingly) departed this world …

Isn’t it curious that when you hear that a friend or former colleague has died at the age of seventy eight or so you feel a sense of surprise as well as sadness? For some reason we always seem to forget that if you have known somebody for thirty years and they were in their early forties then, as you have grown older so probably have they. Our memory of people tends to be from the first day when we met them. Now that I am sprinting through middle age it won’t be long before funerals, cremations and memorial services become a core part of my social calendar.

I am enjoying (thus far) my autumnal years. One of the reasons is that I have discovered the joys of Twitter and Facebook. A whole new world has been opened up for me. I am like a child with a brand new toy. I have a whole new network of friends and colleagues. What is so bizarre about Twitter is that the discipline of only 140 characters is transformational. Every word is precious. I had to smile when I read a Tweet yesterday which said that if Gustav Mahler had invented Twitter it would have been 1400 rather than 140 characters!

There is no reason why during the years that I have left that I shouldn’t mature like a good wine. Some of the greatest works of art and music have been created and composed by men in their autumnal years. My role model here is of course Richard Strauss. Right at the end of his very long life Strauss composed the sublime Four Last Songs.

My favourite is Im Abendrot (At Sunset). The final lines of are astonishing:

“O vast, tranquil peace

so deep at sunset!


How weary we are of wandering---


Is this perhaps death?”

In this industry I am no longer a young buck transforming the world. There are a few more grey hairs and I have relaxed my daily routine of exercise, swimming and running. For all of that there is still scope to confront aging (and eventually death) with a smile. There is a wonderful scene in The Mikado between Ko-Ko (The Lord High Executioner) and Katisha (The Mikado’s Daughter-in-Law Elect):

Ko-Ko

There is beauty in extreme old age —
Do you fancy you are elderly enough?
Information I'm requesting
On a subject interesting:
Is a maiden all the better when she's tough?

Katisha

Throughout this wide dominion
It's the general opinion
That she'll last a good deal longer when she's tough.

There was a few Katishas at last night’s event …

So perhaps I should enjoy the fact that I am now an elder statesman rather than an aspirant contender. All I have to do is to listen to Jessye Norman (conducted by Kurt Masur) sing ‘Im Abendrot’ and everything is fine.

Is growing old a problem? Do a few grey hairs bestow additional gravitas? Is death really such a problem?