“Sixty! Wow!” the new 7th graders say as I introduce myself, feeling like Yeats’ ‘sixty-year-old smiling man … a comfortable kind of old scarecrow.’
“But you look so young ... At least you’ve still got hair ... You don’t look it ... Sixty’s not old …” are their mollifying comments.
They comfort me not.
Indeed, I am a relic in a world no longer mine.
For I have seen generations pass, and many of my own are now dead, dropping off inexorably.
Above the classroom din, I hear their voices, much louder – yet unheard by these youthful souls – calling, calling.
“But you look so young ... At least you’ve still got hair ... You don’t look it ... Sixty’s not old …” are their mollifying comments.
They comfort me not.
Indeed, I am a relic in a world no longer mine.
For I have seen generations pass, and many of my own are now dead, dropping off inexorably.
Above the classroom din, I hear their voices, much louder – yet unheard by these youthful souls – calling, calling.
