One thing I love this week: The old man on the corner
Happy Monday Fatties! (Trying to brand my fanbase).
We are back for another work week, which means another installment of “One thing I love this week” or OTILTW for short. Shirts coming soon. Not really.
As always, I’ll remind you that the point of this weekly blog is to help you start your week on a positive note by reflecting on some of the little (or big) things you’re grateful for in life.
This week’s one thing I love is:
The old man on the corner
This is specific in my case, but it’s also a fairly common thing depending on where you live.
For me, I live in the North End of Boston, which is extremely Italian, and about a 50/50 mix of young professionals new to the area, and super old school traditional Italians who have been here since the molasses flood.
Obviously, the man I’m speaking of falls into the latter category.
If I’m up early enough (aka before 9AM) and take my morning walk, there is, without fail, the same elderly man sitting on the corner of my block with a walker in front of him, just peacefully people watching.
Sometimes he’s got a paper. When it’s sunny out, he wears these thick-framed, orange-tinted 70’s glasses. Invariably, his hair and clothing are immaculate.
I don’t know his name and he doesn’t know mine, but every day I walk past him and say “Good morning sir,” and he responds by pointing at me and saying “You have a good day!”
That’s it. Occasionally, he’ll ask me what time the Patriots are playing if I’m wearing the jersey.
And one time when I was on my way to workout (I workout nbd) he said, “WOW, look at the size of you! Be careful.” That singular statement has maintained my ego for the last 6 months.
I don’t have a picture of the man because:
That would be incredibly sus
He definitely doesn’t know what a blog is and would be disappointed in the state of the world to learn that blogging is a profession
But I’m sure you can picture what I’m talking about. Hell, if you live in a neighborhood in a prominent city, odds are you know exactly what I’m talking about.
Elderly people are often up earlier because they’re not violently hungover for some reason and it’s likely force of habit from their working days. I also read a quote somewhere from an older person once that was something like,
“You appreciate the mornings as you get older because you don’t know how many more of them you have left.”
Absolute morbid bummer of a statement, but a true and important reminder. Really puts things into perspective.
Anyways, back to the man on the corner.
It’s weird, but this brief interaction really boosts my mood every time it occurs. Part of it is because I have immense respect for our elders. I’m blessed with wonderful, doting grandparents who care about their family more than anything on Earth.
Plus, this is the generation that volunteered to go halfway across the world to fight in a World War.
Can you imagine if they had a draft now and our dumb asses had to fight in it? We’d be the worst army of all time. We’d lose half the soldiers because they’d stand up in the trenches just to get a clear picture of the enemy machine gun fire in their BeReal.
But I also think I just appreciate this man’s enjoyment of the present moment. He’s just loving his morning and his life for what it is right then.
That’s something we can all learn from.
