Friday, December 10, 2010

The Thirty-One Years On Game with Time. Time 1: Johnny 0

Me, then and now
My student aide, Vicki, informed me that I had to grow a beard this winter. I said... fine. I haven't grown a beard  for about ten years. For a different reference, the last time I grew one, it was blonde.

I informed Vicki of this, and she noted this datum with a certain skepticism.

So, I went home and rummaged through the pictures, and found one of me at the tender age of 22. Yeah, that's me in the top photo.  I showed this to the children at the college, and they all had a good laugh at the hippie. I had to remind them that hippies, real hippies, existed ten years before my own youthful indiscretions, and were, in fact, their fat old grammas and grandpas now.

I'm not fat.
My vanity feels it necessary to point out the older version of me is not fat.

That's all muscle and sinew. Okay, maybe some fat too. Alright, I'm fat - compared to that skinny little guy. But I could take him. Probably.

4 comments:

  1. Hi Ellen,

    The older version thanks you.

    The younger version was unavailable for comment.

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  2. I bet there's a six-pack under that frumpy white shirt...

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  3. Hi Judy,

    You are rigght, there is a six pack under that shirt... and it covers a fat belly, or one that is starting to head there.

    For some reason I'm reminded of a line from the Graenlandinga Saga (the tale of the Norse in America circa 1000AD), when one of the Norsemen is pierced in the belly with a skraeling (Indian) arrow. He pulls it out and notes the gobs of glistening fat on the stone arrowhead. "This land has been good to me" he sighs.

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