TACTICAL AGING: WHAT TO LEAVE OUT

Tactical aging comes with a certain age.

Some call it the ‘whispering’ age.

Others stick with ‘a certain age.’

Both mean the same thing:

Compared to your high school pictures you’re old.

College pictures? Same thing, you’re old.

How old? “A certain age.”

How old? “Pssst, I’m this old . . . “

Tactical aging:

“How old are you?”

The wrong answer:

“Old enough to fuck you up and leave you in the dirt you snotty little shit.”

Leave that out.

The right answer:

“Old enough to buy beer and drive a car.”

Ask yourself why anyone needs to ask your age.

Unless you’re seventy and still look twenty-five, they can figure it out on their own.

Besides, who else besides Dolly Parton looks twenty-five at 70+?

Male Tactical Aging

This is Marlon Brando young and old.

The top pic is Robert DeNiro in Raging Bull.

During this intentional break, Robert De Niro headed to Northern Italy. Here he learned LaMotta’s accent, but also went on a binge. De Niro went from 145 pounds to a reported 215 pounds to replicate the weight of the retired boxer. When filming resumed, the actor unnerved the director, as he developed breathing difficulties due to the weight gain.

Marlon gained weight, then more weight.

It wasn’t for a movie.

Late in life, the actor was plagued by heath concerns including congestive heart failure, obesity, diabetes and an enlarged liver. 

Marlon Brando was admitted to a Los Angeles hospital with a rare respiratory disease in 2004 and died at the age of 80.

For tactical aging, avoid breathing problems related to weight gain.

I like the sound of it.

If you have respiratory problems get it checked out.

And stop eating non-stop.

That last part was for me. I love to cook and eat what I cook.

Elvis Was Huge, Then He Got Big

How often do we say, “Just one more.”

One more beer.

One more ice-cream cone.

An extra helping of everything? Yes please.

I gained, lost, and gained weight.

One time I wanted to see 199 lbs on the scale before I died.

And I made it.

All it took was chemo and radiation for cancer treatment, but I made weight.

Keep A Constant Weight With Age

If anyone tells me I’m looking fit I say I’m the same weight as I’ve always been.

“It’s the same room. I just rearranged the furniture.”

I heard it in my 50’s. I’d been lifting at the gym.

Mac from Always Sunny did a DeNiro-transformation from normal to fat, to jacked, then back to normal.

He said anyone could do it.

To gain the weight, you ate five 1,000-calorie meals a day. What were they?

ROB MCELHENNEY: As I started off I was doing it with chicken breast and rice and vegetables. But when you’re four months in it and you have to muscle down 1,000 calories for the third time or fourth time in a day and you have to either eat three chicken breasts, two cups of rice and two cups of vegetables — or one Big Mac — you start to see the Big Mac and realize it’s a lot easier to get down … And then every once in a while I would eat three donuts. And every day one of my meals was a high-calorie protein shake.

Late Sixties’ Sleek

Part of tactical aging is to look attractive.

But attractive to who?

This is Robert Kennedy, Jr after a light bench and push-ups in what looked like a prison yard.

Is he going after the prison vote? The youth vote?

Good luck. Without the name you’re another weirdo getting weird.

Fortunately we have current information based on science.

You can be big, or ripped. But big and ripped?

That takes a special vitamin, the one that gets athletes suspended from their sport.

Besides, if I want to see an old guy in shape I like the one with a big beard and a man-bun.

At least we know that guy is on the up and up, or we don’t care.

Another Route For Tactical Aging

Show business people take tactical aging as part of the job.

No one takes meth as part of any job, but it turns into work for addicts.

And the aging is spooky looking.

Is it better to just pork out and let it ride, or panic and take drugs?

John Goodman says it best with:

“In the old days, I would take three months out, lose 60 or 70 pounds, and then reward myself with a six-pack or whatever and just go back to my old habits,” Goodman said in 2017. “This time, I wanted to do it slowly. Move, exercise. I’m getting to the age where I can’t afford to sit still anymore.”

If sitting still and gorging yourself doesn’t sound like the right plan for tactical aging, listen to Johnny.

Put your best foot forward, then put you other foot in front of it and repeat.

Ready. Set. Go.