The Old Coot is out of date, yet again. Published 09/24/2025

 The Old Coot bends and stretches.

By Merlin Lessler

Here we go again, being offered yet another way to eliminate a simple chore. FINDING A KID’S SNEAKER! When a kid said, “Where’s my sneakers,” their mom or dad responded, “Go look for them yourself!” (Unspoken, but on the parent’s mind, “That’s your problem. I’ve got my own, trying to figure out how to help you make a miniature volcano for show and tell.)  That may be a slight exaggeration, and I’m sure a large swath of the population disagrees with my perspective. But, why else would a major footwear company like Sketchers think that a lot of parents want to be relieved of the challenge of finding misplaced sneakers?  They already proved that people don’t want to be bothered with a simple chore like tying the laces in their sneakers. The enormous sales success of their “Slip- ins” verified that assumption.

But this new product, a sneaker for kids with a hidden compartment, where a parent can insert an air tag chip to solve the problem when a kid says, “Mom, Where’s my sneakers.” At least, that’s how they are promoting the product. A quick glance at an app on a cell phone locates the sneakers. What the heck, another task is now eliminated from the modern-day world. I guess the lost sneaker issue takes too much effort: looking, thinking, bending and moving stuff around.

We’ve eliminated many common day chores. We don’t wash our cars, push a lawnmower, rake leaves. We can’t even dry our hands with a towel in many public restrooms; we are forced to use a screaming, high-pitched, ultrasonic blow dryer, a definite threat to hearing. I don’t know about women’s restrooms, but in men’s, most guys give the blower a few seconds, get impatient and bothered by the noise and finish the job by wiping their hands on their jeans. The list of physical stuff we no longer do is endless. Some people replace the exercise that was lost by going to the gym. Or more often, with nothing at all.

I’m not going to put a chip in my sneakers. I’ve opted for all the bending, stretching, looking, thinking and moving things around that I can get. Us old timers need to stick with the credo, “Use it or lose it.” I know I can’t afford to lose any more of it .   

The Old Coot comes up empty. Published September 17, 2025 in NY papers

The Old Coot has nothing.

By Merlin Lessler

I was on the road in my 1983, Sears, Free Spirit, 10 speed bicycle last Sunday afternoon. It was a perfect Autumn Day with the temperature in the 70s paired with a beautiful collection of clouds sweeping across the sky. I was hoping to stumble onto a germ of an idea for this week’s column. And, getting nowhere! I peddled past a swath of houses along the river, with manicured lawns, well-kept gardens and inviting front porches that faced the Susquehanna River.  No people in sight, no walkers, no bikers, no porch sitters. I crossed Main Street into the village park. No Pickleball players, no kids shooting hoops, swinging, coming down the slides, sweeping across the monkey bars or buzzing around in the skateboard park. No People and no ideas for an article.

I kept on peddling, crossing the railroad tracks into what the residents there call, “The Flats.” It’s primarily a residential area with a few commercial entities in one quadrant; it’s separated from the rest of the village by an active set of railroad tracks. I didn’t see any kids as I peddled, no games of tag, hide & seek, no Cowboys & Indians for sure, a childhood obsession in my day, long gone now. I next rode into the school K - 12 campus. The elementary school playground was empty. All that beautiful play equipment sat idle.

I peddled on and on through the complex, but not a soul in sight, not on the tennis courts or on the track around the football field. So, I stopped to “speed” walk, as I call it, on the artificial turf, going from one end zone to the other, dodging imaginary tacklers as I ran kick-offs the length of the field, scoring a touchdown every time. You can do this when there’s no one around. And there wasn’t!

There also wasn’t anyone on the Little League or the high school baseball fields, nor on the soccer practice grounds. No one was playing a pick-up game of baseball. Kids don’t play pick-up games today, for the most part. Everything is organized these days, maybe with a little too much parental involvement. Not like my day, when no one but the players and the coaches showed up for Little League games. How could they; we played in the afternoon when dad was at work and mom was tending to things at home.

But mostly, we played pick-up (sand -lot) games: baseball, football and basketball. Even if there were only two of us, we could devise a World Series game with Mickey Mantle at the plate.

I still had no idea for an article. It felt like I was in a Stephen King novel where I was the only person left in an empty town. I guess I’ll give it another try next weekend. All I can offer is this, my lack of anything interesting to comment on. Nothing going on in town; nothing going on in my head. 

The old coot eliminates a sock problem. Published in NY on Sept. 10, 2025

 The Old Coot skips the socks.

By Merlin Lessler

I'm in the YMCA in Florida, sitting on a bench in the locker room, getting dressed after swimming laps in a 24- lane, outdoor pool. Why am I in Florida? In August? I had to do some mid-summer yard work, to keep bushes from overtaking the house so I came down for a couple of weeks.  It’s exciting to sit and watch the thermometer move toward 100, and then keep going. At least for a guy from the north country. While I was in the YMCA locker room, a guy on the other side of the room was groaning and grunting as he struggled to put on his socks. An old guy, like me. He finally got them on and then swore, “Darn it! I put on my dirty socks, not the clean ones I brought with me,” and started the whole process over again. I hadn't gotten to my socks yet; it can be quite a challenge for an old guy to get a sock started over his toes. But I did just fine; I skipped the socks and put on my sneakers. Socks are overrated.

Then, a younger guy came in; he got dressed standing up, socks, shoes, pants and shirt. I looked over to him, and like the guy in the Progressive Insurance TV commercial who is told to stop talking to strangers and acting like his parents.” I said, “I'm so jealous. I haven't been able to do that for 20 years.” He laughed and said he was 52, and already could tell that his time of getting dressed while standing up was coming to an end.

He’s smarter than I was at that age. I remember getting dressed like that at the Binghamton YMCA when I was in my 50’s. Three old guys sat on a bench nearby working hard to get dressed. One of them broke the ice. “Sonny, enjoy it while you can. Your time to sit on a bench to get dressed is coming.” I never forgot that encounter. Even now, I can clearly picture the three of them sitting on that bench, but the image in my mind, now has me sitting alongside them.

The dressing problems I had back then were to avoid mixing plaids with stripes, not getting into my clothes. Now, beside the sock issue, it’s avoiding going around with a T-shirt, or pants with an elastic waistband on backwards.

Comments? Send to mlessler7@gmail.com

The Old Coot is smiling. Published 08/03/2025 in NY papers

 The Old Coot can smile again.

By Merlin Lessler

I chipped my front tooth the other day. It’s been with me, and intact, since I was seven. I did it when I bit into a plum and smashed into the pit. Unlike little Jack Horner who pulled out a plum, I pulled out a piece of ivory. I’ve broken a molar or two over the years. One on an un-popped, popcorn kernel. Another, in a tug of war with a Sugar Daddy. It yanked out the entire side of the tooth that was held together with a few pins and a filling. It’s since been fitted with a $1,000 cap. The Sugar Daddy is a thing of the past for me.

The chipped front tooth has been fixed, thanks to the skills of my dentist whose name I promised not to mention. But for some reason I never follow through on that promise. It’s Pam Bouton. She’s bailed me out more than once. I’m sure she is astonished at the lengths I go to threaten the existence of those precious ivories. Most likely thinking, “Will he ever learn?” But I know what she’s thinking; I recognize the look. I see it on my wife’s face all the time. It doesn’t matter, I can now continue through life with a smile on my face, framed by an intact set of choppers.    

The trouble with a decent smile, is you are no longer eligible to be a spokesperson for your town after a weather disaster hit: tornado, flood, hurricane, landslide. That sort of thing. You can’t be the guy the TV news reporter looks for to ask your thoughts on the disaster. They seek the goober who has a broken or missing set of choppers. He or she, always scratches their head and says, “I’ve lived here all my life and never saw anything like this. Nope, I no longer qualify, thanks to the skills of Pam Bouton.  

Comments? Send to the paper or to mlessler7@gmail.com       

The Old Coot grew up in an unsafe environment. Published August 27, 2025

 The Old Coot grew up in an unsafe world. Maybe.

By Merlin Lessler

It’s a tough world for parents these days. They try to do the right thing, keep their little ones safe, but they get caught in ever changing “official” advice: face the child forward in a car seat - face the child back - at forty pounds you can use the seat belt - don’t use the seatbelt until he’s eight - use the air bag - turn off the air bag. It never ends. We never seem to do it right. It’s especially hard on grandparents; especially old coot grandparents who are super skeptical of “official” advice. We end up getting scolded by both the media and our grandchildren’s parents. 

It’s not our fault. We grew up in cars that didn’t have seat belts, often sitting in the front seat between mom and dad in a canvas pouch hooked over the seat with a toy steering wheel in front of us, directly in line between our body and the dashboard. I can only imagine how that would have worked out in a crash. I vividly remember sitting in mine, turning the wheel to the left when my father turned his, honking the horn, moving the shift lever back and forth. Don’t ask me how I remember something from so long ago, yet I can’t remember to mail the letters in my pocket when I walk to town.

We were protected back then, even though we didn’t have proper car seats, air bags or seat belts. We had mom’s right arm. The second she slammed on the brakes it shot out and prevented us from hurtling into the dash. It’s hard to imagine that those little, slim, feminine arms were strong enough to hold back a child hurtling forward at 30 miles per hour, but they were. Scientists and public officials say it isn’t possible. They also claim it’s impossible for those same arms to pick up the front end of a car that sits atop a child, but it happens all the time. It’s the mother tiger factor.  

So, what’s a parent to do? Don’t ask me. I’m the guy who drove around with my kids in the back seat (and the compartment behind it) in a VW Beetle, skidding around a shopping plaza parking lot making “donuts” in the fresh fallen snow. I’m the guy who made plaster casts for my daughters to get them to stop jumping out of trees, trying to break their arms so they could wear a cast to school and look “cool.” (It worked by the way; it only took two days for them to beg me to cut them off). No, don’t ask me, or any other old coot what to do about car seats. Or, bike helmets, shin and elbow pads or any other politically correct child safety device. We grew up stupid (and unprotected) and stayed that way.

Comments? Send to – mlessler7@gmail.com

 

The Old Coot is a drain expert. Published August 20 in NY papers

 The Old Coot is a drain expert.

By Merlin Lessler

 I'm a drain expert. No, not the one under the sink, though I can usually fix a clog in that one without calling a plumber. The drains I'm an expert on are the ones along the edge of the road. You have to be a drain expert when you're on a bicycle or you will put yourself in peril; they are as dangerous as an uplifted sidewalk panel that trips up someone taking a stroll. The street drains can trip you too. Not fun, when you are peddling along at 8 MPH, like me, or more, like everyone else.

 I'll pick on my village as an example, although I find it to be true no matter where I ride. When I go down Front Street, I know there are several drains where the pavement surrounding them has deteriorated, causing my front wheel to twist, pushing me into the curb or out into the roadway. The most dangerous drains are several inches below the road surface. It’s almost impossible to avoid toppling over; the wreck will mess you up, your bicycle too. One of the worst ones in town is on Main Street. It’s 4 ½ inches deep. I know; I measured it. There are several like that on Erie Street, alongside the westward lane. Even cars have trouble with them. George Street has a bunch of them too..

 The DOT and other entities responsible for road maintenance have little respect for bicycle riders. They repave the surface and the drains go lower. Over time, they become downright dangerous. It doesn’t have to be that way. They could install a new collar that matches the road surface, but most often they don’t bother. I’m OK in my town, for the most part, because I’m a drain expert. I know when a bad one is coming, and I go around, hoping the driver coming up from behind is paying attention to where they are going and not checking messages on their cell phones. When I’m forced to move onto the edge of “THEIR” lane, they blast their horn and glare at me through their window. Auto drivers aren’t drain experts. But I am.

 Comments? Complaints? Send to – mlessler7@gmail.com

The Old Coot is a hypocrite. Published 08/13/2025 - in Owego, NY

 The Old Coot is a hypocrite

By Merlin Lessler

Medical doctors take the Hippocratic Oath before they begin the practice of medicine. The concept of a code of ethics is generally attributed to Hippocrates, a physician and philosopher in ancient Greece. It includes the principles of non-malefience, fidelity, beneficence, and justice. For me, it boils down to the common phrase we all are familiar with: “Do no harm.” Lawyers take an oath as well; their pledge is legally binding. It varies by state and is quite comprehensive but needs updating to include a pledge to refrain from ambulance chasing and trolling to sell that service on TV, radio, and other media. Life would be so much improved; our insurance rates and the cost of goods would certainly go down.

 The business community isn’t, but should be, held to an ethical standard that also boils down to “do no harm.” Maybe then the pharmaceutical companies wouldn’t spend huge budgets advertising miracle cures for every real and made-up ailment. And businesses in general would stop offering defective manufactured products that don’t live up to the hype. CEO’s should pledge to keep their management teams focused on customers, not short term stock gains, and allow front line employees to bend the rules in situations that defy common sense. 

Oh boy, how about politicians? Pledge to max out after two terms in office. It would be so nice. Where is Hippocrates when you need him? They should also pledge to refrain from enacting new regulations for every minor incident that comes to their attention. And when they enact regulations, they should allow for common sense deviation from the regs, and bend the rules so they “do no harm.” 

Old coots should pledge to refrain from starting sentences with, “Back in the good old days.” WE do take an oath, but nothing like the Hippocratic Oath. Ours, is the “hypocrite” oath.

Comments? Send to – mlessler7@gmail