The old coot is an early shopper. Article # 1127 Published in NY Papers on 04/23/25

 The Old Coot is ready for Christmas.

By Merlin Lessler

It’s a little early for Christmas, for most people, but not for old coots. If we can get our “better half” to get on board. I like that “better half,” but out of date term. It covers all forms of relationships between two people. It used to only be used by men who had been scolded for referring to their wives as, “My old lady.” Smart ones switched to “better half.”

Anyhow, if the two of you can agree, now is the time to start shopping for Christmas. With an old coot twist. You buy your own present, not your mates. Just think of the pressure that would eliminate. You don’t have to fry your brain to come up with something thoughtful and appreciated. Something that most old coots fail to accomplish. We often put it off until December 24^th. Talk about pressure.

Buy yourself a nice gift, something you can wear or a tool you always wanted. Buy it; wrap it; stick it in the back of your closet; do this by Labor Day. By the time December 25^th rolls around, you will have forgotten what’s in the box. You won’t have to fake surprise and delight when you open it. It takes all the agony out of the holidays, and for once, your “old lady” will get something nice, and you won’t get tickets to the opera.

Comments? Send to mlessler7@gmail.com    

The Old Coot is from the green generation. (Published April 16, 2025 in NY Papers)

The Old Coot is “green” with envy.

By Merlin Lessler

I pulled a loaf of bread out of the cupboard the other day. It had been there for the better part of the week, so I checked it for that greenish, bluish sign of mold. None! It wasn’t like this growing up. Bread would start turning green after a day or so. I know.  I was my family’s “bread man.” Every other day, my mother handed me a cloth sack with a draw string closure and said, “Go over to Bill Scales grocery store on Pennsylvania Ave and get a loaf of Spaulding bread. Off I would go on my bicycle, with a dime and a penny in the bag, swinging from my handlebars. The dime was for bread; the penny for a piece of Fleer, Double-Bubble Gum. I liked it better than Bazooka Bubble Gum because it came with a tiny comic strip inside the wrapper. I would stop at the top of Moore Ave on the way home to pull a slice out of the middle of the loaf, hoping my mother wouldn’t notice. It was so good when it was fresh. I couldn’t stop myself.  I still do that to this day when I buy bread from a bakery. I can never wait till I get home. Same thing when I pick up a pizza. It’s never perfectly round when it gets to our kitchen. 

 There aren’t many neighborhood bakeries around anymore. They’ve disappeared, just like the neighborhood grocery stores and neighborhood schools. Life was on a smaller scale back then. We walked to Longfellow Elementary School every day. Walked back home for lunch, and back to school again. We got as much education on the sidewalks along the route as we did in the classroom. Even when we graduated and moved up to junior high, we still walked to Longfellow, to catch one of the two buses to the junior high on the other side of town.

But, oh those “good old days.” Back in the 1940’s and 50’s. I started walking to school with my friend Woody when we were five years old. Our parents weren’t involved, except to say good bye and be careful, on our way out the door. Quite a different world! But, back to the bread. Today’s bread, made in factories, that doesn’t turn green. Mothers don’t have to cut moldy crusts off before making their children peanut butter & jelly sandwiches. The aging process in bread is virtually eliminated, by preservatives. I just wish those preservatives did the same thing for me when I consumed the loaf.?

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

Why is the Old Coot stressed? Published in New York and Pennsylvania on April 9, 2025

 The Old Coot is stressed out for no reason.

By Merlin Lessler

 Us old coots are a creative bunch. We’ve gone through our childhood into adulthood and on to old coothood (which is similar to our childhood years) – Retired - on Social Security - Medicare and a pension (if we’re lucky). Our kids are grown, grandkids too. Life is simple, not a care in the world. Stress free!

 Or, should I say- seemingly stress free. In truth, we’re more stressed than anytime in our lives. We create it. Doctor’s appointment today! Will we get there on time? Will we run into a traffic jam? Will we find a parking spot? Will there be a line at the check in counter? A seat in the waiting room? All that, before we even get to the day of the appointment.

 But, we do get there. Miraculously! Half an hour early. Then we wait. What seems like an hour, looking around the room knowing every person there is ahead of us. Finally, we get escorted to the “little room.” An aide quizzes us, a bunch of, how are you doing and why are you here questions and then grabs your arm and squeezes it in what feels like a vice to get your blood pressure. Which is always high at that moment, at least for me. How could it not be, with all the stress of getting there? You explain it’s not high when we check it at home. They turn away, roll their eyes, and tell you they’ll take it again so they can let you go home. MORE STRESS!

 Now comes the hard part, waiting for the doctor. Or, more commonly today, a physician’s assistant or a nurse practitioner. How long will I wait? Will I remember all the things I wanted to ask? We have written them down, but when we pull the note out of our pocket, it’s the grocery list. The list for the doctor is back home, sitting on the kitchen table.

 So, all that stress to handle a simple task and it bore no fruit. We flunked! We have the exam and remember one or two things we wanted to ask, but know that when we get home, our wife is going to ask what the doctor said about X, Y, and Z. More stress. We say the heck with it, and go to McDonalds and wolf down a Big Mac, fries and a milkshake. No stress now. Cholesterol crowding the “high” line? So what!  We just don’t give a damn.      

 

 

The Old Coot has the side effects, not the benefit. Published in NY State (04/02/2025)

 The Old Coot has the side effects.

By Merlin Lessler

 If you watch regular TV, or even streaming TV, you can’t escape a barrage of ads for prescription drugs. I used to think of drug dealers as guys in back alleys, wearing top coats, selling heroin. Now, it’s pharmaceutical companies on TV pushing legal drugs; some are worse for you than the illegal ones. A lot of the supplements can have adverse effects too, or be of little value, but they aren’t required by the FDA to warn of the side effects.

 My main problem with these ads, as an old coot, is with prescription drugs. I watch the ad promo, but I also listen to the list of possible side effects. It’s hard because they are accompanied by wonderful, but distracting imagery. I may not even take the medicine, but I still experience many of the side effects. I get all the bad and none of the good. If old age had been advertised when I was young, with the possible side effects, I would have been better prepared.

 It should have been a subject in high school, along with the side effects of credit card use and other real life skills. Kids can parrot the state capitals, but can they explain how compound interest can compromise their life style? Or, that they will have to pay a plumber $100 to clean the screen in a faucet that they could do in two minutes themselves.

 I started writing this article to complain that I have some of the side effects of medicines I don’t even take; I ended up complaining about the lack of practical life skills in our school classrooms. I never know where this pen will take me when I sit down to write an article. It’s something Miss Foley, my high school English teacher never taught me, but apparently taught Rod Serling, creator of the Twilight Zone, who was her student too, eighteen years before I sat in the back of her classroom. If she had, or if I had paid attention, you wouldn’t have to suffer when my article wanders all over the place. Or maybe, it’s just an old coot thing. And no, I’m not comparing myself to Rod Serling, just the opposite.