Longing for longevity

My cell phone usually bounces around in my hip-hop shorts pocket whenever I manage to take a late- afternoon constitutional around our village. Clue: our perimeter street that’s a long stretch enjoyed by brisk walkers like me, as well as joggers and cycling toddlers (and where cars are banned) has a proximate view of the Ortigas property development along C-5, where Tiendesitas has been joined by SM Hypermart and a spanking new Starbucks by Julia Vargas Ave.

I take my cell phone along because my four-kilometer, forty-minute walk gives me a chance to reflect on all the missed calls I have to acknowledge.

The route’s become boring, too, as I gain increasing familiarity with all of my co-villagers’ houses and front gardens – which help religiously sweep up their frontages or just flirt with the driver towards sundown, which walls and gates suggest a level of paranoia, which homes are privileged by practicing musicians and/or professional gardeners, which new and exotic flora I can try to filch from or politely ask for a cutting...

Such familiarity breeds cavalier regard if not contempt. And so, in lieu of wearing blinders like a thoroughbred, I concentrate on my cell phone and send messages to all those insistent voice callers, suggesting in brief that such calls should only be made by direct family or in times of emergency, because one never knows when the called party is at a meeting, in a movie theater, onstage receiving or handing out an award, or in bed, asleep or trying to sleep with someone.

And, oh yes, I’m getting deaf: my ears don’t hold up well against the press of a cell phone. Try Joe de V. instead, and ask him why all that desperation chug-chugging the Cha-cha train.

That’s all true. As a senior citizen, I find my auditory abilities increasingly impaired (all those years of listening to rock bands!), so that I often ask my students to holler their personal evaluation of a literary trope, in story or poem, else I just nod unappreciatively at their mumbled recitation. And when I speak through a cell phone, I soon sense that everyone in the building or block becomes privy to what should otherwise be private disclosure.

Last weekend, after several days’ failure to find time for my brisk walk, owing to a procession of meetings, a proliferation of deadlines, and a proclivity to accept social invitations, I finally grabbed an hour of free time towards sundown. And it was back to pounding the streets, finally, which is my only recourse, apart from regular "maintenance," to stave off rising BP.

I was grateful for the exercise. It was the day the "super" typhoon was supposed to hit the NCR, too, but proved a no-show. So my brisk walk turned even brisker in the balmy air and less than swirling breezes.

One of my voice callers acknowledged the efficacy of simple texting, and engaged me in that exercise as I turned quick corners once I got past the back shadow of Starbucks. Good for you, he SMS-ed, that you’re back to exercise, should help you reach 105.

Eww, I replied, sex can’t be too palatable at that age, no, no, I’m just breaking in my new flip-flops.

But it got me thinking, or reflecting, away from my criminal interest in a neighbor’s scarlet-red annatto blooms: Does anyone really want to even turn centenarian? Must we desire longevity beyond the vision-mission statement of completing 10 novels and a dozen collections of poetry, plus some short fiction, essay collections, stories for children, commissioned biographies, books of translation, a Reader and a Festschrift, perhaps? Why, that should all mean a full life, enough already!

Oh, okay, a memoir, too. But not one to cover crossing the century mark. Not on your life.

Aphysician buddy recently e-mailed an article that suggests: "Live to be 100? Let’s do it!" "Living to 100: Centenarians Show Us How" by Jeff Stone cites all the brand-new stats on how American centenarians are becoming a fast-growing group, having "doubled since 1990," and now totaling "16 times the number of centenarians in 1950."

Hmm. Must be all those vitamins. Or watching, in lieu of raucous MTVs, those videoke discs showing summer-skirted women languorously walking past tulip fields to a Burt Bacharach number.

But Mr. Stone writes otherwise, saying that connections with people may be a major reason why centenarians are in such good shape. In fact, they’re "remarkably robust." He cites The New England Centenarian Study (NECS), which has found that:

"One quarter of the 169 study subjects – all of whom were at least 100 – were completely free of any significant cognitive disorders and even surpassed the research interviewers on some mental tests. Fifteen percent still lived independently in their own homes. Medical expenses for centenarians are significantly lower than for those in their 60’s and 70’s. Most are uncommonly healthy until the very end of their lives.

"Conventional wisdom says people inevitably decline into worsening health and senility when they reach their 80’s, 90’s, and beyond. In reality, centenarians, 80 percent of whom are women, are actually more healthy as a group than people 20 years their junior. They have somehow managed to weather the stresses of life and avoid major threats like heart disease, cancer and Alzheimer’s disease."

Stone cites good genes, stress-resistance, and determination as the allies for reaching "this amazing milestone." Characteristics shared by centenarians include the following:

"Good longevity genes; Emotional resilience – ability to adapt to life’s events; Resistance to stress – excellent coping skills; Self-sufficiency; Intellectual activity; Good sense of humor, including about themselves; Religious beliefs; Strong connections with other people; Low blood pressure; Appreciation of simple pleasures and experiences; Women tend to have borne children after age 40; Zest for life; Don’t currently smoke or drink heavily; Many play musical instruments; Some Are Genetically Privileged."

Checking myself against that list, I find that I only fail in four areas; not bad, four out of 15. I smoke and drink heavily beyond TGIF, have not borne kids before or after turning 40, have high BP, and... well, what do religious beliefs have to do with anything, you tell me? Now don’t cite Methuselah; that was fiction!

On the other hand, I had a great grandma who lived to 102, and was still alive when I was born, privileging our clan with a picture (unfortunately now lost) of five generations together, with infant me and my mom, her mom and grandma, and the centenarian. Come to think of it, that I grew up with mostly women around me may have also blessed me with "excellent coping skills."

Never mind that my dad, a smoker and lush, only made it to 62. Simple math would lead to the establishment of a golden mean between my matriarchal and patriarchal birthrights, er, life rights. I may reach 82. Wow. I better start consulting publishers on auctioning off that memoir.

"The average person is born with strong enough longevity genes to live to 85 and maybe longer," a Dr. Perls believes. "People who take appropriate preventive steps may add as many as 10 quality years to that. The vast majority of baby boomers do a terrible job preparing for old age. Many consume high-fat diets, smoke, drink excessively, and don’t exercise. We have great potential to extend our lives, researchers say, if we just take care of ourselves."

Okay, okay. So I couldn’t help being a baby boomer. Okay, so now I’ll take care of myself.

I will not commute in heavy traffic. I will not answer voice calls. I will munch on a lot of grapes as a counter-measure to all that sisig. I will not stress myself by quitting cigarettes and chonx. I will meditate and do tai chi, instead of yoga. I will drink lots of green tea, also banaba brew to fend off that evil prostate C.

I will stay connected with other people; boy, and how. I will drink red wine, better yet, single malt whisky, so it pumps up my heart valves. I will continue to take coffee and eggs, as doctors have reversed themselves on anti-oxidants and bad cholesterol. I will jack off. I will be optimistic about our (change of?) government. I will stay away from terrorists and coup plotters.

I will do crossword puzzles. I will ingest extraordinary amounts of garlic and rich, red tomatoes for their lycopene. I will continue gardening. I will give vent to my rage by sounding off at all busybody security guards, uncivil jeepney drivers, and time-and-paper-wasting bureaucrats. I will allow my tics to prosper so that my level of stress enjoys many escape routes. I will continue to hum Beatles tunes and A Whiter Shade of Pale. I will love and help my family and friends; the rest of the planet can come later.

Above all, I will continue to cultivate good humor. In fact, a possibly apocryphal Chinese secret to achieve long life, I have heard, is to head for the bathroom mirror upon waking, and stare thence laugh at one’s mug. I do that daily, at no additional provocation.

In fact (part two), I’ve added a little fillip: knowing that we’re hardly ever correct with our pronounced prophecies, I tell myself: "This is the last day of your life!" And then I laugh some more. And I feel so insane it really wouldn’t matter if, on that day, or any other, I turn out to have the tongue of an angel.