• Do you often look in the mirror and see your, arrrgh, mother?
• Are you feeling used up, generally achy and just not sexy anymore?
• Do you find yourself saying things like "Ah, the music in the ’60s and ’70s was much better!"?
• Do your membership cards now include Hair Club for Men and Weight Watchers?
• Are all of your friends who you hang out with bald, overweight or wrinkled?
If you said "yes" to one or more of the foregoing questions, you must be in the middle of a severe midlife crisis (which happens when you’re between 45 and death).
Okinawans, who seem to have discovered the proverbial fountain of youth, may have their own longevity secrets (of course, you read Dr. Tyrone Reyes’ article on the opening page), but these survival tips (from the book, yes,Welcome to Your Midlife Crisis by Paul della Valle with illustrations by Lennie Peterson) just may come in handy when you find yourself battling this crisis called midlife.
• For men, grow a ponytail. Even if there’s nothing growing anymore on top of your head.
• Or buy a rug. And we don’t mean a carpet. Of course, some women love follically challenged men (think of Yul Brynner, Telly Savalas and Bruce Willis). But if you think it isn’t for your man, get him a rug (a toupee or a wig, whatever). Today’s toupees are not like yesterday’s rugs – they look so real no one will ever know. And they won’t be laughing at you behind your back – promise!
• Grow weird facial things. They go well with your warts, moles, and the liver spots that will soon start appearing on your face.
• Begin the great coverup. To hide what you call "laugh lines" or "signs of wisdom," use all sorts of concealers, mascaras, eye shadows, eye liners, whatever. But don’t go over half an inch of makeup lest you end up looking like a walking corpse.
• See a shrink. Tell him everything that’s bothering you, your unfulfilled dreams, lost youth, and maybe upcoming death. Then wake him up when you’re time’s up (meaning the consultation) and pay his exorbitant fee.
• Get serious about golf. To fill the time between your long-lost youth and approaching geezerhood, get busy with a time-consuming, frustrating and expensive game like golf. Other than a ponytail on a fortysomething, nothing is quite so pathetic as a herd of fortysomething guys in little plastic raincoats standing in the rain on the sixth tee of a public course at 6:30 a.m. on a Saturday.
• Get an earring. If you think getting an ear (or both ears) pierced will make you look younger and hipper, consider getting two other things instead:
1. Real.
2. A life.
• Change subscriptions. Naturally, you will have to stop subscribing to Cosmopolitan (and stop reading articles like "How to please your man in bed") and start subscribing to Modern Maturity magazine (or some such mags) and reading up on things like "How to cash his millions when your man drops dead."
• Adjust to midlife sex. When you hit the big four 0, your husband may have a bout with impotence. This can be caused by the following:
1. Maybe he has performance anxiety.
2. Maybe he had too many beers with his lunch.
3. Maybe you forgot to shut off the lights before you took your clothes off.
• Change careers. So what if you’re making a fortune as a bank executive or a rocket scientist? Wouldn’t it be more fulfilling to be a singer and dream to be a rock star?
• Become a vegetarian. Many people become vegetarians when they hit midlife. Her reason: She wants to look like the slender young woman working in the health food store where she buys her anti-arthritis supplements. His reason: The slender young woman in the health food store has a great butt.
• Lower your expectations. Yup, so what if you didn’t become president or senior vice president, with a key to the executive washroom? Of course, you’re happy simply being down here with the boys. You’re happy to have any job at your age.
• Stop picking up babies. Your back is going to be far too weak to pick up anything at all, not to mention a screaming 40-pound toddler. Along with that, your memory will weaken, too – you start getting your children’s names mixed up and they stop talking to you.
• Look on the bright side of the change o’ life. Just think of the money you’ll be saving on tampons and birth control pills in the years you have left. Best of all, menopause gives you a great excuse to wear purple and act totally bonkers.
• Appreciate the midlife positives. Relax, your midlife crisis will soon be over. Wear your wrinkled bowling shirt and support hose proudly. Greatest news of all, you and your mate will never have to worry again about the other running off with somebody else. Just look at each other.
Yes, there’s life after midlife!
Here’s a follow-up to last week’s story on the sorry plight of a housewife and professor, who was a victim of a break-in:
How P300,000 of merchandise was allowed to be bought at a supermarket in Mandaluyong City through the Amexco gold card of Dr. Josephine A. Pasricha, professor at the UST Faculty of Arts and Letters and president of Pasricha Travel and Tours, is now being investigated by the Western Police and the NBI.
The office and residence of Dr. Pasricha in Manila was the site of a break-in and theft on the evening of Feb. 7 perhaps up to the morning of Feb. 8. Among other precious things lost were art objects and jewelry, all passports of the Pasricha family, and eight credit cards, which included American Express, AIG, Citibank Mastercard and Visa, Standard Charter, Equitable-PCI Bank, Metrobank, and BPI cards. Even if the credit cards were cancelled on the afternoon of Feb. 8, apparently the thieves were still able to buy P300,000 worth of merchandise as well as withdraw P10,000 from AIG and P10,000 from Metrobank.