More with Less

"Age is only a number, a cipher for the records. A man can’t retire his experience. He must use it. Experience achieves more with less energy and time." -- Bernard Baruch (August 19, 1870–June 20, 1965)

You're Old; Get Used to It and Enjoy

Well, gang, we're crossing the Big Six Oh like the demographic tsunami we are. I didn't realize it but this year is the threshold for the first among us.

From the Bradenton, Florida, Herald:

They're all in the same boat, staring squarely at a number that once meant one thing: You are old. But these are baby boomers hitting 60, and like everything else they have encountered, they are likely to make it their own.

They've got the power. Those born between 1946 and 1964 number 78 million strong in the United States.

That means they are landing on 60 with startling regularity. Every seven seconds, a baby boomer turns 60 - a phenomenon that will continue for the next 18 years.

It will happen to President Bush on July 6, and former President Bill Clinton on Aug. 19. Dolly Parton and Donald Trump joined the crowd this year, too.

Man, that's a crowd to be counted among. We say we're here to stay even as the grim reaper keeps reminding us that we have a use-by date. Enjoy yourself because by now you should know how to do it.

Arthur Lee, Lead Singer of Love, Dead at 61

Arthur Lee, lead singer for the 60s folk-rock/psychedelic band, Love, has died. The Memphis native who called himself "the first Black hippie" succumbed to acute myeloid leukemia at the age of 61.

I really dug his band and remember their version of the Burt Bacharach/Hal David "My Little Red Book" as a quintessential moment in my rock and roll youth. The band's third album, Forever Changes, remains one that I still listen to on my iPod.

Love was a great, multicultural, Los Angeles band and Arthur Lee is the person I'll always remember as the embodiment of it.