Ah, the Sweetness of Youth

They say youth is wasted on the young.

“They” are old people who are hugely offended by the beautiful carelessness of youth and its beautiful disrespect. Those qualities are beautiful in young people because they haven’t been broken to the saddle yet. They’re still frolicking in the green grass of the pasture, going everywhere at a run, long muscles stretching.

The rest of us (I’m 67), are ridden by the boss, bridled by deadlines, straddled by the mortgage, yoked to the plow, pulling hard and slow to the end of another row. A kid falls, she gets a bruise. I fall, I get a broken hip and three months in a rehab facility.