<html><body><div style="color:#000; background-color:#fff; font-family:times new roman, new york, times, serif;font-size:12pt"><div style="RIGHT: auto"><SPAN style="RIGHT: auto">Just wanted to wish you a happy 60th birthday. Remember what George Burns said, "The trick is to make it to 100 years old because you rarely ever hear of anyone dying after that age."</SPAN></div>
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<div style="RIGHT: auto"><SPAN style="RIGHT: auto">Donovan Arnold<VAR id=yui-ie-cursor></VAR></SPAN></div>
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<DIV style="BORDER-BOTTOM: #ccc 1px solid; BORDER-LEFT: #ccc 1px solid; PADDING-BOTTOM: 0px; LINE-HEIGHT: 0; MARGIN: 5px 0px; PADDING-LEFT: 0px; PADDING-RIGHT: 0px; HEIGHT: 0px; FONT-SIZE: 0px; BORDER-TOP: #ccc 1px solid; BORDER-RIGHT: #ccc 1px solid; PADDING-TOP: 0px" class=hr readonly="true" contenteditable="false"></DIV><B><SPAN style="FONT-WEIGHT: bold">From:</SPAN></B> Tom Hansen <thansen@moscow.com><BR><B><SPAN style="FONT-WEIGHT: bold">To:</SPAN></B> Moscow Vision 2020 <vision2020@moscow.com><BR><B><SPAN style="FONT-WEIGHT: bold">Sent:</SPAN></B> Monday, August 8, 2011 1:59 PM<BR><B><SPAN style="FONT-WEIGHT: bold">Subject:</SPAN></B> [Vision2020] On Turning 60<BR></FONT><BR>
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<div class=yiv2009993717MsoNormal>Courtesy of Monkey Mind Online at:</div>
<div class=yiv2009993717MsoNormal> </div>
<div class=yiv2009993717MsoNormal><A href="http://monkeymindonline.blogspot.com/2008/07/briefest-on-turning-sixty.html" rel=nofollow target=_blank>http://monkeymindonline.blogspot.com/2008/07/briefest-on-turning-sixty.html</A></div>
<div class=yiv2009993717MsoNormal> </div>
<div class=yiv2009993717MsoNormal>--------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------</div>
<div class=yiv2009993717MsoNormal>“We grow too soon old and too late smart.”</div>
<div class=yiv2009993717MsoNormal> </div>
<div class=yiv2009993717MsoNormal>I first saw that little bit of folk wisdom calligraphed on a bread board with a cutesy Germanesque spelling. As I've rooted around looking for a possible source I've found it attributed as coming from the Jewish tradition, the Dutch tradition and, yes, the German. Today, my sixtieth birthday, it just feels like regular old human wisdom.</div>
<div class=yiv2009993717MsoNormal> </div>
<div class=yiv2009993717MsoNormal>If only I knew then...</div>
<div class=yiv2009993717MsoNormal> </div>
<div class=yiv2009993717MsoNormal>Ain't it the truth?</div>
<div class=yiv2009993717MsoNormal> </div>
<div class=yiv2009993717MsoNormal>In East Asian cultures at sixty one becomes officially wise. I've tried to tell my friends this and they seem to think its supposed to be ironic or something. At least so far as it has to do with me...</div>
<div class=yiv2009993717MsoNormal> </div>
<div class=yiv2009993717MsoNormal>I have to admit I don't feel particularly smarter, not particularly wiser.</div>
<div class=yiv2009993717MsoNormal> </div>
<div class=yiv2009993717MsoNormal>I do feel older. That, all I have to do is look in a mirror, to confirm.</div>
<div class=yiv2009993717MsoNormal> </div>
<div class=yiv2009993717MsoNormal>Lots of gray. On the tubby side. Young women are polite to me and I fear increasingly find me cute. And not in the good way...</div>
<div class=yiv2009993717MsoNormal> </div>
<div class=yiv2009993717MsoNormal>On the other hand I've always felt I was born middle-aged (James, sixty isn't middle aged, I hear some whipper snappers exclaim. Sixty is old...). And these days I often feel I'm growing into my true Jamesness.</div>
<div class=yiv2009993717MsoNormal> </div>
<div class=yiv2009993717MsoNormal>And, on balance, not a bad thing...</div>
<div class=yiv2009993717MsoNormal> </div>
<div class=yiv2009993717MsoNormal>As our teacher Rumi sang...</div>
<div class=yiv2009993717MsoNormal> </div>
<div class=yiv2009993717MsoNormal>I used to be shy.</div>
<div class=yiv2009993717MsoNormal>You made me sing.</div>
<div class=yiv2009993717MsoNormal> </div>
<div class=yiv2009993717MsoNormal>I used to refuse things at table.</div>
<div class=yiv2009993717MsoNormal>Now I shout for more wine.</div>
<div class=yiv2009993717MsoNormal> </div>
<div class=yiv2009993717MsoNormal>In somber dignity, I used to sit</div>
<div class=yiv2009993717MsoNormal>on my mat and pray.</div>
<div class=yiv2009993717MsoNormal> </div>
<div class=yiv2009993717MsoNormal>Now children run through</div>
<div class=yiv2009993717MsoNormal>and make faces at me.</div>
<div class=yiv2009993717MsoNormal> </div>
<div class=yiv2009993717MsoNormal>Not a bad thing, at all...</div>
<div class=yiv2009993717MsoNormal>--------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------</div>
<div class=yiv2009993717MsoNormal> </div>
<div class=yiv2009993717MsoNormal>I am 60 today. My spouse is not 60. </div>
<div class=yiv2009993717MsoNormal> </div>
<div class=yiv2009993717MsoNormal>We are 38.</div>
<div class=yiv2009993717MsoNormal> </div>
<div class=yiv2009993717MsoNormal>Seeya round town, Moscow.</div>
<div class=yiv2009993717MsoNormal> </div>
<div class=yiv2009993717MsoNormal>Tom “celebrating the 35<SUP>th</SUP> anniversary of my 25<SUP>th</SUP> birthday” Hansen</div>
<div class=yiv2009993717MsoNormal>Moscow, Idaho</div>
<div class=yiv2009993717MsoNormal> </div></DIV></DIV><BR>=======================================================<BR>List services made available by First Step Internet, <BR>serving the communities of the Palouse since 1994. <BR> <A href="http://www.fsr.net/" target=_blank>http://www.fsr.net</A> <BR> mailto:<A href="mailto:Vision2020@moscow.com" ymailto="mailto:Vision2020@moscow.com">Vision2020@moscow.com</A><BR>=======================================================<BR><BR></DIV></DIV></div></body></html>