by James Cagney
Why do you weep, poor dear old man?
It hurts me within when you weep.
He answers:
I weep for the long lost wonderful years
I once thought were mine to keep.
She says:
Why would you keep them, poor dear old man?
That’s too much to ask. Just living those so-called
Wonderful years is life’s most onerous task.
For time passes and life passes and all
Things end in the sadness,
Except for those sometimes fortunate ones
Who find peace in a benevolent madness.
Surely the vital thing in old age is to maintain an interest and never stop planning for the future. I started painting at sixty and am still intensely caught up in it. I am studying classical guitar and I’ve also just taken up the bugle, trying to learn all the traditional carriage calls. For my physical well-being, I still put on a record and do a chorus or two of buck dancing. It’s a mistake to set limits on yourself; life will do that whether you like it or not. A successful life must be determined by one’s attitude. In a favorite phrase of my brother Ed, “We live between our ears.” Sermon over.
Recently I went to a party given by Sergei Bongart, my painting teacher—a most delightful affair with really interesting people—and, Bongart being Bongart, the best in the way of food prevailed. Prominent among the desserts were some napoleons that I can only describe as real works of art. Now, a napoleon to us as kids was a thing of awe and beauty—something never to be forgotten. My sister Jeannie was at the Bongarts’ with me, and as we were going around the table, I pointed to one of these little masterpieces and said, “Honey, look—a napoleon!” We looked at each other and grinned. I said, “Let’s take one to brother Bill.” So Jeannie took it, wrapped it, and put it aside. The next day she gave it to Bill, and his joy at seeing this sumptuous thing was unbounded. He called me right away, and I asked him what he thought of it.
“Jim,” he said, “I want to tell you I remember the first napoleon I ever had in my life. It was in Ridgewood. Mom brought some home—one for herself and one for each of her four boys. And that was an event!”
This little incident made me realize so clearly that, if in our childhood, we were given unlimited napoleons, we wouldn’t have had the deep, deep pleasure it still gives us to sink a tooth into that superb pastry. Bill and I got to talking about a very rich man I know well who has never had a moment of deprivation in his life. To him a napoleon is just a napoleon; to us it was, it is, an experience. It points up that in the early days of our family, no matter how tough things were, and God knows they were tough, we still feel we had the best of it because we knew how to enjoy things when we got them.
A friend wrote this to me a bit ago about the far-away fella business: “Yes, I’d say Pat gave you the right designation. You’re a far-away fella in any number of ways. As a kid you used to look at other people and say to yourself, ‘I wonder what it would be like to be them?,’ and so you grew up to be a man with the gift of wonder, which allows you to observe people and places analytically. You became a man out of the common run of activity who loves the solitudes and the elements—a non-city man from the city. You’re a man with the reputation of being a semi-recluse when actually—and here’s the drama of the thing—you’re more involved with living than the vast majority in the churning bowels of the city. In all these ways and more, you were born and you will die a far-away fella.”
If the foregoing is true, and I’d like to think it is, it has come about through things I had very little to do with. My parents were a gift, and so was my family; I was lucky enough to marry the girl I did, and have the children I did; my good friends came to me unbidden; my job was one I enjoyed; and I’ve lived my life trying to be true to all these.
Which is my story to date. So, in Jim Barton’s words, thanks for the use of the hall. Thanks, too, for buying the tickets that gave me this lovely and deeply loved farm whence these words come. And, above all, the very number of those tickets prompt me to say: grateful thanks for giving a song-and-dance man across the years all those heart-warming encores.