On The Silly Side by Jimmy Del Ponte

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“What is a Yute?” This question was asked by the judge in the movie My Cousin Vinny. “Yutes” is how Joe Pesci pronounced the word youths. Sometimes my “Somerville accent” makes me say “troat” instead of throat, so I can relate.

Irish playwright George Bernard Shaw (1856-1950) once said that it’s too bad that “youth is wasted on the young.” I believe that if we try to think young, and take pretty good care of ourselves, we can perhaps stave off old age, or at least old thoughts.

Through my work with the city, I am lucky enough to have met quite a few seniors and they are vibrant, interesting, and bursting with life. Most will also tell you how fast this ride we call life has gone by. Weren’t we all kids just a few years ago?  When we were young we wanted to be older. We couldn’t wait to drive, and now driving is a game of survival. We have to fight tailgaters, texters, and cell phone gabbers. Then we have to deal with those  “music lovers” with the huge bass speakers that rattle your fillings if you are any place near them. It does seem like just yesterday that we were kids with a clean slate to work with. What would life bring us? When I was young I wanted to be the next Paul McCartney. We all know how that turned out.

I remember the train rumbling through Davis Square and wishing I could just get on and go on an adventure. Little did I know it would have brought me to the adventurous city of Fitchburg!  But still, I wanted to be older. I cut myself several times trying to encourage my “beard” to grow in thicker. Now I hate shaving.

As always I tapped into the minds of a few of my friends and peers for their thoughts on growing older in the ‘Ville.

Let me preface my findings by saying that my friends and I are perfectly happy, enjoying every minute of leisure we get. We work hard and play harder. The only thing that is different is that 30 or 40 years seemed to literally fly by. So what would we change and what do we miss?  What did we carry from our youth? One of my more spirited friends now has four sons to raise and I have two. That old adage “the apple doesn’t fall far from the tree,” has never rung truer. Our boys don’t stop testing their dads as to how much they can get away with. My dad used to tell me how he and his friends would hop streetcars, and sneak into the movies. However, if I had tried that when I was a kid, I would have been grounded with a size 10 and 1/2 work issued, black steel toed shoe print on my butt! What if we catch them smoking? We all tried smoking at one time or another so how do we handle it?  We flip out, that’s how we handle it. But we have to remember back when and give them a little break.

A friend chimes in with this, “Remember when we had the energy to work a full and a part time job, went out every night with our friends and still managed to go to work on 4 hours sleep? Now if I am up until 2 a.m. and it takes me a week to recover.”

The Circle of Life that they talk about in The Lion King can be understood a bit clearer with this next example. A friend of mine from way back in the day, who kept right up with all the  wild fashions and trends of the 60’s and 70’s, recently wrote the following, “One of my daughters went to a Katy Perry concert wearing a dress made of poker chips, dice and money. The other daughter accepted a bid from the sorority, Sigma Kappa. Where did I go wrong????? HA HA.” What goes around!  The character “Lou” from the Rodney Dangerfield movie Back to School, had these words of wisdom. “One son I put through College, the other son I put through a wall.” A little rough but you get the picture.

How can I tell my kid not to get his ear pierced when I had both mine pierced, and one of them twice? As I get older I feel I have the right to be a bit cranky when I am tired, or when my hip acts up, or when I have to get up and go “downstairs” twice a night, or when I am cleaning and no one moves a finger to help. Often I feel justified in yelling at the kids as they sit at the computer and pretend they don’t see me putting the dog’s leash on him for a walk. I have, however, been trying harder to remember that they are kids, and being a kid doesn’t last. Who knows that better than us?

I also realize that there is going to come a time when my two sons won’t be able to spend as much time with the old man as they do now. I am not looking forward to that day. I want them to be my sidekicks forever.

I am still a kid at heart, as I find most Somerville people are. We still have that inner child that recalls the wonderful times we had growing up in the ‘Ville. We still just want to have fun, laugh, and be healthy and happy. I feel like that same silly kid until I look in the mirror. I see a Dad, an employee, a bill burdened adult, an aging hippie, and a responsibility laden citizen. Damn it!  But if I look deeper, I can still see that carefree, optimistic, thrill seeking, youngster full of wide-eyed excitement and hope.

I am now determined to let my kids enjoy being “yutes” as long as possible.