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We went to Harrogate. So far, so suitably middle-aged and dull. We had dinner in an Italian restaurant (pizza and red wine, one of the great combinations). And then we went to the blues bar to watch some rock and roll - inspired by Rory Gallagher read the blurb. It was load, fuelled by booze and great fun.
And the audience was almost entirely folk like me of a "certain age" - greying and bit paunchy, pretending to be a little younger than the reality but still fit, solvent and enjoying the music of our youth. A music that doesn't sound all that different (except for being much better) that the music produced for today's youth.
And people like this aren't interested in "dignity and security" - it sounds like the right retirement home with nurses who are ever so polite when they arrive for a bed bath or wipe your bottom. Understand this politicians - we are planning on having a bloody long period of retirement before we get to the point of needed our bottoms wiped and the drool mopped up. None of this planned retirement is about dignity or security - it's about fun, about party, about spending all that cash we've saved up on going places, seeing things and drinking loads of red wine.
When we retire, we intend to carry on buying unsuitable cars, wearing jeans that perhaps don't flatter our figures, talking loudly in public bars and listening to George Thorogood very loudly when the neighbours (who prefer folk rock) aren't too near. We're going to take cruises down the Rhine, sit on beaches in Spain and take grandchildren to Florida. We are going to be the least dignified and most carefree generation of retirees ever. And the last thing we want is political parties basing their campaigns for our votes on how we're going to wear beige, have chintz curtains and slightly tweedy sofas. Let alone live in the sort of 'retirement homes' that 30 year old housing people are planning for us.
This is a generation of retirees that went to Black Sabbath concerts, sat in muddy fields talking about peace and love or strutted its stuff on disco dance floors. And close behind us are a bunch of folk who wore safety pins, pogo-ed and spat at the Sex Pistols and Suzie Sioux.
You really need to know where you can stick your dignity and security. And it ain't pretty up there.
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5 comments:
I quite agree - Alhough I'm not sure I would class Jethro Tull as folk-rock
This is folk-rock. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=9bzls8GQPUs&list=PL9AA4441C7F0B6A17
But we won't be allowed to watch Jeremy Clarkson on State TV, there's a risk it might make us think.
Well said, (I am of an age whose golden years were the last fun years for the ascendancy of the neo-puritans, the 80s).
Ian B clearly knew nothing of the 1990s.
Yes, but when do you plan on doing this retirement? :)
Because, given that 65 year olds are increasingly fit and ready for action, and likely to live on for decades, I should say the case for raising the retirement age is nigh on irrefutable, which is why Labour have not questioned the coalition's stance on the matter.
My decision has been taken that any party vowing to lower the retirement age is untrustworthy, especially if they make implausible assertions as to how they are going to fund this. That includes Syriza, the French Front Nationale (that repository of nasty and unfeasible policies- all of them bankrolled from Moscow) and many others, but mercifully not Ed Miliband.
I wish you a long life of cruises, eating, drinking and having your names cursed by your junirs. But it will most likely have to come later because we aren't living in Lloyd George's day, are we?
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