Truth be told, I probably understand a little less now than when I turned 50. When I was 20 I knew practically everything. Now I know that many of my abilities are not quite what they were: my backhand overhead volley, unreliable at the best of times, will never win a point again, even as a fluke. No longer can I convincingly pull off interpretative jazz ballet; it’s character roles at best from now on. Doddery colonel, ageing archduke, that kind of thing.
My memory for names is worsening by the minute. Concerned, I sought advice from a medical acquaintance – I can see his face – and he told me I had Nominal Aphasia, a common condition which makes remembering names more difficult. Nothing to worry about, it comes with age. It’s only when you develop Everything Aphasia that things become problematic.
I do understand that the internet has failed on every moral and ethical level, delivering on none of its major promises except providing some slight convenience in the retail experience. Apart from that, it’s ruined everything. There, I’ve said it. Having lived through that quaint time before the digital overlords ran the show, I am immediately suspicious when any tech advance is justified as having the potential to find the cure for cancer. The interactive CD-Rom was going to help find the cure for cancer. I suspect AI will create more cancer than it cures; perhaps we can avert disaster by convincing the bots that they might be coming down with something, and they’d best take it easy, give the world domination a rest for a bit.
Seriously, tell a robot they get paid sick leave and of course they’ll take it, they’re not stupid. And if Elon Musk and his fellow tech-bros want to live on Mars, the sooner they head off the better.
I also understand that there is nothing really new under the sun, except the sun is now cooking the planet to a point where we’ll all be living in Mordor with air-conditioning. Honestly, with the existential threats of AI, climate change, nuclear annihilation and the failed promise of the interactive CD-Rom, it’s hard, as the proverbial frog, to know in which particular pot of water you’re being brought to the boil. Every burner on the stove is being used. Part of the problem is that we’re being told what the problem is every second of every day. When you just had half an hour of James Dibble at seven o’clock, things didn’t seem quite so bad.
Having suspected it for some time, I’m now convinced that art is the only thing that endures. Technology will never make art – it will forge it beautifully – but it is only the human mind with an act of free will that can genuinely create a work of art. Asking a machine to do it for you delivers a pyrrhic victory at best, an illusion as flawed as the idea that technology democratises the creative process. If everyone’s a superhero, no one is.
Which is another thing I now understand: there is no point in giving everyone a certificate just for turning up. There is nothing to be gained by having children play soccer on a round field with no goals. Life is intrinsically unfair; there will always be winners and losers. Better if we strive for a world where everyone gets a turn at being either.
What else? When medical science gave us another 10 years of life, it gave it to us at the wrong end. It would be far better if we got another decade between 30 and 40. What is the point of hanging about at an age when you can barely move, smell a bit odd and – on a good day – the Nominal Aphasia is a fond and distant memory?
Having said that, I now appreciate that an active senior is capable of many things. For one, they’d be a far better hit-person than the youngsters making such a mess of targeted assassinations these days. They’d do a practice run the day before to make sure they got the right bloke, there’d be no need to torch a stolen car because they’d catch the bus – you’d be mad not to with a Seniors Card – and they’d charge very little for the job because they wouldn’t want their pension compromised.
Which is why I chose a bunch of self-funded retirees to go on an art heist caper through the galleries of Europe in my new book, Near Death in Venice, an ideal Christmas gift and readily available. Oh, I also understand that in an age of increasing competition for the discretionary spend, you should never let an opportunity for self-promotion pass you by.
Near Death in Venice (Simon & Schuster) is out October 27.
Read more from Good Weekend magazine: