Older Than My Old Man Now

[Loudon Wainwright, Jr.]

If I remain still, if I’m alone and silent long enough to hear the sound of my own blood, or breathing, or digestion, above the rustling of leaves or the whirr of the refrigerator, my father is likely to turn up. He just arrives unbidden in the long-running film of my thoughts, like Hitchcock in his pictures, and he looks, for all these 40-plus years of disembodiment, much like himself: big and sandy-haired with freckles on the backs of his hands; perhaps a bit more diffident in the way he holds himself than I remember. He doesn’t stay long, and as far as I can tell, his visits have no message. Yet even though years of therapy have led me to make the dark-whistling claim that he’s finally dead and gone, my father, who died when I was seventeen, continues to be my principle ghost, a lifelong eminence grise, and only my own end will finish it

[Loudon Wainwright III]

Older than my old man now
He died at 63, that’s way too young
Now you gotta feed me, now you gotta need me
And I feel like a faithless son

Sixty-four is awful old
You know what can happen next
Hey, I’m older than my old man ever was
And I’m trying to keep it in context

Yes, I’m older than my old man now
His father died at 43
From now on it’s all gravy, I got twenty years more
Maybe, I guess we’ll have to wait and see

I wasn’t sure the day would come
I’ve been living underneath his thumb
But I don’t feel so free, I don’t even feel like me
Now that there’s no race left to run

Yeah, I’m older than my old man now
I guess that means I kicked his ass
But just ‘cause you survive, that don’t mean you feel alive
And your demise will come to pass

Nobody’s sure exactly why
Everybody’s got to die
Still it comes as quite a blow, know when you got to go
And the world is gonna pass you by

Yes, I’m older than my old man now
Trying to keep it in context
Not only older than my old man ever was
But I’m guilty to have outlived my ex