When I’m sixty-four

I go to sleep at night telling myself that this may be my last day on earth and that I may never wake up the next morning. When the pilot announces for all of us to get back to our seats and to fasten our seats belts and the aircraft jolts and shudders through bad weather I say to myself, “Oh well, I have had a good life and I have no regrets if it ends here.”

NO HOLDS BARRED

Raja Petra Kamarudin

One of my favourite albums is Sgt. Pepper’s Lonely Hearts Club Band by the Beatles. I even once wrote a play for the MCOBA annual dinner and concert based on this album. Anyway, if you have never heard the song When I’m Sixty-Four you can hear it at the video link below while you can see the lyrics HERE.

And, yes, you guessed it — I am now 64 going on 65. So that song has a special meaning for me. More importantly, though, when you are 64 you tend to look at life quite differently from when you were 24 or 44.

When I was 24 I just wanted to earn a living. As long as I had enough money to pay for my house rent and car instalments with a bit of extra to put food on the table I would be happy like hell (although why would one be happy about hell is beyond me). Shopping would be a weekend in Golok to buy cheap Thai clothes where RM100 can be stretched very far indeed.

At 44 I wanted more than just my needs. I wanted my wants as well. Needs is a car to get to work and a roof over your head, some clothes on your back and a bit of simple food on the table. Wants is the car must be a BWM or Mercedes Benz with a Porsche 911 parked in your garage as your weekend toy plus a big bungalow with six bedrooms, two living rooms, a dry and wet kitchen, a chauffer and three servants at your beck and call, and dinner at an expensive restaurant at least twice or thrice a week.

At 64 you do not really care too much about the bells and whistles and the trappings of life. Flying business class no longer gives me an orgasm. I go onto the Internet to find cheap flights and get excited when I can find £50 air tickets. I no longer get a kick staying in the executive suits of five-star hotels and am quite comfortable sleeping in B&Bs. I do not own a Savile Row suit or expensive Baju Melayu and my wardrobe is made up entirely of jeans and T-shirts. Dressing up in cold weather means donning my leather jacket, which makes me look like an over-aged Rocker who has not yet grown up.

I go to sleep at night telling myself that this may be my last day on earth and that I may never wake up the next morning. When the pilot announces for all of us to get back to our seats and to fasten our seats belts and the aircraft jolts and shudders through bad weather I say to myself, “Oh well, I have had a good life and I have no regrets if it ends here.”

Somehow death no longer frightens me like it used to. I no longer love life like when I was younger. Although I do not love death like one of those Muslim Jihadists, death is something I take in my stride and smile while others have worried looks on their faces, not knowing whether the plane is about to nosedive and crash to the ground.

Am I suicidal or fatalistic? Maybe, I am not too sure of that. But one thing I am sure of is that I do not fret over what cannot be avoided and resign myself to the fact that whatever will be will be — que sera, sera.

So I suppose being 64 does have its merits. You no longer fear life. Hell, you do not even fear death or worry about what will happen to you and where you will go once you die. Que sera, sera.

At 24 I would attend weddings of friends and relatives. At 44 I attended dinners and functions with business associates and contacts. At 64 I seem to be attending more funerals than any other events. And when in the past I used to attend funerals of grandparents, uncles and aunties, now I am attending funerals of my contemporaries, those of my age or younger.

So that tells me my time is indeed getting very close — que sera, sera.

It feels good to be able to look death in the face and tell the Grim Reaper to come get me if it can. The last thing I would want at my age is to spend the remaining years of my life in fear and worrying about when my time will come.

My only concern is what will happen to my family once I am gone. And because of that I decided in 2013 to spend my entire life savings to set up the kopitiam in Manchester. I do not need the money wherever I will be going once I die so why keep it in the bank? I wanted to leave that money to my family in the form of a business that hopefully will feed them for many years to come.

I suppose the fact that both my parents died when they were just in the mid-40s helps somewhat. I have now outlived my parents by 20 years or so. Hence I am grateful for that extra 20 years which my parents did not have. So I am happy about that bonus of 20 years and do not worry about whether I can live another 20 years till 85. I focus on what I have rather than what I do not have.

In a sense that makes me a better Muslim than many other Muslims. Other Muslims worry about what they do not have and fight to get what they feel they are not getting. I am grateful for what I already have and do not care much about what I do not have because there is nothing that I really want other than those extra 20 years which I already received and which were denied to my parents.

Some may call this lack of ambition. Others may call it laziness. I call it kesyukuran, contentment for what I already have with no resentment for what I do not have. And this is what true Islam is all about, not about fighting or going to war for whatever grievances you perceive you may have.

SEE VIDEO ON YOUTUBE HERE: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=eCss0kZXeyE