Approaching Seventy

On November 12th, barring unforeseen circumstances, I will be turning seventy. Which means that the earth will have turned 25,568 times with me on it

On November 12th, barring unforeseen circumstances, I will be turning seventy. Which means that the earth will have turned 25,568 times with me on it. In Judaism, seventy-year olds are considered smart people. How could that be? I have so much more to learn.

One of my fun ways of learning is by giving courses and lectures to young people. In order to prepare myself, I always learn much more than I teach.

Second, I get to feel their age for a couple of hours a week. And finally, I am humbled by the opportunity given to this almost-septuagenarian (or however it's spelt) to share ideas and thoughts with eager and bright university students.

These days I am giving my fourth course on popular music to 150 students here at TAU. The basic question of the course is "What makes some popular songs so wonderful that they are still being sung and enjoyed after fifty years or more?". We look at songs and examine, discuss, probe, question the various hypotheses proposed by various experts in the field.

But this year I have decided to involve the real experts - my students. What songs of days past (fifty years or more) do they love and why? What? Take Five from 1959? What? Duke Ellington? What? They still love Elvis songs? Needless to say I am having the time of my life.

November 12th will come and go and hopefully I will go on giving the course for years to come. Of course one day this everturning earth will gobble me up. But in the meantime, to paraphrase the beloved Gershwin brothers, "I'm teaching and I can't be bothered now."