Medicare for … me?

It’s official. I’m old.

There have been some telltale signs in recent years: The gray hair, the bald spot, regularly scheduled naps, a daughter who turned 40, a granddaughter who turned 17, a fully stocked medicine cabinet, and the fact the golf ball no longer travels as far as it once did.

Oh, and my wife may have pointed it out a couple of times in recent years when I kneeled down to pick up something and had trouble standing back up.

“We’re getting older, Donnie,” she would matter-of-factly say.

Of course, as my wife can legally document, I don’t always listen to her.

And since I decided at a young age to never grow up – my cousin Tommy Joe Sneed, who is 13 years older than me and a wise man, once told me acting like a grownup was overrated – old age was one of those distant things that only happened to my grandparents and great-grandparents.

Perhaps that’s why, even though we have three children, my wife often tells people she had to raise four, and most of my friends have nominated her for sainthood.

But there’s no denying it now after I received my Medicare Health Insurance card in the mail the other day from the Department of Health & Human Services, along with a 36-page booklet explaining “important decisions about your Medicare coverage.”

The booklet offers information on Medicare Part A and Part B, Medicare Advantage (Part C), Medicare drug coverage (Part D) and Medicare Supplement Insurance (Medigap). There are questions, answers, telephone numbers and websites to help me make those “important decisions.”

It was like being slapped in the face with a wet washrag when I opened the envelope. While I always planned to be around for age 65, although I still have to navigate the next four and a half months to achieve it, I never thought I would get here this fast.

It was only yesterday, after all, that I had a 27-inch waist, a natural ‘fro and my gorgeous girlfriend/later-to-be-wife was teaching me to do “the bump” to disco music at the Forum Show Palace.

In all fairness, I was given advanced warning. For the last seven and a half months, or since I turned 64, most insurance companies operating in the United States have either sent me letters or mailers imploring me to “make your important Medicare choices.” With them, of course.

“You deserve a health plan you can count on and doctors you can trust,” read one.

“We can help you find a plan that’s right for you,” screamed another.

“Top tips when selecting Medicare Supplement Insurance,” mentioned yet another.

“You can’t predict your future. But we can help protect it,” one company assured me.

And then there have been the phone calls.

Good thing we’re registered on the “Do Not Call list,” otherwise we may have received more than the nine calls that came in one day. Fortunately, I was busy shaping young minds at my retirement job as a paraeducator at an elementary school, so only my wife and dog had to listen to the home phone ring all day.

Those calls were on top of my good friends who want to offer me an extended warranty on my 2004 Jeep Wrangler.

So I guess it’s time to finally admit that I’m old and I’m going to have to knuckle down over the next few months and “get ready for Medicare.”

But don’t expect me to grow up. Tommy Joe was right.