USA: AP Correspondent in Japan Turns 92 on September 15

AP Special Correspondent John Roderick reported for the AP for 39 years, mainly in Asia. Here is what has on AP Blog SEATTLE (Associated Press -Seattle Post Intelligencer), August 30, 2006: I turn 92 on September 15, a national holiday in Japan called "Respect for the Aged Day." Respect, indeed. I get none from my friends, or enemies for that matter. Familiar with my freewheeling, unfettered years as a foreign correspondent, many of them in Japan, they exclaim scornfully: "If Roderick can do it, anyone can!" Though I'm a little hurt by their condescension, I have to admit they are right. Anyone can live long by following a few important rules. I have lived by them for years. 1. Avoid violent exercise. "Whenever I feel the urge to exercise," said the Irish wit and dramatist Oscar Wilde, "I lie down until the feeling passes." Forget that he died at 47; that's a whole other story. 2. Have sex as often as you decently can; new pills make it possible at any age. But if you don't or won't or can't, don't worry. It is a brief and highly overrated pleasure. You can live long without it. 3. Love extensively. You can't have a really fulfilling life without it. Unlike sex, love is best when it has many partners. Love your family, your friends, some of your more interesting enemies, your dog, your cat even your mother-in-law. Especially love your country but don't hesitate to criticize its leaders. No one has a monopoly on wisdom. Like an old Rolls Royce, love will last a lifetime and never break down. 4. Keep moving, mentally and physically. Life is motion, death its absence. Oscar exercised his wit and his brain without letup. We still laugh at what he said and wrote. Walk a bit and savor the life around you. Read a lot. Enjoy music, from bebop to opera. Have a hobby. If you can possibly do so, travel in America and abroad. It will widen your horizons and give you the chance, like me, to bore your friends with fascinating stories of what you saw and did. 5. Be an optimist even if it's not easy, given the sorry state of the world. Try laughing, albeit bitterly, rather than crying when yet another politician starts a war, screws up the environment or runs away with the public treasury. Ridicule is the best weapon against hypocrites ands politicians. 6. Choose the right family and the right state to be born in. My state was Maine and, though of volatile French descent, I picked up many of its flinty virtues such as honesty, fair play and impartiality. But not, I'm afraid, its reputation for brevity. My four older brothers never stopped asking questions, like Socrates, about the meaning of life. We didn't always find the answers but the brain kept ticking over. We were always disconcertingly lively, never dull. 7. Drink moderately. After many years of enthusiastic drinking and monumental hangovers, I slowed down, now settle for a glass or red wine once in a while. 8. Eat sensibly. Until about ten years ago, I loved Maine lobster, pate de foie gras, French fries, duck a l'orange and rich pastries like profiteroles. Then I came down with diabetes II. Terrified, I went on a diet. I lost thirty pounds and am bursting, almost offensively some say, with energy. Here's a sample of what I eat daily. Breakfast: Orange juice, oatmeal studded with nuts and raisins, and figs, prunes and dates as a side dish. Coffee. Lunch: A green salad or California sushi (rice stuffed with fake crab). Fruit. Whole wheat bread. Hungry between meals? Try plain yogurt laced with a little golden honey. Dinner: Stuffed celery. Salmon, Mashed potatoes, corn on the cob, baby carrots, cherry tomatoes. Sugar free chocolate. A glass of red wine. 9. Choose a country with a high life expectancy rate. The AP helped me by assigning me to Japan, whose population lives longer than any other on earth. I now divide my time between Kamakura in Japan and Hawaii, the state whose citizens have the best U.S. record for longevity. The Japanese live long because they eat a diet rich in fish and bean curd. Trade winds, which give Hawaii the most temperate climate anywhere, contribute to a relaxed living style good for growing old gracefully. 10. Avoid people who tell you they have the secret of long life. They probably are fakes. ©1996-2006 Seattle Post-Intelligencer