I’m 105 years old, and sooner or later, almost everyone who talks to me asks the same thing. What did you eat? What did you drink? Did you take vitamins?
People want one secret. Preferably something cheap, simple, and easy to store in a jar on a shelf. If I told you it was garlic, everyone would be happy. They’d buy garlic and consider the matter settled.
But I’m not going to lie to you. I don’t know the recipe that gives a man 105 years. What I can tell you is about five things that, in my opinion, helped me not leave earlier. Not all of them can be bought, and the most important one isn’t even on a plate.
My name is Józef. For 39 years, I drove a bus. First around the town, then through the surrounding villages. I knew every stop, every pothole in the road, and almost every woman who only waved her hand when the bus was already pulling away.
The first thing, though, was on the plate. I ate simply. In the morning, bread, an egg, or a piece of cottage cheese. At noon, soup, potatoes, groats, cabbage, beets.
Meat was rare, because back then meat didn’t wait for a man at the store around the clock. If there was an apple, I ate the apple. If Maria baked a pie on Sunday, I ate the pie. Not three pieces.
One proper one. I didn’t know the word detox. A man went to the toilet, and somehow nobody turned that into a separate science. But I didn’t eat without restraint.
When I was full, I stopped. That sounds trivial, only today people keep eating long after hunger has already left. I’m not saying to ignore your doctor. If a doctor forbids something, you listen to him.
Don’t try to prove at the table who is smarter. But no single dish explains my 105 years by itself. The second thing started every day at 6:00 in the morning. For years, the alarm rang before the neighbor’s rooster even remembered why he was kept.
I got up, washed, drank tea, and left for the first route. A man had an hour, a route, and people waiting at the stop. Even on Sunday, I woke up early. The body doesn’t read a calendar.
I used to think that after retirement I would be happy. Finally, I’d sleep in. I wouldn’t have to go anywhere. Nobody would complain that the bus was too cold or too warm.
The first week was pleasant, the second passed somehow. Then I started sitting in the armchair until noon. I didn’t know why I should get dressed if I wasn’t going anywhere. Maria would put tea in front of me and ask if I needed anything.
I’d say no. One day she looked at me and said: “Józek, you’re not resting. You’re slowly disappearing. ”
I was offended.
An old man most often gets offended exactly when the woman is right and he has no good answer. And that brings me to the third thing. The weeds by the raspberries taught it to me. A few days after that conversation, I went out behind the house to check the fence.
I saw that everything around the raspberries had overgrown. I pulled out one weed, then another. Then I brought a small bucket. After an hour, I had dirt under my fingernails.
My back hurt and I was breathing like an old steam engine. But for the first time in many weeks, I ate dinner with an appetite. I didn’t go to the gym. I didn’t have a special outfit or a watch that counted steps.
I walked to the store, watered the garden, swept in front of the house, and carried the coal myself as long as I still could. Movement wasn’t exercise for me. It was part of the day. To this day, I try to walk at least a bit, just slower now.
My legs sometimes behave as if each one got a separate order, but they go. Before I tell you about the two most important things, I have to admit something people don’t like to hear. I was lucky. My father lived to 92.
My grandmother also passed 90. Clearly, I got a body with strong hinges. Some people ate more sensibly than me, moved more, and left earlier. Illness doesn’t always ask whether a man did everything right.
That’s why I won’t give you a guarantee. These five things aren’t a prescription for 105 years. They are just things that helped me live once I had already received the extra years. The fourth thing is people.
I lived with Maria for 58 years. In the morning, she sat across from me at the table. In the last years, we talked little, but after so many years together, a man hears even what the other person didn’t say. After her death, I closed myself off completely.
My son Andrzej lives 40 minutes away from me. He called rarely. There was always work, renovations, the children, or something more important. One day he said: “Dad, I’ll come when things calm down a bit.
”
I answered: “Son, I’m 105 years old. Nothing is going to calm down for me anymore. Come now, or we’ll meet at my funeral. ”
He came on Saturday.
At first we talked about the roof, the weather, and tea being too strong. That is, about everything men talk about when they’re afraid to say something important. Finally, Andrzej said: “Dad, when I was little, I always waited for you to come back from your route. And when you came back, you were so tired you had no time left for me.
”
That hurt me. I didn’t like hearing it, but I remembered Maria’s words. A man can either take offense, or he can finally listen. I told him: “I thought that as long as I worked and you lacked nothing, I was a good father.
”
He didn’t answer right away. He just looked out the window. Then he said: “You were a good father. You just weren’t there.
”
I sat in silence for a long time. What do you say to that? I could have explained that I worked so they’d have something to eat, that the schedule was hard, that no one gave me a choice. But I had a roof over my head, an empty cup of tea, and a son in front of me.
Nothing else mattered at that moment. I said: “I’m sorry. ”
I’m not even sure what I was apologizing for exactly. For all the evenings I came home too tired to play.
For the school plays I missed. For every time Andrzej waited at the window and I walked in silent, ate dinner, and fell asleep. We didn’t fix our whole life in one afternoon. Such things only happen in movies.
But since that Saturday, Andrzej comes more often. Sometimes I call first. Pride is heavy, and the phone is light. When a man has someone to say a few words to, it’s easier to open his eyes the next day.
And then there’s the fifth thing, the most important one. Every morning, you need at least one small reason to get up. I truly understood this only after Maria died. The first morning, I woke up at 6:00 as always.
I went to the kitchen, boiled the water, and prepared two glasses of tea. Only when I put them on the table did I remember that Maria wouldn’t come anymore. One tea was for me. The other one cooled by the empty place.
I sat for a long time. Then I thought that maybe I had no reason to live through the next day. I didn’t want to do anything to myself. I just didn’t see any matter that was still waiting for me.
And then, through the window, I saw the overturned flower pot by the steps. Maria would never have left it like that. I went out, picked up the pot, scooped the dirt back with my hand. Then I walked to the gate and a bit further down the road.
I didn’t suddenly feel happiness. The grief didn’t disappear. In the evening, it was still empty. But the next morning, I got up again.
First for the flower pot. Then to buy bread. Later because the raspberries needed watering. Another time because I promised to call Andrzej.
A man thinks he needs a grand purpose in life. I needed a small matter for tomorrow. This morning, I also woke up at 6:00. I made one tea.
The second one I only put out in my thoughts now. I looked at the garden, checked that the flower pot was standing. Then I called my son and asked if he’d come on Saturday. I don’t know why I lived to be 105.
Maybe genes, maybe luck. Maybe simple food helped a little, a steady rhythm, ordinary movement, and people I didn’t completely let go of from my life. But I know why I got out of bed today. I had someone to call, and I had raspberries to water.
That’s enough for me.