I was thirty once. That was over  thirty years ago. I was vain, cocky, and not as nice a person as I am today. I lacked experience and compassion.  Sure, I was better looking then, but so what? But from t his vantage point, I realize that those beautiful young people are welcome to have each other as much as they like, all night long, as long as they leave me alone. Advertisers target them and use their images in ads, because they have more spending power  than they do brains. So let them all skip merrily down the road to work enslavement and bankruptcy together.

When I was younger, I couldn’t understand why older people preferred the company of other older people, when they could hang around with the “it” crowd, on the beach, or in nightclubs. Now I know why.

Dubai is such a place, full of nightclubs and well-paid thirty somethings mingling up a storm. I wish them well, I really do, but I wish they would take their smart phones and their fancy cars and their fashionable clothes and drive to a different part of town than the one I inhabit. I’ll be here, in the quiet neighborhood, the one where nothing much happens, trying to watch television so I can stay awake until nine-thirty, even though most nights I can’t make it that late.