Man that is born of a woman hath but a short time to live and is full of misery, according to the Book of Common Prayer.

Or else life is long, the man grows fat and bald, and a woman points this out fully and makes him miserable, according to common experience.

These are not cheerful thoughts, but today they are hard to avoid. The problem is that I write this on a day when the time known as “many years from now” has finally arrived. Tuesday, Jan. 3, 2012, was my 64th birthday.

Readers of a certain age will recognize the “many years from now” line from the Beatles song “When I’m Sixty-Four,” a track on the famous 1967 “Sgt. Pepper’s Lonely Hearts Club Band” album. It is a jaunty tune — but at the same time full of youthful insecurity and sadness. It is a perky anthem of coming ruin, many years from now.

For the benefit of readers too young to be certain of their age, it is worth explaining that in the olden days there were things called records, which went round and round and emitted the sounds of songs that made our lives go round and round. too. And there were things called albums, but to heck with that — all you need to know is the lyrics of “When I’m Sixty-Four”:

When I get older losing my hair

Many years from now

Will you still be sending me a valentine

Birthday greetings, bottle of wine?

These are important questions for the baby boom generation, and at last I have lived long enough to answer them authoritatively.

Yet it is amazing to me that “many years from now” is now. It seemed so far away at the time. But it is a perverse characteristic of life that it speeds up as you grow older. One minute you are tending the carrier pigeons and the next moment modern communications have been revolutionized by the iPhone, with not even an interim stage involving an iPigeon.

The pace of change has become so frantic that an older person hardly dares to go to sleep at night.

In fact, this is the mistake I made with my hair. Sure, it showed early signs of deserting its post, but it didn’t happen over many years. It seemed like I fell asleep as a passably hirsute person and woke up the next morning as a bald person — a classic case of hair today, gone tomorrow.

But, you ask, will the lady of my life still be sending me a valentine? Well, it’s not yet Valentine’s Day and a well-aged husband can only live in hope.

But she did offer a morning birthday greeting, and I held out hope for a bottle of wine later, although I wasn’t presented one at breakfast, perhaps because she fears that I might drink it at breakfast.

(Of course, this is ridiculous. Wine is not for breakfast. Beer is for breakfast. If you put it on your Rice Krispies, not only do they go snap, crackle and pop but they sing ribald songs as well.)

I remain confident that my life’s companion will answer all the pleading questions in “When I’m Sixty-Four” in the affirmative. Paul McCartney knew human nature. In the mouth of the prospective old person speaking to his partner, the song puts this line: “You’ll be older too.” Yes, reciprocity will work its magic and stir the old embers of romance to any couple’s mutual benefit.

However, this doesn’t give any 64-year-old man a free pass. Consider this verse as fair warning:

If I’d been out till quarter to three

Would you lock the door?

Will you still need me, will you still feed me,

When I’m sixty-four?

To answer these questions in order, at quarter to three tell the dog to move over in his little house because you are staying there, buddy. But she may still need you — someone has to take the trash out and clean the gutters — and she may still feed you. But the meals will be small portions, because you are getting fat and you are doomed to search in vain for a hearty sausage hiding under a lettuce leaf.

No, my fellow old fellow, your lot will be doing the garden, digging the weeds — and don’t you dare be asking for more. If you disagree:

Send me a postcard, drop me a line,

Stating point of view

Indicate precisely what you mean to say

Yours sincerely, wasting away

Ah, life is a long and winding road, as another Beatles song instructs. This is all I know when I’m 64.

Reg Henry is a columnist for the Pittsburgh Post-Gazette. Email rhenry@post-gazette.com. This column was distributed by Scripps Howard News Service.

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