That old-people smell

A New York Times article appeared in the Democrat-Gazette recently, titled “Do old people smell? Scientists sniff each way.” As if I didn’t already have enough to be worried about, as a large segment of the population already blame old, white-haired Caucasians for all the problems the country has today.

They may be right. Now in my late 80s, I must smell something awful. I did get a lecture on how to take a shower, though, which you might find interesting. While on Project Redwing, on a tiny island—½-mile wide and just enough length to land a B-52—all our water had to be distilled, and my commander had just come from a meeting where he and the other commanders had been severely lectured about wasting water.

Our CO then lectured us on just how to shower: “Turn on the water, get wet, turn the water off, soap down, turn the water back on and rinse off.” There were times, however, if the Geiger counter reading was too high, we might jump back in and take another quick shower to remove any radiation.

There was a plan in place to evacuate the island if radiation saturation reached a certain point. A Navy destroyer was standing by for this purpose. Saturation level was reached one time, and we all got ready to get out to the ship, but the radiation level dropped, and evacuation was canceled. So we just took another quick shower to remove as much radiation as we could.

Anyway, out here on my Big-Little Farm, I keep active and shower and try and not to smell up the place, and try not to be too deplorable when I go to Walmart. DONAL B. WRIGHT Cabot