We’re still feeling all up in the air. What a thing to wake up to on the first of March, a day Pearl and I have been long awaiting. First day of meteorological spring.

“You could’ve knocked me over with a feather,” Pearl said. “If you ask me, it’s that Yippee person’s doing.”

“Who asked you,” Biff remarked. This was a rhetorical question, as Biff’s questions so often are.

Of course Biff and I knew that when Pearl said “that Yippee person” she was referring to Israel’s prime minister, Bibi Netanyahu. She knows his name perfectly well, but it doesn’t always come to mind quickly; she has to go through several steps to call it up. In her mind, Netanyahu equals yahoo. Yahoo equals yippee. Hence, that Yippee person.

The ability to hold a thought (Now why did I come upstairs?) or dredge up a name from memory is harder than it used to be, very much like being under the influence of marijuana, as I recall, but without the rest of the high.

This is what happens to the elderly brain, mine included. The information is still in there, mostly, but access to it becomes increasingly difficult.

I picture a secretary, my administrative assistant–I’ll call her Sally–in charge of the memory files inside my head. Once sharp and agile, Sally has slowed down with age. Her coffee breaks grow longer. Some days she can hardly get out of her chair. The spirit is willing–she means well–but the flesh is weak.

Oh, what is that word, it’s just one syllable, for manic depressive? I wonder. The politically correct word?

Sally considers for a moment, then selects a file from the memory bank and slaps it down. “Probiotic?” she suggests helpfully. No, no, I say, not probiotic…

“Bipolar!” Sally gleefully announces, hours later, out of nowhere.

I can’t fire Sally–perish the thought–and I pray she doesn’t retire during my lifetime. She cannot be replaced. My Texas grandmother relied on a well-worn dictionary and a magnifying glass. My Michigan grandmother had to go through the entire list of her grandchildren before arriving at the name she wanted: “Bill! Harry! Martha! Melinda! Molly! Jimmy! Where are your mittens?” Sally and I are stuck with each other. That’s just how it goes.

They say you can’t teach an old dog new tricks. In fact, a sudden change in behavior is often seen as a bad sign in an elderly person. The words unstable and erratic come to mind. Worse words, even scarier, come to mind as well, but never mind that. The point is, when a senior citizen starts acting up and making big changes–other than, say, moving to Florida or dyeing her hair blue–people are unlikely to expect a good outcome.

Still, a person can’t just give up on self improvement. Right? It is possible, though perhaps not common, to make sweeping changes for the better, even to achieve greatness, late in life. Look at Charles Darwin, Laura Ingalls Wilder and Susan Boyle! Not to mention Grandma Moses and Colonel Sanders.

Some people, like Betty White, Gabby Hayes and Andy Rooney, notwithstanding their many accomplishments over the span of their lives, apparently became famous mostly for being stereotyped as oldtimers. Keith Richards, born Dec. 18, 1943, has become a meme for his longevity despite a famously dissolute former lifestyle. “For every cigarette you smoke an hour is taken off your life and given to Keith Richards.”

Andy Rooney was primarily known as a white-haired curmudgeon with astoundingly wild Irish eyebrows–he would never get past a television makeup artist with those unruly eyebrows today–although we think he must have been young once.

Whenever you have something grumpy and curmudgeonly to say, why not follow the lead of countless trolls and simply post your message under the name Andy Rooney? It won’t hurt to add his highly recognizable photograph as well. That way you won’t be held accountable for your own cranky, cantankerous sentiments. Just make sure that whatever you’re complaining about predates Rooney’s death in 2011.

Now what was I saying? About Iran. Well, Pearl and I are still pretty much up in the air about that. I’ll let you know next week what we think.

Have a good week.

(Martha Allen, of Keene Valley, has been writing for the News since 1996.)