Where did it all go?

I’ve always considered myself to be reasonably young looking and in good physical shape for someone my age. I go to the gym regularly, eat cleanly and can never make it to the end of Monday Night Football without falling asleep.

But sometimes reality of your internal chronometer smacks you squarely in the face.

Case in point.

Last week I was in the waiting room of my doctor and noticed among the stack of un-interesting publications he routinely subscribes to, that 80s pop star Cyndi Lauper was on the cover of AARP magazine.

I did an immediate double take. But there she was in all her red headed glory on a publication geared toward the 50 and older crowd. For those keeping score at home, Ms. Lauper is actually 63. Let me repeat that for emphasis, 63.

I mean, it wasn’t all that long ago that “Girls Just Want to Have Fun" and “Time After Time” were at the top of the charts.

Or was it?

I don’t know whether it was reflexive or desperate, but as soon as I returned home I phoned my financial planner to get a status report on my portfolio.

Too bad the accelerated pace at which the years pass by doesn’t always register with some.

Again case in point.

I was at a CPA firm in the New York area where the managing partner was 66 and declared that he wanted to work full time for at least 5 more years.

Ok fair enough. But his problem was that he had no one on his bench to assume the leadership reins so his succession plan would lie externally via a merger.

He assured me five years was too soon to begin setting the transition table so to speak and told me to revisit this next year. Despite all my arguments and protestations to the contrary and a painstaking explanation of how five years was, for most practitioners, just five in-person client visits, he remained unmoved.

Sometimes there’s nothing more you can do to demonstrate the pitfalls of succession procrastination. I even contemplated bringing the AARP magazine as prima facie evidence of how quickly it passes you by.

Still it had the effect of rearranging the deck chairs on the Titanic.

There’s not a lot of certainties in this line of work, but one thing’s for sure, the above firm owner will hardly be the last one to refuse to come to grips with the reality of aging. There will be lots of others.

Time after time.