Correspondence #44: David Amram

Birthday bonuses at 94 and hopes for 2025

A Beat musical legend drops us a typically positive line…

Email, November 28th, 2024

Dear Simon,

I’ma little late in answering your Nov 17th b’day greetings but it was nice of you to send me a cheerful mail instead of condolences! Thank you for your nice note!!

I have had over 200 e-mails, texts , phone calls and letters plus last minute changes in my new composition as well as rehearsals here and in Boston. So I am LATE (but GRATEFUL) for your thinking of me and sorry to be so long in answering you.

I survived my last birthday and am glad I was here to celebrate it.

At 94 (in addition to proving that old age doesn't mean that you have had the chance to be dumb longer than other younger folks), it is wonderful to wake up and realize that you have a whole day to try to do more than you can ever accomplish, and have the chance to do it.

So the only philosophic conclusion I have reached is that if you are lucky enough to make to the BIG 94, and survive you must…

– Continue to inhale

– Don’t forget to exhale

– Hang out with positive people as much as possible, since nasty, narcicisstic soured megalomaniacs already fill an overcrowded field and a non-growth industry.

– Eat a few vegetables every week.

– Try and get some sleep (I’m still working on that)

– And most important, stay enrolled in the University of Hangout-ology, which has no tuition fees and you’ll find that EVERY person you cross paths with can teach you a lesson

These are all thoughts I had while driving back from Boston, with my son Adam at the wheel…

We are all born to be creative until we are talked out of it.

Huge hugs for all the holidays. 2025 will be full of surprises and new adventures!!

Big cheers from down town metropolitan West Camp, NY (population 142 counting the live stock)

David