Remember how you felt when you learned there were people in the world with your exact name?

Me: Well of course, dummy, didja think you’re the only Dave Newton in the world? Well, yeah.

I was an only child. Can you tell? (Still am.)

Haven’t we all been taught there’s nobody else on the planet exactly like you? This seems an uniquely cultural trait of Americans. We’re the self-esteem champs, right up there with France. I mean, you think Afghani kids are taught to love themselves so much?

Anyway, that was the day I handed my Mobil credit card to the kid at the corner gas station and he did a double-take. Yep, he was the other Dave Newton in our town. Even had my middle initial.

It was the same Mobil station from which, on another day, I watched a construction helicopter crash into the new shopping center across the street. But that’s another story.

Or is it?

Looking back, I think I crashed too, the day I met my first Other Dave.

It was a short drop from low altitude. It didn’t kill me. But I’m not the same guy I was before.

Today, if you want an ego plunge, just Google your name. You’ll meet yourself coming and going. Actually, the more “common” your name, the more pages of “you”s there’ll be.

One of the benefits of living in a digital-speed world. Perspective is just a click away.

Why didn’t Newt Gingrich’s ex-wife-eruption clobber him in South Carolina?

I’m probably oversimplifying, but I think I know.

Newt may be 68, but he’s in shape. He’s a hip old pol, an expert at pushing buttons. He’s also a damn-the-torpedoes type.

He’s not above using his age to overcome his “baggage.” It’s his big message, and he put it right out there for the South Carolina Republican voters when he said, “I’m a 68-year-old grandfather!”

He delivered that line more than once, always answering for his indefensible past. Like he was saying, O.K., I was a dude, and I did bad things, but come on! I’m sixty-eight now.

Yep, lower testosterone level, less gender-driven stupidity. Newt figured out it’s actually a political advantage of age. He’s the first to take that advantage.

South Carolina got it, Newt.

Now, maybe Bill Clinton’s got a 3rd Act, too.

Yes, wisdom comes with age. But some of the behavior that comes with age, face it, you ought to get rid of.

Like…old guys feel entitled to be angry, over the full range — from grumpy to outraged.

Another manifestation of this is Universal Critic. There are sub-categories, like How-____-has-gone-to-hell-in-a-handbasket.

Here’s a dynamite combination — grumpy old guy meets Internet social networks.

Example: a Twitter acquaintance of mine used the “s” word casually in a tweet. I tweeted back: “Tsk. Language.” I thought my tongue was in my tweet, but I was in fact being a Grumpy Senior Critic. (How public language has gone to hell in a handbasket: that’s a blog post for another day.)

Now, my friend tweeted back: “Would you say that to a guy, Dave?” OMG, the old sexist-pig riposte. (Which is yet another post. Not now.)

Next day, I got to thinking about all this, and tweeted an unconditional apology — publicly — to my friend. She forgave me, graciously, good-naturedly.

I’m glad I apologized. I may advocate for cleaner, more intelligent speech again, but not on Twitter. I write good short stuff, but not good enough to provide sufficient context on this subject.

But I want to talk about the underlying bad old-guy habit: anger-cum-grumpiness.

It just comes naturally with age. Right up there with emailing complaints to your bank (did that this morning); firing off angry letters to the editor (done that too, several times); chewing out the kid across the condo drive for washing his car on a 20-degree January day, thus laying down a sheet of hazardous ice on the street (yesterday).

I wouldn’t have done any of these things twenty years ago. Ten? No, I don’t think so. Five years ago, at 68? No doubt. Getting into shouting matches? Done that. Got to worrying about it. Wife got on me about it. Wrote about it.

I used to be such a nice guy. Which is part of the problem, of course. Quote from a psychologist I used to know: “A ‘good boy’ is a spiteful brat.”

Anyway, I’m working on it. Awareness, acceptance, are the first steps toward change. Suppression isn’t the answer. Apologizing to my Twitter-pal was my solution to that particular infraction. I stopped worrying about whether I was right. It’s more important to stop myself from slipping into the Internet snark-fest. Making that decision may be the result of some of the good stuff that’s come with my age.

I expect to mess up again. There are so many legitimate reasons to get grumpy.

Apparently not, if you’re old.

Old people are happier than young people. I’ve heard that before. But according to a new book, “30 Lessons for Living,” death itself no longer scares the elderly.

The new book was written by an evidently reformed gerontologist — that is, after a long career treating old people as sick people, he finally noticed their uncalled-for happiness and, gasp, wisdom. (Yep, this is irony-cum-sarcasm.)

Here’s a link to his segment on PBS Newshour.

One of the book’s highlights, featured in the PBS interview — old people don’t fear death. And, I have realized, I can attest to this.

I remember worrying a lot about dying when I was younger. I’m giving away my doubts about life after death, I suppose. Honk if you have no doubts.

I have gradually become aware that I’m not worrying about death anymore. I wonder…is it because of the diminution of certain pesky hormones after sixty?

Maybe it’s because animals no longer need such an intense self-preservation instinct after a certain age, and nature (God?) accommodatingly reduces it.

I may not be as concerned about death as I used to be, but I am interested in advanced physics with its hints of the existence of parallel universes. Maybe, other places to go after death.

And John Edward continues to astound me.

Whatever the reasons and results, I’m discovering there is comfort and happiness in the naturally-occurring wisdom of age.

Very soon, we need to do our second housecleaning.

We performed our first culling when we cleared our thirty-five year home and moved closer to our grandchild. We dumped a lot of stuff then, but we also took a lot along.

That stuff is taking up space, downstairs. All over the house, actually. Maybe this spring.

Likewise, my head is crammed with no-longer-operative memories, patterns, habits. It’s time to sort it out and make a run to the dump.

People don’t say “What do you do?” anymore. A guy cut right to the chase the other night: “Are you retired?” For the first time, maybe, I didn’t pause. “Yes, I’m retired,” I said.

I ignored the impulse to launch a recital of what I used to do for a living, or even my current projects, which I no longer feel compelled to attack every morning.

Yes. I’m retired.

This is a good sign, I think, a sign of growth.

I’m not at an age when I ought to be trying to make time fly.

But see, I’m not a nostalgic person. I’ve always looked forward to the next thing.

So, what happens when the next thing is retirement?

Not much.

Does this sound familiar?

Don’t get me wrong. I was looking forward to retiring from my last job. I was burnt to a crisp and my employer was even crisper about me. Couldn’t blame ‘em.

I loved the great, relaxing stretch of serious full-time loafing. Made it last three years.

The next phase was mental rebound, the return of restless energy and the search for new challenges. Well, actually, a great spinning of wheels with impossible project ideas. I’m well-known for my Kamikaze projects. (You could count 3rdActs.com as one of these, except I’m not giving up.)

Then came the creeping realization that I’m actually not the same jumpy dude I was before. Retirement was asserting itself. It is now my career. I enjoy it.

So, let me try to explain…I’m still ambitious and I’ve got projects. It’s just that I’m over seventy now, and what I have discovered about this age is, Don’t-Give-a-Damn is a powerful force in my life.

Oh yeah?

This is hard, you know. I don’t really want to try to predict. I’d kinda like to be surprised. I’m just afraid I won’t be.

Here’s what I’m thinking, though, as a cockeyed optimist. (I’m making this up as I go.)

Because I’m not a hard-core Republican, I think Barack Obama’s going to do better than people think he will, this election year. See, I don’t think he’s done that badly, given what he was up against, including a loyal opposition who declared its goal was to make sure he was unsuccessful. I think there are lots of people like me, who’ve kicked the Kool-Aid addiction and don’t subscribe to the purist conservative point of view, and who are still capable of rational analysis. We’ll see.

Because I’m not a hard-core Democrat, I don’t think all Republicans are demons. I do tend to give Democratic politicians more of a break than Republican candidates. The good-sense Republicans kinda keep a low profile. If I saw more of them I’d probably like them better. I’d like to hear more from Jon Huntsman, for example. I like him for asserting his convictions in the atmosphere of a broken party’s dysfunctional dialogue.

I remember when it was possible for me to like candidates from either party and feel comfortable with my vote, election to election.

I don’t believe either party should be allowed to try to turn back the clock, either to laissez-faire or the New Deal. We need new ideas, and a new synergy of all our positions and values. It’s clear that no President and no Congress, elected on purity of ideology and unyielding conviction, can get this done. Getting together is going to have to rise from the grass roots.

So, in politics, I’ll be watching for who appears to be most rational and sensible about rebuilding our economy through the intelligent practice of our practical political values — we need to regain our understanding that we’re all on the same side, that we can combine our differences, as we have learned to do since the Civil War. I believe the big story of 2012 will be the rebirth of American synergy.

As an example of the kind of thing that can give me a tiny glimmer of encouragement, I give you Rick Santorum on Meet The Press this morning, displaying political sanity in response to David Gregory’s attempts to trip him up on the subject of political inconsistency. In particular, watch the segment on Santorum’s abortion legislation views. (You’ll need to pick it out on the MTP page. I don’t trust the specific clip links.) I actually feel better about Rick Santorum after watching this segment.

Am I crazy? No. Crazy is thinking we’ll never get along, can’t find common ground. Americans find a way to move forward and get something done. I’m not a hard-core Republican or Democrat. I’m an American.

Started off quiet and tapered off.

I’ve said it before — I’m not nostalgic. Yes, 2011 will be a year to remember — so many earth-shaking changes, literally and figuratively. But not yet. I’m ready to just let it go for now.

A better way to look at it:

Wishing a transforming, rebuilding 2012 to all, but especially to the people of Tunisia, Egypt, Japan, Libya, Iraq, Afghanistan, Bahrain, Darfur, Haiti, The Philippines, North Korea.

And, of course, to ourselves, the people of the United States of America.

That’s me.

I’m 73 right now. I’ve been younger. But I’ve never been older.

Get my drift?

In spite of AARP, in spite of watching our parents, our friends, and hundreds of others all around us get old, nothing prepares you for your own aging.

I mean, cut yourself some slack. This is the first time you’ve been through this. As well as — as far as we know for sure — the last.

I have friends who’ve made the study and practice of support for aging their lives’ work — well, I know one person like this. You know who you are — and “they” have been taken by surprise by their own aging. You just have to get there to find out what your experience will be like.

So, what made me think, when I was 65, that I could create a Website that addressed getting old? I had no experience.

Well, I’ve had a few more years now. And I’m just beginning to grow up.

To be continued.

Thank God.

American Airlines entered Chapter Eleven bankruptcy the other day.

One of the reasons they did so was to release themselves from their contractual obligation to pay pensions to retired employees.

Interestingly, the company president, Gerard Arpey, quit in protest. Read this op-ed opinion piece from the New York Times.

Mr. Arpey believes it’s immoral to walk away from pension promises. Mr. Arpey is a person. A corporation is not a person. The best corporations can do is attempt to practice ethics. A corporation’s highest moral duty is to its stockholders. Don’t kid yourself. That’s the only promise it’ll keep.

What a dilemma. When you’re overtaken by the pressures of change, you’ve got to find a way to survive. Right? Breaking long-standing promises, even old, burdensome pension programs, must be one way to keep a failing company going, right? When it’s obvious that the whole company will disappear if you don’t? Pensioners will lose anyway if the company goes down. We must prevent that at all costs.

Or must we?