Nearing Ninety: And Other Comedies of Late Life

By Judith Viorst

The newest illustrated poetry collection in beloved author Judith Viorst’s “decade” series (from It’s Hard to Be Hip Over Thirty to Unexpectedly Eighty), exploring, with her signature savvy and humor, what it means to be an impending nonagenarian.

In Nearing Ninety, bestselling author Judith Viorst candidly shares the complicated joys and everyday tribulations that await us at the age of ninety, all with a large dose of humor and an understanding that nothing—well, almost nothing—in life should be taken too seriously. While she struggles to make it to midnight on New Year's Eve, while she’s starting to hear more eulogies than symphonies, while she’ll forever be disheartened by what she weighs (and forever unable to stop weighing herself), there is plenty to cherish at ninety: hanging out with the people she loves. Playing a relentless game of Scrabble. And still sleeping tush-to-tush with the same man to whom she’s been married for sixty years.

Accompanied by Laura Gibson’s whimsical illustrations, Nearing Ninety’s amusing and touching reflections make this collection relatable to readers of all ages. With the wisdom and spunk of someone who’s seen it all, Viorst gently reminds us that everybody gets old, and that the best medicine at any age is laughter.

• Language: English
• Publisher: Simon & Schuster
• Release date: Apr 2, 2019
• ISBN: 9781501197123

Judith Viorst

Judith Viorst is the author of the beloved Alexander and the Terrible, Horrible, No Good, Very Bad Day, which has sold some four million copies; the Lulu books, including Lulu and the Brontosaurus; the New York Times bestseller Necessary Losses; four musicals; and poetry for children and young adults. Her most recent books of poetry include What Are You Glad About? What Are You Mad About? and Nearing Ninety.

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Contents

Epigraph

Ninety

What Happened

Trading Places

It’s Time

Still Kissing After All These Years

I Should Be Over This By Now

Dealing With It

The New Year’s Eve Party

On Nearing Ninety

In Praise of the Double Bed

Telling My Age

What We Still Argue About

Right Now

Sightings

Man Mowing the Grass

The Graduation Brunch

In the Park

The Crestwood Village Retirement Community

Charlie Beerman

The Babes of the Upper East Side

At the Nursing Home

A Most Viable Widower

At the Japanese Restaurant

At the Playground

Endings

Some of the Things That Are Not on My Bucket List

My Stuff

Lunch With Shirley

My Father, the Age I Am Now

The Remains of the Day

Not Especially Spiritual

Answers

A Warning (or Maybe a Love Song) for My Husband

Attitude

Another Way of Looking at Things

Lasts

My Legacy

About the Author

In memory of Robert Pitofsky, beloved friend

To be interested in the changing seasons is a happier state of mind than to be hopelessly in love with spring.

—George Santayana

Ninety

What Happened

Tell me, what is it you plan to do with your one wild and precious life?

—MARY OLIVER

So while I was writing thank-you notes for the guest towels, the fondue forks, and the other wedding presents;

And while I was mastering Julia’s coq au vin;

And while I was discovering that I had married a man who didn’t believe in entering checks in a checkbook;

And while we were disagreeing about the cost of