I read this week that “drivers over 70 face eye tests every three years”. Why “over 70?”, I ask, as a grumpy 70-year-old who has just had to renew his licence. As arbitrary numbers go it’s no worse than 65 or 75, but what’s the reasoning? The RAC will have a view (supporting its members, who are probably getting on a bit); the Police and the government another (based on evidence, one would like to think).

I do believe that the roads have become busier and more dangerous in recent years – with scooters, electric bikes and other distractions – but young drivers are demonstrably more accident-prone than us old gits; with better eyesight and reactions but too cocky by half. As we all know, you can prove anything with the right statistics. 

I’ve been driving for five decades; it’s exactly 50 years since I passed my test (first time, need I add?) in my instructor’s red Ford Escort, so permitting me to take Dad’s sliver-grey two-litre Capri onto the mean streets of Birkenhead.

Not unlike this one

Once I got stopped by the feds in Upton because I looked too young to be the owner of such a head-turner, but was then told by the respectful officer that I “didn’t look like a thief”, which is nice. To my chagrin and shame I bent the Capri, slightly, twice: once in a car park and once reversing through our wrought iron gates (allegedly wrung and welded by Mum at evening classes). Dad was surprisingly relaxed about the “scratches”, perhaps because he’d done the same himself not long before.

I’ve never had an accident involving another moving vehicle, and would very much like to keep it that way. But I am getting older…

Statin island?

There’s no question that my eyesight is getting worse, and after years of not wearing glasses while driving, I accept that I really must do so. My sight is not just a bit worse than it was (annoying), but suddenly much worse (alarming).

Perhaps something does happen to your body at that Biblical age of 70, and it’s not something good. It is not the idea of being 70 (officially old) that bothers me. It’s no secret and I am glad to have got there. It’s the ageing body. It is remarkable how many of my contemporaries have had or are awaiting hip surgery, knee surgery, heart surgery, and so on. I’ve had two torn tendons this year, so I am not immune either. If it’s not one thing it’s another. And almost everyone is on some sort of medication, which will negatively affect your travel insurance premium. You might think that being on preventive medication, such as statins or blood-pressure tablets, would be a positive thing since you are reducing your risk of a stoke or heart attack, even if you’ve never had one. But the insurance racket doesn’t work like that. Rant over.

***

Driving down to La Bréchoire this summer, wearing the appropriate glasses, I recalled our excitement at buying a holiday house, then uninhabitable, 25 years ago. (It was probably a daft thing to do but we have not regretted it). To get there you have to drive for at least five hours through half of France. I’ve been asking myself how long I’ll be able to carry on doing it. What if I fail a sight test? Or maybe technology will come to our aid and soon we’ll all be at the wheel of driverless cars.

Eyesight apart, will I want to undertake a long drive like this in 10 years’ time when I will be 80? The short answer to that is “no”. Just maintaining a holiday home abroad can be hard work. I think I will know when the time comes to pack it in, sad though that will be.

Carpe diem and what not

But this time at least, no problems. We stayed in Charente for three weeks, seeing lots of friends and slotting in a couple of short trips to the seaside, first to Royan, then to Fouras. Great fun, if a bit hot.

Since retirement, there’s no longer a rush to get back to Blighty, so we stopped for a few days in northern Brittany, in a little resort called Ploumanac’h, near Perros-Guirec.

We love Brittany. The people are friendly, the food is superb and there’s plenty to see. You have to grit your teeth when entering 17c Atlantic seawater, but I’m sure it is very good for you. Brittany was where we spent our honeymoon exactly 35 years ago, in a tiny tent on a packed campsite.

Our last night in France was spent at Saint-Suliac on the River Rance, just a few miles south of Saint-Malo.

What better place for an anniversary dinner (one day early). We’ll go again.

***

Back in England, yet another anniversary event followed two days later.

In autumn 1975, shortly after passing my test – during a long university vacation with little to do but learn to drive – I headed off to Spain to take up a teaching assistant post in a girls’ school in León. I’ve written about this before so I will only say that it was a memorable, life-changing year.

And here, in Brighton last week, are three of the five people in the extraordinary photo (click slideshow for “then and now”) from 50 years ago. Despite all our comings and goings, Gordon (who still lives in León), Kate and myself have stayed in touch. Would you recognise any of us? I barely recognise myself. Young, skinny, and the life and soul of the party. Frequently an idiot too, but I seemed to be popular.

What are anniversaries for?

Publishers love them, broadcasters love them. It’s easy copy. But I do hope that one day we can stop commemorating the two World Wars and move on!

On a personal level, I admit to enjoying the process of looking back more than I used to. There’s a temptation to trot out the corny line: “it was all different in my day”. Of course it bloody was. On one hand Woolworth’s and Spangles, on the other the IRA and all those strikes. I wouldn’t even bother to argue about life being better now than 50, 35, 25 or even 5 years ago. It wasn’t only the non-existence of mobile phones or the internet back then. Washing machines are now cheap, central heating almost ubiquitous. Did you know that in 1975 there were more black-and-white TVs than colour ones in the UK? (Spain, as I soon saw, was more backward than the UK in technological matters as in almost everything.) Many changes are gradual and you hardly notice them coming.

Technology has advanced hugely but of course it hasn’t stopped us worrying about the state of the world we live in. We face huge challenges with the deteriorating environment, but at least we are all aware of the dire effects of climate change, polluted air and water, and vanishing natural resources. Fifty years ago very few people were even talking about it. Meanwhile, the political situation is depressing, with dictators and idiots in charge everywhere and democracy under threat. But regimes come and go, as wars come and go. In 2025 we are better informed about what is happening across the world, which inclines us think that there is more evil around than there used to be.

I look back fondly on the tokens of my youth that have disappeared, but their magic is rarely intrinsic and more that they were associated with my youth. Back to Proust.

***

I sometimes ask myself what remains of the young man, adolescent and child I once was. I can no longer recall how I thought as a child, although I have flashback memories of my early teenage years. Was I happy, on the whole? I am really not sure. Is what you are feeling, “normal”? With no siblings to talk to, my earlier selves are beginning to fade away. I see arrogance mixed with painful insecurity; but perhaps that is par for the course. If my personality has profoundly changed over the years – and I hope it has – it is since I got married on that roasting hot day of 4 August 1990, 35 years ago. I have absolutely no regrets about that – though if I had, I’d be unlikely to be saying so here! It is one anniversary worth celebrating.

***

Post-holiday washing and assorted chores out of the way, we move on to planning what ought to be the major event of the second half of 2025. More about that next time.