McAllister proves age really is just a number

Danny Glover said it best, “I’m too old for this stuff.”

That’s a tame version of the message he muttered over and over in the popular movie series, “Lethal Weapon.”

Many times in life, people feel like they’re just too old, or too sick or even too busy to do the things that make them happy and give their lives purpose.

Don’t count 84-year-old Mick McAllister among them.

Even though his life has been rich beyond belief, and he narrowly escaped being famous several times, McAllister is still as humble as can be.

“How are you?” I would ask every time he and I spoke during our face-to-face interviews and telephone conversations for the “84 Years Young” series.

His response was always the same.

“Oh I can’t complain,” he would say. “I’m just glad God has blessed me enough to keep me here another day. He (God) has blessed me with wonderful family and wonderful friends and I really don’t know what I did to deserve it.”

The answer to that is simple — plenty.

McAllister has been around some of history’s most famous musicians and had a front row seat to watch his brother-in-law Ted “Dutch” Vankirk navigate the Enola Gay to Hiroshima, Japan where it ended World War II by dropping the atomic bomb — an event that forever changed the face of world relations and warfare.

As if that weren’t enough, he was a medic on the USS Tranquillity, which pulled 316 survivors out of shark-infested waters after the sinking of the USS Indianapolis — one of the largest disasters in Naval history.

McAllister’s tennis teammates say he always comes to the court with a smile and a good joke, so it should come as no surprise that the Lake of the Woods resident is full of compassion too. He has lived through catastrophe himself, and feels for those who suffer in tragedies such as the Virginia Tech shootings.

“I’ve been blessed with a wonderful bank of memories I can fondly look back on,” he said. “That’s why my heart hurt so much for those poor kids that were killed at VPI. They didn’t get the chance to build their memory banks.”

It seems to me that living a life like his would be exhausting and it would be easy to kick back on your laurels and think, “Job well done” but that’s just not McAllister’s style.

He still found time to raise two daughters, Nancy and Katie, and still has the energy to take care of his wife, Jean — who undergoes dialysis treatments in Culpeper three times a week. As if that weren’t enough, he’s still to this day on the tennis court promptly at 2 p.m. twice a week.

So what’s his secret?

Friend and teammate Joe Nolan — a retired Marine — jokingly said it has something to do with McAllister’s choice of vodka. I don’t think so.

I think he is simply part of one of the toughest, most resilient generations in history.

He reminds me of my grandmother, Dorothy Layman, who at 85 years of age survived the Great Depression, breast cancer, two knee replacements and the death of her husband of 50 years and still volunteers her time to work with patients at Roanoke Memorial Hospital.

The old adage, “They just don’t make them that way anymore” must be true.

So anytime anyone, myself included, feels like they can’t do something for whatever reason, they should take a look at Mick McAllister because he is a perfect example of only being as old as you feel.