A hint has come to me here in southern California, where I have been
spending the winter, that you are planning to celebrate my birthday--my
seventy-fourth this time, and would like a word from me. Let me begin by
saying that I hope that each one of you will at least reach my age, and
be able to spend a winter, or several of them, in southern California,
and get as much pleasure out of it as I have. It is a beautiful land,
with its leagues of orange groves, its stately plains, its park-like
expanses, its bright, clean cities, its picturesque hamlets, and country
homes, and all looked down upon by the high, deeply sculptured mountains
and snow-capped peaks.
Let me hope also that when you have reached my age you will be as
well and as young as I am. I am still a boy at heart, and enjoy almost
everything that boys do, except making a racket.
Youth and age have not much to do with years. You are young so long as
you keep your interest in things and relish your daily bread. The world
is "full of a number of things," and they are all very interesting.
As the years pass I think my interest in this huge globe upon which we
live, and in the life which it holds, deepens. An active interest in
life keeps the currents going and keeps them clear. Mountain streams are
young streams; they sing and sparkle as they go, and our lives may
be the same. With me, the secret of my youth in age is the simple
life--simple food, sound sleep, the open air, daily work, kind thoughts,
love of nature, and joy and contentment in the world in which I live.
No excesses, no alcoholic drinks, no tobacco, no tea or coffee, no
stimulants stronger than water and food.
I have had a happy life. I have gathered my grapes with the bloom upon
them. May you all do the same.