CALL OF THE MILD

By Jeffrey Kluger

It started happening about three years ago, when I turned 39 and was first preparing to establish a beachhead in my 40s. By any measure, 39 is a tough age to be. It's the age at which even the fittest ballplayer is described as a "grizzled veteran." It's the age at which a former rock 'n' roller embarking on a comeback tour will be referred to respectfully as "the patriarch of pop." It's the age at which you first realize that no matter how successful you become in your career, you are chronologically disqualified from ever again being referred to as a wunderkind.

It's also the age at which you find yourself overcome by an inexplicable impulse to make strange little grunting noises when you stand up, sit down or bend over.

Inevitable as death, ineffable as love, unappealing as the sudden appearance of jowls, the impulse to make strange little grunting noises when you stand up, sit down or bend over hits everyone in different ways. For some, it may first occur when hoisting a bag of groceries; for others, it may happen when stooping to pick up a toddler or crouching to tie a shoe. Typically, the strange little grunting noises never sound like much--a weary uhhh as the weight of the body is raised or lowered. Sometimes the uhhh may be followed by a few expressive words, like a thoughtful hoo-boy or a quick oh, my, my, my, my, my.

While the fact of this middle-aged vocalizing is clear, the reason for it is not. Certainly, it has nothing to do with temperament; the curmudgeonly seem to grunt no more frequently than the congenial. Nor does health or fitness play a role. I exercise four times a week and eat a diet so low in fat my doctor nearly took to prescribing me pork chops, and yet my hoo-boy arrived right on time. But if the roots of the grunt can be found in neither physiology nor psychology, where do they lie? Increasingly, I've begun to suspect that the answer is evolution.

The journey of life comes with a clear itinerary, and according to the schedule, our 20s and early 30s should be devoted to procreation. By the time we reach 35 or so, our reproductive mission ought to be complete, and nature will pretty much have lost interest in us. More and more, however, early middle-agers have spent their pre-35 years building careers and waited until 40 looms and the reproductive last call sounds before finally beginning the business of making babies.

Happily for the offspring who result from this late-life breeding, the evidence suggests that advanced years are no bar to raising children well. But if the public and scientific perception of older parents has changed, nature hasn't got the message. With an ample supply of vigorous twentysomethings willing to handle the procreative duties, it has never relished the prospect of a population of comparatively weary middle-agers joining the parenting party. It's not for nothing that with 2 a.m. feedings, PTA meetings and after-school trips to Gymboree, our most energetic years coincide with our most fertile ones. For middle-agers, hanging around to breed too long can seem a little like hanging around to pitch too long. You may think you can still go a full nine innings, but be honest now, wouldn't you be more comfortable if you took a seat in the dugout?

To make sure we do just that, I'm convinced, nature invented the middle-aged grunt. In the same way aged--and thus expendable--dolphins swim at the bottom of the pod because sharks attack from below, and lame zebras run at the edge of the herd because lions attack from the outside, so too may older humans be programmed to advertise ourselves to predators with a distinct uhhh. Seemingly the most innocuous of sounds, the grunt may actually be a chilling verbal cue announcing easy pickings, free chow, fresh fast food. Every exhausted sigh we emit as we stand or stoop may be the evolutionary equivalent of a flashing EAT AT JOE'S sign, except in this case the message has been shortened to a simple EAT JOE.

The idea is unsettling, but if nature has to place what she considers an older post-breeder in harm's way in order to protect the fair and fecund, I suspect she wouldn't hesitate. Indeed, as we get older still, nature gets harsher still--and our impulse to attract predators becomes even more pronounced. What else explains the otherwise sensible retiree who suddenly takes a liking to lime green slacks with matching shoes made from what could only be flexible linoleum? What explains the woman whose style sense always ran to the reserved who suddenly fancies floral straw hats the size of chafing dishes? A lapse in taste? Maybe. An indifference to fashion? Perhaps. I submit, however, that it's something closer to heroism.

As our age increases, so does our willingness to fall on a grenade, take a bullet, step into a pitch for the rest of the team. To be sure, it's the rare community that ever finds itself set upon by a pack of hungry jackals or other predators, but if one ever is, it's the 40-plus population that will be manning the perimeter. As a new recruit in this mid-life militia, I'm happy to do my part. But if I'm going to be spending the rest of my life standing a post, I hope you don't mind if I--uhhh--sit down for a minute.