Turning 56!

Happy Mark Buerhle day to me! (Photo by G.N. Lowrance/Getty Images)

So I was looking for a little inspiration today as I turn 56. I went to this site called “Things Other People Accomplished When They Were Your Age.”

They only had listed four accomplishments for age 56, which right away seemed a bit light. When you type in another age, say 23, the whole box fills up with glorious achievements — John Singleton directed “Boyz ‘N the Hood,” and Jack Nicklaus won the Masters and Orson Welles did his “War of the Worlds” radio thing and John Keats wrote “Ode to a Grecian Urn,” and so on.

Four things at age 56. Well, they better be good.

1. At age 56, Mao Zedong founded the People’s Republic of China.

So, yeah, not going to lie, that one didn’t move me much. Sure, great accomplishment and all but I mean it seemed like a lot, you know, laying siege to Chongqing and forcing Chiang Kai-shek to flee the country, I don’t think I feel up to quite that much effort.

2. At age 56, George Granville Leveson-Gower, duke of Sutherland, destroyed the homes of Scottish Highlanders and drove thousands of residents off the land to make room for sheep.

Really? Age 56 is so bad that this was one of the four accomplishments they found? There apparently is a Gaelic song about the duke with a verse that is generally translated like so:

First Duke of Sutherland with your fraud
And your friendship to the Lowlanders
It’s in hell that you belong
I’d rather have Judas by my side

Touching. Come on, give me something here for age 56.

3. At age 56, Doug Hughes self-published the world’s largest Christmas newsletter.

This does seem more my speed, obviously, but I’m not quite sure I’m going to put it quite up there with Keats writing “Ode to a Grecian Urn.” Apparently, Doug and Diane Hughes decided to pull together all their Christmas newsletters and put it into one giant one they called “Hughes News.” On the cover, it promises:

• A 25-year retrospective on our lives together

• Complete collection of Christmas Carol parodies

• When our kids said cute things: Quotable quotes

• Christmas stories and poems for you to enjoy

And while I certainly appreciate the effort (and you can get your own copy from Barnes and Noble), I’m not going to tell you this makes me feel any better about turning 56. What’s the last one?

4. Henry Ford became the sole owner of the Ford Motor Company.

OK, this is the lamest one of all: Henry Ford bloodthirstily buying out all the other investors hardly seems like an enviable life achievement, not to mention it immediately led to him funding the rise of Hitler and creating antisemitic booklets. So, yeah, not too inspired here.

Whew. I’m more depressed about turning 56 than ever.

On the other hand, Mark Buehrle wore No. 56! So how bad could it be?*

*Others to wear 56 include: Eight-time all-star and thoroughly underrated ballplayer Bill White; sack-machine Lawrence Taylor; Shawn Green who once hit four homers in a game; Al Leiter who is a very nice guy; Kole Calhoun who needs to learn how to spell his first name; Melvin Mora who led the league in on-base percentage one year; Andre Tippett who for some reason was my favorite Patriot in the 1980s; former Dutch basketball player Francisco Elson who is fluent in five languages (talk about inspiration); Solid defenseman Sergei Zubov and Joe Schmidt who pretty much invented the middle linebacker position!

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