Dick Van Dyke turns 100 on Dec. 13, but the Hollywood icon revealed in a recent essay for The Times U.K. the issues of getting to the milestone birthday.
“It’s frustrating to feel diminished in the world, physically and socially,” the “Mary Poppins” star revealed. “I get invites to events or offers for gigs in New York or Chicago, but that kind of travel takes so much out of me that I have to say no. Almost all of my visiting with folks has to happen at my house.”
His body, he said, can’t keep up.
“Mostly, it’s the physical deterioration that feels accurate,” he wrote. “Like my old characters, I am now a stooper, a shuffler and a teeterer. I have feet problems, and I go supine as often as is politely possible.
“Those fake old-timers smacked their dentures. I chew nicotine gum all day long — still, decades after I quit smoking! My sight is so bad now that origami is out of the question. I have trouble following group conversations and complain frequently about my hearing aids, though I would never refer to them as ear trumpets. I’m not that old.”
Just last month, “The Mary Poppins” star joked about his age.
“It’d be funny if I didn’t make it,” he quipped.
The Hollywood legend and his wife Arlene were at an event in Malibu, Calif., to raise funds to benefit The Van Dyke Endowment of the Arts and the Dick Van Dyke Museum.
“That’s right,” he said of turning 100 on Dec. 13. “I’m not officially a hundred until December,” Dick said. “Two months. Two months.”
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