Passport to senility of a clapped-out old wreck...

ISUPPOSE it is only natural. The older you get, the more things there are to remind you of it. When you’re young, the passing of time is measured by way of birthdays, the Gregorian calendar and New Year’s Day hangovers. But it doesn’t stay that way forever, of course.

The powers of recovery begin to fade long before creaking limbs and aching joints become part of the daily routine. It is surprising how early on in the game that it feels like those New Year’s hangovers are lasting until some time in early February.

Nor is that the only reminder that there is plenty of mileage up on the clock. I’m of age when I am starting to hear the umpteenth cover version of various songs from my youth.

Meanwhile, I am seeing television series of yesteryear being remade for the third or fourth time. Am I the only person old enough to remember that House of Cards was originally a BBC drama set in the Palace of Westminster?

Exactly the same thing applies when it comes to the big screen. According to reports, remakes of The Bodyguard, Weird Science and An American Werewolf in London are all in development at the moment.

Funny, but it feels to me like it was only yesterday that the original versions were first shown in the cinema. I suppose it is all relative.

But there is, of course, nothing that is more guaranteed to make you feel old than getting a new passport. I have been giving this matter some thought in recent days, largely because mine expired last week and I need to order a new one.

Almost exactly 30 years have passed since I queued for hours on end at the old Molesworth Street office for my very first passport. It was such a landmark moment that I can recall the name of the official who dealt with my application.

Even two full decades after it was last used, I can still see in my mind’s eye the photograph of yours truly in its pages.

To the average observer, I probably would have looked like a typically scruffy teenager who needed a good spell in the Army to straighten him out. But I like to think that the photo also showed a certain brighteyed optimism and spirit of adventure. Best of all, my face still had a visible bone structure.

By the time I got my next passport, I was just about to head off on my first holiday to Italy. I obviously look older in the updated snap, but also – if I may be so bold as to say so – almost dashing.

The haircut is certainly better, and I’m wearing a natty shirt and tie combo. The jowls a little bit fleshier, admittedly, but the cheekbones are still there for all to see.

Things went badly awry with my most recent passport, though. To describe me as looking like a clapped-out old wreck in the mugshot would be putting it kindly. It would probably more accurate to say that I resemble one of the blokes on America’s Most Wanted (if you haven’t seen it, don’t be confused by the name; it isn’t a dating show).

Worse still, I now have to go and get a new picture taken. God only knows what that will look like. But if it anything similar to the reflection I saw in the bathroom mirror shortly before sitting down to write this column, trust me when I say it won’t be a pretty sight.

Still, I suppose that’s what you call a first-world problem. My more pressing concern at the moment is that I won’t have enough reading material to bring with me on holidays.

I’d actually put aside a handful of books for that very purpose. But I am already halfway through one of them and itching to get stuck into the next – and the holiday is still weeks away.

Every cloud has a silver living, though. I’d never have thought there was a saving grace to the short-term memory loss that also comes as part of the ageing process.

But there is. I’ll probably have totally forgotten even reading the books by the time it comes to packing my bucket and spade.