This is 68: Sal Cataldi Responds to The Oldster Magazine Questionnaire
"Isn’t that what retired folks should do: divide their time between taking each other to various doctor’s appointments and early bird specials?"
From the time I was 10, I’ve been obsessed with what it means to grow older. I’m curious about what it means to others, of all ages, and so I invite them to take “The Oldster Magazine Questionnaire.”
Here, writer, musician, and retired PR executive responds. - Sari Botton
Sal Cataldi is a writer and musician living in the Hudson Valley. For three decades before his retirement in 2021, he was the president of a NYC-based public relations firm whose clients included AMC, IFC, IMAX, WWE, Comcast, Tanqueray, and Entenmann’s. For two decades before his move to the Hudson Valley in 2017, Sal and his two children lived on a houseboat in Long Island while he led the corporate life with a busy sideline in music. It was an intriguing lifestyle that was profiled in The New York Times.
Since he departed the PR world, Sal has been freed to increase his focus on his writing and music making. His articles have been regularly featured in The New York Times, Rolling Stone, PopMatters, Huff Post, Inside+Out Upstate NY, and other media. On the musical front, he keeps up a busy live performance schedule and has released over 20 critically acclaimed recordings with his solo project Spaghetti Eastern Music, the poetry/music duo Vapor Vespers, the ambient guitar duo Guitars A Go Go, the psych-rock quartet Spaceheater, and the jazz outfit the Hari Karaoke Trio of Doom. In 2024, he launched Reading Is Funktamental, a podcast about books and music that has included guests like indie rocker Robyn Hitchcock, Traffic’s Dave Mason, Moon Zappa, and Roxy Music’s Phil Manzanera. His writings can be found here: https://muckrack.com/sal-cataldi
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How old are you?
68. And yes, I can’t believe it.
Is there another age you associate with yourself in your mind? If so, what is it? And why, do you think?
Not really, as I have always tried to remain in the present, but my most commonly remembered dream regards sitting at my desk in class at my old Catholic grammar school. I was about 7 and can still feel the itch from the gray woolen uniform pants like it was yesterday! Sometimes, I dream about being there and realizing I am not wearing pants! I can also remember the gaze of the scary nuns when I would screw up diagramming sentences. Those nuns were big on grammar.
I also associate a lot with being around 13 or 14, when I discovered the guitar and got a bit independent—staying out late with my friends, taking the subway from Queens to Manhattan to go to our first concerts or weird art films at the Elgin Theater. That was the time when a lot of my ideas about what I wanted to do with my life were formed.
Do you feel old for your age? Young for your age? Just right? Are you in step with your peers?
After the 15 minutes of aches and pains in the morning, I feel pretty young for my age. I like to stay active (too active in the words of my partner) with morning runs, writing for various publications, and recording and playing music. In 2024, I played 78 gigs with multiple bands, way more than in my rocker youth, and published over 70 stories.
I had a very high-velocity career running a boutique PR firm for 35 years, so I like to stay busy and feel I’m being productive, setting and reaching new goals. I find a lot of my peers are the same way now. Some may have been lucky enough to retire and now throw themselves into their creative passions, ones that they may have had to delay earlier in life, like painting, writing and like.
What do you like about being your age?
The wisdom you get from going around the sun so many times. I realize that bad and good times are largely temporary, so I worry less about things in general, or, at least, I try to.
I know that my time here is finite, so I concentrate on doing what gives me the most pleasure and satisfaction, creatively and in terms of family and friends. I do generally say “yes” to too many things, and I am working on that a bit, being a little more selective with how I spend my time.
I associate a lot with being around 13 or 14, when I discovered the guitar and got a bit independent—staying out late with my friends, taking the subway from Queens to Manhattan to go to our first concerts or weird art films at the Elgin Theater. That was the time when a lot of my ideas about what I wanted to do with my life were formed.
What is difficult about being your age?
Aside from looking in the mirror every morning? I would say it’s health—my own, and that of those around me. In that regard, I have been fortunate, but at this age, you have to wonder when the shoe will drop!
It’s also difficult to realize where we are as a society these days. I came of age in the 60s and 70s. I guess I drank the Kool-Aid of the fantastic future I saw as a kid visiting the 1964/65 World’s Fair—briefcases that would turn into flying cars, and also the peace and love hippie thing.
I think I grew up in a time of optimism about the future—we had President John F. Kennedy, Martin Luther King, Jr., leaders who at least spoke to and appealed to our higher selves. Maybe it was a bit of positive propaganda, but it was way better than all the negativity dished out on social media, 24-hour news, etc, and by the incoming political regime. It seems like it’s a global psyop designed to generate fear and a sense of hopelessness—that a person is powerless to change things. You can at least start with yourself, turn off the monkey mind, and realize you have the power to tune it out and get on with that which is positive and brings joy to you, your loved ones, and society.
What is surprising about being your age, or different from what you expected, based on what you were told?
The fact that I am here. My father died of pancreatic cancer in a matter of four months when I was 6 and he was only 35. So, naturally, I always felt that I also wouldn’t enjoy a long life. He was a first-generation Italian-American who worked very hard and had a lot of dreams he didn’t live to see. That’s why I was always doing so many things at once.
I’ve traveled extensively and had been writing and playing music, although I had another career, a business to run, and two children to raise. Still being here, living to collect Social Security and see my two kids grow to adulthood, is the biggest surprise.
What has aging given you? Taken away from you?
Lots of wisdom and experience, the good and some bad, that I learned to navigate. Learning to surf life’s up and downs is the greatest gift. It’s taken away a lot of my hair and too many people I love and miss.
How has getting older affected your sense of yourself, or your identity?
You should become more confident and comfortable in your skin as you age. You should know who you are, and if you’re not a fool, you realize you should love yourself and stop beating yourself up. I feel I followed the path I set out for myself when I was younger regarding my identity—to do something creative for a living and take care of business—my family, and my finances.
After the 15 minutes of aches and pains in the morning, I feel pretty young for my age. In 2024, I played 78 gigs with multiple bands, way more than in my rocker youth, and published over 70 stories. I had a very high-velocity career running a boutique PR firm for 35 years, so I like to stay busy and feel I’m being productive, setting and reaching new goals.
What are some age-related milestones you are looking forward to? Or ones you “missed,” and might try to reach later, off-schedule, according to our culture and its expectations?
If it's in the cards, I look forward to being a grandparent someday. I was looking forward to retirement, as I had a lot of interests. I still wanted to have the time to fully explore, which I am doing now with a lot of gusto.
What has been your favorite age so far, and why? Would you go back to this age if you could?
This is the best age. As long as one is healthy, has a good relationship, passions, and enough financial stability, this is the best age. But there is something wonderful and scary about your early- to mid-20s—the immediate post-college years when you hustle to find your place in the world.
My path to a productive professional career took a while, and I struggled a bit then, with little money and weird jobs like selling light bulbs over the phone while playing music for peanuts at the delightful sh*thole clubs in dirty old ‘70s and ‘80s NYC. But the road there, the struggle, is sometimes what you remember and miss the most.
Is there someone who is older than you, who makes growing older inspiring to you? Who is your aging idol and why?
In 2022, Josh Sapan, a former client and cable TV executive, a friend of mine, wrote an excellent book called The Third Act: Reinventing Your Next Chapter. It contains the stories of 60 people, some well-known celebrities and many more unknowns, who are using this chapter of their lives to do amazing things, from a former Black Panther who started a community theater, to a former marketing exec who launched a stand-up comedy career at 83. From Picasso to Henry Miller, anyone continuing to create as they age is an inspiration.
What aging-related adjustments have you recently made, style-wise, beauty-wise, health-wise?
Since I quit smoking at 29, I’ve been a runner, although a slow one! But I get out most mornings to clear my head and get in a creative headspace for writing and music-making. I was never fast, but now I am genuinely crawling along time-wise. It’s like one of those slow-motion Baywatch jogs on the beach without the sexy. It's essential to keep my weight down, my body warm in the winter, and my mind clear.
My partner, Deb, is very into healthy eating, so now it’s a primarily organic diet with the meat, chicken, and veg we consume. I’m more mindful of my dental and medical care thanks to her. Isn’t that what retired folks should do: divide their time between taking each other to various doctor’s appointments and early bird specials? One adjustment that came with age that I enjoy is rising early. I only need about six hours of sleep and love getting up with the roosters to start my day before the sun rises.
My father died of pancreatic cancer in a matter of four months when I was 6 and he was only 35. So, naturally, I always felt that I also wouldn’t enjoy a long life. He was a first-generation Italian-American who worked very hard and had a lot of dreams he didn’t live to see. That’s why I was always doing so many things at once…Still being here, living to collect Social Security and see my two kids grow to adulthood, is the biggest surprise.
What’s an aging-related adjustment you refuse to make, and why?
I still feel I’m at the age where this hasn’t impacted me yet. I can still be physically active and stay out into the early morning hours playing music. But maybe I can only do the latter for one night, rather than a series of consecutive nights.
What turn of events had the biggest impact on your life? What took your life in a different direction, for better or worse?
The death of my father when I was 6. It made me realize that time was finite and I should do all the things I wanted to do and not wait for tomorrow, because it might never come. I also saw my mother rise to the occasion and raise me and my sister alone. Her courage and resourcefulness had a huge impact.
I was in my mid-40s when I divorced, and the impact of that was both tough and very rewarding in the end. I got the opportunity to raise my kids on my time in my own way, and my ex did likewise, and we both did a good job. They were primarily raised while I lived on a house barge, which was a wonderfully different existence for them, one immortalized by my daughter in her college entrance essay. It also allowed me to do so much with the time when I wasn’t with my children. I have traveled to Asia, South and Central America, and Europe. And I also had the time to devote to music and writing.
What is your number one regret in life? If you could do it all over again, what is the biggest thing you’d do differently?
Sadly, I wasn’t at my mother’s bedside when she passed. I was on the East Coast, and she lived in the Bay Area. Aside from that, there’s nothing that I’d send to rewrite!
There is something wonderful and scary about your early- to mid-20s—the immediate post-college years when you hustle to find your place in the world. My path to a productive professional career took a while, and I struggled a bit then, with little money and weird jobs like selling light bulbs over the phone while playing music for peanuts at the delightful sh*thole clubs in dirty old ‘70s and ‘80s NYC. But the road there, the struggle, is sometimes what you remember and miss the most.
What is high up on your “bucket list?” What do you hope to achieve, attain, or plain enjoy before you die?
I feel I’ve accomplished a lot of what I set out to do, on some level. I want to continue to create and help pass on some wisdom to my children and see them have fulfilling lives full of adventure and love.
Is there a piece of advice you were given, that you live by? If so, what was it, and who offered it to you?
Leave the gun, take the cannolis?
What are your plans for your body when you’re done using it? Burial? Cremation? Body Farm? Other? And what do you expect to happen to your “soul” or “spirit” after you die?
Definitely cremation and storage either in a Medaglia D’Oro coffee can or to be baked into a series of pasta bowls to be given to friends and family. I am a Pastafarian in this life and beyond.
As for where we go when we die, I don’t subscribe to the big guy in the sky who passes judgment. I think we’re probably all part of one organism, matter that gets recycled back into the universe as new humans, animals, plants or things.
One book that had an influence that I think a lot about is Ouspensky’s The Strange Life of Ivan Osokin. It deals with reincarnation, a man who returns to life as a child hoping to win his true love in a second chance at life. As he ages, his memories of his past life dim… and he makes the same mistakes.
What’s your philosophy on celebrating birthdays as an adult? How do you celebrate yours?
I don’t celebrate much at this age anymore. I generally don’t want gifts for birthdays or holidays, as I have everything I need. Anything more will just be more culture. The card and what you write on it is the most important gift. But that said, I did have a couple of great parties thrown for me when I turned 50 and 60. Hopefully, I will be here for one on my 70th birthday.
When it comes to the birthdays of my partners, I like to gift experiences over things. My present partner is a painter, so we will generally head to some far-off museum to see the work of one of her favorites. In 2023, it was Oslo, and in 2024, Florence, Italy, to see retrospectives of the work of her favorite artist, Helen Frankenthaler.
That's my dad! He's as cool as he sounds. :)
I love the description of running like the intro to Baywatch in slow-mo 😁