Old

At a certain point, you get old. You wear trousers instead of jeans, you tuck your shirt in, your hair starts to thin. You forget about becoming a pilot or a artist or a movie star and you work for a bank, a real estate comany, a hotel. You don on an aloha shirt and spend your days either staring at a computer screen or schmoozing the higher-ups, sometimes both.

Such was the group of individuals gathered at the Hapuna Beach Prince Resort yesterday for the First Hawaiian Bank Economic Outlook conference.

Before the conference started, the key speaker, the bank's media person, and some businessman gathered in the room and contemplated the fauna-inspired carpet. One cluster of long, pointed leaves in particular had them especially intrigued.

"Wow that really looks like....you know," said the media person, who had thinning white hair, spectacules and a wide, somewhat flat, face.

"I was just about to say that," laughed the key speaker, who also had white hair and glasses. His face was rounder, but so was his stomach. "How many leaves does marijuana have anyway?"

"Oh-ho-ho!" exclaimed the businessman, also white-haired, but without glasses. "Leave me out of this conversation!"

"Well I guess we wouldn't know how many leaves it has anyway," the key speaker chuckled. "I never saw it in this form anyway."

More good-humored innuendos about pot-smoking and then the audience began filtering in. The key speaker, who'd been delivering the bank's economic forecast for 15 years, looked mildly disappointed. He sighed and wandered towards his seat with an air of resignation. "This really gets old after awhile."