I am not sure exactly when it was — maybe a few weeks, maybe a month or more — but there I was at the Malibu CVS, glancing over the magazine racks. In a rag that made the National Enquirer look like the New York Times, a prominent cover of longtime resident and “Mary Poppins,” “Night at the Museum” star Dick Van Dyke was on display.
“Unrecognizable beyond belief,” it blared! No doubt photo-shopped was the worst picture of Dick I had ever laid eyes on. In fact, I had a hard time believing this was my friend and longtime neighbor. “Days Numbered,” “On the Way Out” and similar rants, the headlines screamed.
I thought to myself “Really? I just saw him at the gym today, pumping iron and dancing a jig.”
I didn’t think much of it until the following week when my husband and I were at the PCH health facility as usual at 6:30 to 7:00 a.m., and all was well.
We were riding our bikes and Dick was on the exercise machine. Being so early, there was no music on, that is, until my husband said, “Wait a minute. Let me turn on his favorite channel and he’ll be whistling in no time.”
Sure enough, within minutes Dick was chirping away like a songbird and doing a little Kansas City shuffle to boot, all to an audience of two.
Dick and I share the same birthday (but not year), and I run into my spry 90-year-old pal all over town, from the gym to the pharmacy to the grocery story. He is forever friendly, gracious and upbeat.
It’s no wonder he has penned a book about the secrets to his success. The name of the recently released tome is hardly surprising — “Keep Moving.”
“They asked me to do it and I figured why not,” he told Malibu Seen. “I think it came out pretty well.”
I asked him if the title was the secret to a long, healthy life.
“Oh, yeah,” he said. “That’s my secret. Just keep moving your feet and keep going.”
In the world, according to DVD, no matter what your age, you gotta dance and gotta sing. Dick recently performed at Disneyland and regularly puts on a show with his band, “Dick Van Dyke and the Vantastix.”
I am not a family member or a 50-year pal like director Carl Reiner. But I will say my pal Dick is on to something, especially when he said, “The point is to find something you enjoy doing and do it.”
Just keep moving. Got it!
SPEAKING OF SOLID GOLD
Stay tuned to CNN because Malibu’s Tom Hanks and Gary Goetzman are back with another slice of history: “The Eighties.”
They’ve brought us peace and love, anti-war demos, the British invasion and cultural revolution of the 1960s, and the Watergate crazy disco, “love to love you, baby” era of “The Seventies.”
Now, they’re back for more, bringing a more recent blast to the past in “The Eighties.” So grab your shoulder pads, dust off the old Beta Max. Think “Dynasty” and get ready for another trip down memory lane!