Aging Well: Maui man is first-time father at age 75
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KIHEI, Hawaii (KITV) — An an age when some people are becoming grandparents, or even great-grandparents, a Maui man became a father for the first time. Shep Gordon is 75 and his son is eight-months-old.
Meet the Gordon family: Dad Shep, 42-year-old mom Katie, and little Benjamin Robert Gordon. Shep and Katie say it was a lucky bounce to have Benjamin in the pandemic.
“It turned out well because I got to spend all my time with the baby. It was a blessing in disguise. If it was normal times, we’d have been traveling, people over,” Shep says.
“We always have so much going on. Even though we’ve spent the last year in a pandemic and haven’t had the social life we once had, we’ve got this beautiful boy we’re chasing around now because he’s starting to stand up,” agrees Katie.
Shep works part-time as a manager for rock star Alice Cooper, and co-owns a restaurant, Humble Market Kitchin, with Roy Yamaguchi. His full-time job now, he laughs, is as a dad. “Everything else is secondary,” he says.
Shep says he always wanted a child of his own, but the time wasn’t right. As he sees it, “I love babies, and it was an experience I hadn’t had. In the end, what is life all about?” Gordon has four adopted children but this is his first biological child.
Shep has many life lessons he wants to teach Benjamin, like: “It’s more important what you think, than how you look. You’re more beautiful by your thoughts than you are the perfect haircut.”
But he’s also learning from his young son. “I’m acutely aware, particularly from having the baby, of how finite life is. I know I won’t be here to see his graduation from college,” he admits.
So Shep appreciates every moment in the present. “I think gratitude is the key to happiness,” he shares.
And there may be more to be grateful for in the near future. They are thinking about having a second child. Shep reveals, “We did in-vitro, so we have a girl in the freezer, so to speak. We’re thinking about bringing that to life.”
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