Madeline
Rookie
- Banned
- #1
In a few more years I will be sixty, which is unimaginable to me. In my head, I am still 19. If you had asked me back in the day what life at sixty would be like, I would never have guessed this.
For sure, there are losses due to aging. Physically I'm not the woman I was at 19...or 39..or....49. If I have one serious regret, it is that I did not work harder to save my strength and flexibility. Yes, I know I could gain back ground...but I also never knew it could change this much.
But there have also been gains. When I was 19, my big concern about men was "does he like me"? But at 55-ish, it's totally different...it is not my job to figure out what he likes...my job is to figure out what I like. And that's not an easy thing to do. The same effort is required to find joy in work, clients, homes and so on.
At 19, I was very idealistic, and one of my values was what we called "anti-materialism". Meaning we looked down on the rich and swore never to be one. I got that nonsense out of head at 25, when my kidlet was born. If you can't pay for the doctor your child needs, you know things must change.
But it doesn't stop at "enough money". Soon, the need to pay for medical care is supplanted by the "need" to buy the child anything and everything they want or you want them to want. Somewhere around 40 I looked around and decided that past a point, money was just not a motivator for me. If you're driving a Volvo but grieving because you cannot afford a Porsche...that's a mistake, I think.
There is not a single thing I have ever bought that today brings me joy. If the house caught fire, I'd take photos, short stories and paintings -- but never, ever anything that insurance could replace.
I have regrets of course, but I'm more or less past grieving over them. The rest of my life is much more interesting to me than the past. I have lived long enough to know that no matter what I have done, thought of doing, or not done....someone else has committed greater sins. I don't care how twisted and sick you are...there is someone else who makes you look like a school crossing guard.
It's far too late for any man to be the complete center of my world. Maybe it was too late for me to place a man in the Center of My Universe even at 19. I have too many people I love and issues I care about and beauty and art that move me to sweep all of it aside and just focus on him. I trust my friends more than I do my lovers, and I expect my friends to be permanent parts of my life...I have not felt like that about a lover in years.
So much of life is appealing that I am only willing to sample the finest from here on out. I cannot spare the time or energy for a bad relationship, because there is far too much else of great joy on offer. If I knew today I'd never have another lover I'd be sad...but if I knew I had to have even one more relationship in which I had to pretend he was someone other than who he is, I'd be truely anquishedl.
I do not yearn for a long, long life. I have some poor health habits, like smoking, but even though I know that smoking may shorten my life I am unwilling to be enslaved to the hope of the most distant date of death possible. I don't know many people in their 90's with a great quality of life...and a decade of languishing holds no appeal for me. Smoking has always brought me pleasure, and trying to quit has always been terribly painful. I just do not see the point of living in distress.
Aging has not disfigured me all that much....mainly I have a squishy body, almost like a baby's. It has not made me sexually irrelevant. By now I know, no matter what, there will always be someone (likely a gaggle of someones) who wants me. The fact is I may not want any of them...but no one, regardless of any feature of their lives or selves, is utterly without lustful admirers. Even death row inmates have their ardent suitors.
Time has taught me that sorrow is the gate to joy, to growth, to knowledge, to beauty. When I have been terribly sad I have developed a capacity for joy I never could have if I were constantly contented. I have also learned that life is change. If you're happy today...it will change someday...and you will be sad. If you are sad...you will eventually be happy. If you are in a great relationship...eventually it will end, if only by death. If you are single...the odds are you will one day be involved again.
During far too much of my life, I was motivated by fear. Because I envisioned terrible things happening if I chose to act, I remained passive. But almost without exception, most things I feared so deeply happened anyway. Not only did I survive them, but many have brought me joy I never even suspected could be had. Fear -- in the absence of danger -- is a foolish, wasteful thing.
Will I ever fall in love again? Maybe not...I don't fall easily. I don't worry about it. I think if someone wonderful came along I'd have the sense to reach out, but living alone and being single has brought me great peace and comfort I would not have if I were involved.
If you worry about growing old, and you are younger than I, it may comfort you to know that life at 50 or 60 is an adventure and offers freedoms and securities you do not have today. I very strongly suspect that this trend continues into the 70's and beyond as well. A sixty year old has more in common with a 19 year old than a 30 year old would have, because (most times) both are responsible only for themselves, and both have lives constrained only by their own rules.
Age is not "just a number" and I'd be lying if I said I never wished for the body and the opportunities I had at 19. Still in all, I am not wistful for my 30's or 40's...decades in my life when work and parenthood had me stressed out all the time. I get to be selfish again, and it's wonderful.
[ame=http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=GRbtVpMn43I]YouTube - John Lee Hooker - Rock Me Baby[/ame]
For sure, there are losses due to aging. Physically I'm not the woman I was at 19...or 39..or....49. If I have one serious regret, it is that I did not work harder to save my strength and flexibility. Yes, I know I could gain back ground...but I also never knew it could change this much.
But there have also been gains. When I was 19, my big concern about men was "does he like me"? But at 55-ish, it's totally different...it is not my job to figure out what he likes...my job is to figure out what I like. And that's not an easy thing to do. The same effort is required to find joy in work, clients, homes and so on.
At 19, I was very idealistic, and one of my values was what we called "anti-materialism". Meaning we looked down on the rich and swore never to be one. I got that nonsense out of head at 25, when my kidlet was born. If you can't pay for the doctor your child needs, you know things must change.
But it doesn't stop at "enough money". Soon, the need to pay for medical care is supplanted by the "need" to buy the child anything and everything they want or you want them to want. Somewhere around 40 I looked around and decided that past a point, money was just not a motivator for me. If you're driving a Volvo but grieving because you cannot afford a Porsche...that's a mistake, I think.
There is not a single thing I have ever bought that today brings me joy. If the house caught fire, I'd take photos, short stories and paintings -- but never, ever anything that insurance could replace.
I have regrets of course, but I'm more or less past grieving over them. The rest of my life is much more interesting to me than the past. I have lived long enough to know that no matter what I have done, thought of doing, or not done....someone else has committed greater sins. I don't care how twisted and sick you are...there is someone else who makes you look like a school crossing guard.
It's far too late for any man to be the complete center of my world. Maybe it was too late for me to place a man in the Center of My Universe even at 19. I have too many people I love and issues I care about and beauty and art that move me to sweep all of it aside and just focus on him. I trust my friends more than I do my lovers, and I expect my friends to be permanent parts of my life...I have not felt like that about a lover in years.
So much of life is appealing that I am only willing to sample the finest from here on out. I cannot spare the time or energy for a bad relationship, because there is far too much else of great joy on offer. If I knew today I'd never have another lover I'd be sad...but if I knew I had to have even one more relationship in which I had to pretend he was someone other than who he is, I'd be truely anquishedl.
I do not yearn for a long, long life. I have some poor health habits, like smoking, but even though I know that smoking may shorten my life I am unwilling to be enslaved to the hope of the most distant date of death possible. I don't know many people in their 90's with a great quality of life...and a decade of languishing holds no appeal for me. Smoking has always brought me pleasure, and trying to quit has always been terribly painful. I just do not see the point of living in distress.
Aging has not disfigured me all that much....mainly I have a squishy body, almost like a baby's. It has not made me sexually irrelevant. By now I know, no matter what, there will always be someone (likely a gaggle of someones) who wants me. The fact is I may not want any of them...but no one, regardless of any feature of their lives or selves, is utterly without lustful admirers. Even death row inmates have their ardent suitors.
Time has taught me that sorrow is the gate to joy, to growth, to knowledge, to beauty. When I have been terribly sad I have developed a capacity for joy I never could have if I were constantly contented. I have also learned that life is change. If you're happy today...it will change someday...and you will be sad. If you are sad...you will eventually be happy. If you are in a great relationship...eventually it will end, if only by death. If you are single...the odds are you will one day be involved again.
During far too much of my life, I was motivated by fear. Because I envisioned terrible things happening if I chose to act, I remained passive. But almost without exception, most things I feared so deeply happened anyway. Not only did I survive them, but many have brought me joy I never even suspected could be had. Fear -- in the absence of danger -- is a foolish, wasteful thing.
Will I ever fall in love again? Maybe not...I don't fall easily. I don't worry about it. I think if someone wonderful came along I'd have the sense to reach out, but living alone and being single has brought me great peace and comfort I would not have if I were involved.
If you worry about growing old, and you are younger than I, it may comfort you to know that life at 50 or 60 is an adventure and offers freedoms and securities you do not have today. I very strongly suspect that this trend continues into the 70's and beyond as well. A sixty year old has more in common with a 19 year old than a 30 year old would have, because (most times) both are responsible only for themselves, and both have lives constrained only by their own rules.
Age is not "just a number" and I'd be lying if I said I never wished for the body and the opportunities I had at 19. Still in all, I am not wistful for my 30's or 40's...decades in my life when work and parenthood had me stressed out all the time. I get to be selfish again, and it's wonderful.
[ame=http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=GRbtVpMn43I]YouTube - John Lee Hooker - Rock Me Baby[/ame]
...................4 years of trade school
