Ten Things You Might Not Know About Aging

1. Certain brain cells (in the memory department) retire around the age of 60. Recently I took my recipe file box(es) to Michigan but left several desired recipe cards (from the files) “back home in Indiana” on the kitchen counter. So something definitely went haywire there.
2. Wrinkles are no longer wrinkles once they evolve into loose pleats and swags. In the neck area. And maybe other places, too. Which I won’t bother to mention.
3. In regard to the aforementioned wrinkles, it’s handy to have a husband who sees through the same visual lenses he had when he was 18. He keeps telling me I look like a sweet young thing. I think he’s schmoozing me. Whatever.
4. Birds of a feather flock together. Our flock of friends is a bunch of old (but gracious and sweet) coots/geezers and biddies/broads. Do you think such categorization might be considered slanderous?? Just remember: it takes one to know one.
5. Dry skin in the winter takes on new meaning when fingertips develop Mesa Verde cracks and legs are covered with fish scales. Or alligator leggings. Or something else reptilian. Take your pick.
6. A senior equation: holiday food + indulgence = regret. Another senior equation: grandchildren – responsibility = delight.
7. It is possible to consume two full glasses of Blue Heron (a white wine) on an empty stomach without feeling the least bit blue (i.e. melancholoy) - before, during, or after. This is sheer evidence that with age we become numb.
8. I recently realized if someone would ask me what I wanted to do, or where I wanted to go, or what I wanted to have, I’d be tongue-tied. DUH. I guess that means I’ve done, seen, and had the critical things. Or else I’ve lived in a bubble. Or maybe I only need some new catalogs. (Just kidding.)
9. There is no possible way for old people to keep up with newfangled technology. It changes at warp speed, and old-fart brains are simply missing the techno-synapses the younger folks have through evolutionary progression. So, young whipper-snappers, cut us some slack. We’re not faking our incompetence – it’s the real thing.
10. Old age is pretty slick since you can completely shed the tough stuff of younger years. Like that first year (decade?) of marriage. Or delivering babies. Or redefining for posterity what it means to be THE Super Woman of the century (shudder). Or pretending/controlling/fearing/bludgeoning (all of the above) your way through life like a chameleon drama queen.

You might ask, is there a summary statement? I’ll let George Burns (is my age showing?) have the honors. “When I was young I was called a rugged individualist. When I was in my fifties I was considered eccentric. Here I am doing and saying the same things I did then and I’m labeled senile.”