AGE

We have been knee deep in birthdays around here. I’m about to turn 53. I have reached that stage of the game where I have to admit that the years left to me are less than the years I have been here. I have a very sweet (delusional) baby sister who says I’m still just middle-aged. God bless her but how many 106 year olds do you know running around?
I remember anxiously awaiting my 30th birthday. Somehow I thought that being in my thirties would signify that I was a “grownup”. I loved my thirties. I had “arrived”. Physically I felt great. Spiritually I was strong. I thought that I had learned so many things.
I look back now and think I didn’t know squat! The best and the worst were still yet to come. Here are some of the things I’ve learned:
1. I wish that I had known that the body I disliked in my early years was going to be the body I wish I still had in my 50’s. Lesson learned- accept the body you have now because you’ll wish you still had it when you turn 80.
2. Having wrinkles does NOT mean you won’t still get pimples- an unfairness I intend to talk to God about when I see him.
3. Don’t worry about how you look to your husband when you are naked. Since you will probably be the only naked woman in the room –you look darn good to him!
4. Not being able to see things close up without reading glasses is a good thing. We can’t clearly see our wrinkles and graying hair- a blessing I intend to thank God for when I see him.
5. At a certain age, your body reminds you of every injury or injustice it ever suffered! Payback is a b…. lesson learned- treat your body with great care. That broken leg you had from a ski accident WILL come back to haunt you later on in life.
6. God has an amazing way of keeping us older people humble. He stops us from being insufferable know it alls with a little thing called memory loss.
7. Babies and toddlers are for the young not the young at heart- getting off the couch and up the stairs to investigate their activities takes me ALOT longer than it used to.
8. It is impossible to talk about my private business with the hot doctor who is younger than half of my children!
9. It’s also impossible for someone to push me into something I don’t want- I’ve survived half a century, I can survive you! (I realized this when someone was tailgating me in an effort to make me speed up. I slowed down!)
10. No matter how bad, dark, impossible or never ending a situation might seem, there is always an end. The light does shine again. Time may not heal all wounds but it certainly does ease them.
So, here’s to the next half century- if I learn even half of what I’ve learned so far I’ll be happy. If only I can remember it all!
That’s the view from my side of the street, what’s yours?