GETTING "OLD"

 Ask anyone over the age of 40 . . .  Yes, I said "FORTY" . . . they will tell you getting "old" sucks.  

Before 40 life is full of exciting adventures.  Falling in love, children, fullfilling careers, travel and all sorts of good things to fill our days.  Then one day you realize you can't read the small print on anything smaller than a bill board on the side of the road.  You go to the market and can't read the ingredients on a can of mixed vegetables. You go to a restaurant and if the lighting in the place is any less than the five thousand watt halogen lights in a Major League Baseball stadium you can't read the menu. You find yourself looking around to see if anyone else is using their cell phone flash light to illuminate their menu.  Suddenly driving at night becomes an issue. There are all sorts of little indications that your eyes are NOT what they used to be.                                                                                                                                   

Next thing to go is your hearing.  People no longer speak clearly, everyone "mumbles". The TV suddenly isn't loud enough for you to catch all the dialogue and your kids all speak too quickly and quietly. You are now asking people to repeat what they said or you are getting very good at reading lips. If none of that works you find yourself just nodding and agreeing with everything because you have no idea what was being said. As a result you are now the president of the PTO in your kids school.                                    

Add to all that your body decides it no longer wants to function as well as it used to.  You have aches and pains in the oddest places and your stomach no longer wants to digest Mexican food or any other food for that matter.  You are now spending a ridiculous amount of money on toilet paper each month and less money on food.                                                                                                                                          

Your body temperature refuses to remain a constant 97.4 degrees. If you're a woman you are either freezing or roasting.  There is no happy medium. It is either one extreme or the other.                           

Things that used to be fun are now a chore. I actually remember enjoying cooking. Finding new recipes to make for dinner or guests. Spending hours in the kitchen preparing a meal was fun. That ship has sailed! Now I want to order take out or just not eat because I can't stand being in the kitchen. (I literally can't stand without my back aching so that adds to the fun of spending hours on your feet preparing food.)      

And of course there is the whole sleep or lack of sleep issue. I can fall asleep in a chair at two in the afternoon but come eleven o'clock at night I am wide awake.  If I do fall asleep I wake up forty two times because I have to pee. There is no comfortable spot in the bed and it is either too hot or too cold.                        

The ultimate indignity is your hair.  If you are a man your hair decides it no longer wants to reside on your head. As it slowly disappears from your scalp it begins to flourish in your ears and nostrils. (I think I have actually seen men trying to do a "comb over" from their ears).  If you are a woman you have the opposite problem.  The hair not only continues to grow on your head it also begins to grow on your chin and upper lip. Suddenly you find yourself morphing into your great grandfather Luigi who sported a handlebar mustache and beard. 

All of this is because you have now entered the TWILIGHT ZONE !  You have no idea how or why this is all happening but you do know you don't like it. Who ever coined the phrase "Twilight years" had no idea just how right they were.

As the years pass things continue to get worse and worse until you find yourself telling people things like, "Don't get old", "This growing old stuff is for the birds" or "Just wait till you get to be my age, then you'll see what I'm talking about".  All this is understandable considering it is un chartered territory so every thing that now happens is unexpected and unwanted.  No one wants aches and pains. No one wants to walk with a cane or walker. No one wants to take 14 different pills each day. It just isn't natural.

But it IS !  It is a fact that we can't stop time. As the years, days, hours pass we grow older. Can't stop it, Can't change it. You, Me, We are ALL in this together and aging isn't something you can bypass unless you really prefer to die at 27 just so you don't ever have to feel old.  I personally enjoy being alive, even with all the "charming" adventures it brings.  Each day is a gift . . . some days I would prefer not to open that gift but then I think of all I would miss. As I sit here under the big maple tree here on The Man's farm I am not pain free but the aches and pains that have become a regular part of my aging life are nothing compared to the serenity I feel. The warm sun, the gentle breeze, the birds chirping all overshadow everything else that is going on in my life.  Sitting here reminds me of how much I am blessed and I wouldn't change that for the world.  

There are plenty of times in our daily old lives that we think we just can't put up with the aches, pains, worries and whatever but we CAN. We can, we do and we will because there is always SOMETHING that makes us know we would rather be here.   

I totally believe there is a God and Heaven. I know that once my days are done here on Earth there is a much better place that I will go but until that time I want to appreciate and enjoy every second of being alive and being old even though I REALLY am NOT old YET.