Yesterday I turned 37 and it set me to thinking... when did birthdays go from being exciting to unimportant? I think it must have been when my daughter was born... a complete alteration of perspective. I'm just marking time, while she's growing and learning.
I had several people say to me,"Wow. I didn't think you were that old!" which I know was meant as a compliment, even if it was a little back handed. In truth, minus the arthritis, I don't feel 37; perhaps that makes the difference. I'm still me. The same person I was when I was my daughter's age... and that always comes as a surprise to me. Maybe it was all the reading as a child, but I always thought when I grew up I'd be different, feel different, grow into a different character? (I'm not sure I'm explaining it all that well.) I think the only sad thing about getting older is realizing I'll never be able to know it all... I can't learn everything, but it won't stop me from trying.
The physicality of getting older doesn't bother me yet (except the arthritis, but that I've had for years). The 'will I die my hair when there are too many grey's to yank out' bit, the shape of my body, none of it seems all that important in the grand scheme of things. Although, every once in a while I look in the mirror and for a flicker of a second I see Gaius in my reflection.
Is that what it means to grow old gracefully? I don't know that 37 can be considered old enough to count towards that particular expression, but I certainly see it dawning on the horizon.
Thinking about all this had the start of a Lewis Carroll poem rattling around in my head all day yesterday, and my new found appreciation for it made me smile:
"You are old, Father William," the young man said,"And your hair has become very white;And yet you incessantly stand on your head—Do you think, at your age, it is right?"
"In my youth," Father William replied to his son,"I feared it might injure the brain;But now that I'm perfectly sure I have none,Why, I do it again and again."
