Is aging all in the mind? I am surprised that I’m 75 and still feel so interested in life. I thought that 75 was old when my grandmother was this age, but now I see “old” as people well into their 80s. Even so I had two gardener friends who dug and planted when they were well past 85.
I do notice that I feel wise compared with anyone under 50, but I think that is really just having lots more experiences than they (and learning from them).
The greatest thing about getting old is that you can do the things you like to do when you want to do them.
I think I’m a do-er because my parents were do-ers. My mom moved to Florida when she was 60 and started a grandmothers’ bowling league. Then she became president of the newcomers’ club while organizing the cancer fund drive.
In the past 10 years, I’ve had time to start a non-profit group, Homesharing for Seniors, and organize 36 gardeners to establish a wildflower sanctuary and then a garden club.
When I attended my 50th high school graduation reunion I joined a whole dance floor full of really expert dancers. Our bodies had thickened, but we seemed to effortlessly slip back into that time when graceful closeness on the dance floor was the rule.
My best friends from the reunion group stayed overnight at the hotel where the party was held and met for breakfast the next morning. The same organizers who ran things during our high school years expertly decided how we’d put tables together to fit our group. The same followers sat where they were told. Among us was one fanatic Cubs fan, two world travelers and an expert antiques collector.
We don’t change personalities when we get older, I’ve discovered. We just become more set in whatever our ways were.
The former editor in chief of our high school newspaper (I was the features editor) has had to be attached to an oxygen tank for the past six years, yet continues to cook expertly for her nearby family, write her memoirs, convert the family movies to videos and correspond by e-mail with those who are far away, all the while keeping her same cheery outlook we all remember.
If by some wild chance someone would ask me how to age joyfully, I’d say, “Take what you have and run with it.”
