Birthdays and aging
We celebrated my mother’s birthday this weekend for the first time in as long as I can remember.
That’s sounds really neglectful and awful, but it really isn’t like that. Mom has never enjoyed birthdays. I remember when she turned thirty she cried. It was such a sad day for her–the thought of aging.
What is ironic is that my mom does not really age, or she shows her age really well and regularly (and sometimes to my chagrin) gets mistaken for my sister rather than my mother.
What is even more ironic is that seeing her struggle against father time has encouraged me to embrace him. I am a realist I guess, but this is the way I see things…
I will never be the size or have the shape I had in high school (or college for that matter), but I can do my best to look as great as I possibly can in the body I have now. Ten years down the road when gravity has wreaked even more havoc on me and my boobs I’ll be wishing I could have this version of my body as well. With that event in mind I will vow to be as comfortable in my skin as I can be. Of course I could also stop rebelling against exercise in all its torturing forms and look better than I ever have.
If the silver hairs that have started to make an appearance amongst my curls in some way represent all the things I have learned and give me some claim to maturity that at 30 I still don’t feel, then I welcome them and even embrace them. To this day I look around me and see people that are only a few years ahead of me in age and I think about how “grown up” they seem when despite all appearance to the contrary I feel like a kid…well a kid with a little direction, but a kid nonetheless.
I don’t think wrinkles are fun for anyone, but they are inevitable. My oil of olay and I plan to engage in a mighty battle against wrinkles but one day they will overcome. So I am going to make my peace with that which I cannot control and say that my life lines (see what I did there? Life lines don’t sound near as daunting as wrinkles) will show the world how much life I have experienced. My hands will show how much of myself I put into each hand knit I ever made. My sorrows and dissapointments as well as all the math I’ve had to do will be etched there in the lines of my forehead. My crows feet will attest to everytime I squinted against the bright sun on a perfect day, and my laugh lines I hope will be the deepest of all my wrinkles. My youth may not be forever but a youthful state of mind is a prize beyond imagining.
Shakespeare said it best…
“Let mirth and laughter let old wrinkles come”
So there it is, my take on age. To my beautiful mom, I love you! This has been an interesting year so far and I’m so happy you decided to embrace life and let us celebrate you. Happy birthday!
Posted in Life in General
May 22nd, 2007 at 10:21 am
My mother has this sign in her house that says,
This has become my new motto.
“Running is hazardous for my health. When I run, my thighs rub together and my crotch sets on fire.”
Mom’s are great! My own mom spent most of my youth taking care of my brother, me and my dad (who was paralyzed due to an aneurysm) . That’s 19some years! Now, she’s able to travel and do something for herself.
I hope your mom had a wonderful birthday, and remind her, you’re as young as you feel.:D
May 22nd, 2007 at 11:32 am
I like to think of wrinkles as the road map to a life.
I’m glad your mom let you celebrate her birthday this year. Belated wishes to her.
May 22nd, 2007 at 3:18 pm
Is that a labrador cake?
Now I’m hungry. Thanks!
May 22nd, 2007 at 3:51 pm
why yes, that is a labrador cake. My mom and dad train labs for hunt tests. They have several but her “baby” is a chocolate lab named Tater.
May 22nd, 2007 at 4:16 pm
Yum, that cake looks yummy! Yum! Cake!
I’m having a hard time concentrating on anything else. Cake!
May 22nd, 2007 at 6:25 pm
A very lovely post! You’re right of course, I just wish that women would embrace the same thought processes as you do. My mother is also afraid to death of aging. I picked up a little bit of that fear but I push it aside. I am still too young to think about what it will be like to be 30 and 40 and so on. I vowed to be comfortable in my own flesh when I am 100. =)
May 22nd, 2007 at 7:30 pm
I so understand your comment about how you see people who are only a few years older than you and they seem so old (but I sometimes feel that people only a few years younger are so young)
I’ve never been one to care about the age (well except for trying to get the big gurl to stop telling everyone). I’m the age I am and there is nothign I can do to stop it. Yummy looking cake - makes me want to go looking for something to eat.
May 24th, 2007 at 5:17 am
Lovely essay. I am looking forward to my greys (although considering how often I dye my hair, I may not ever notice them) as a sign of wisdom and beauty. The lines, however, can stay away for the time being.
I used to have a terrible time with the concept of “adult” - really, really awful. I could never be an “adult” because in my mind, grown-ups acted in X or Y manner and I hadn’t figured out how to attain that perfection and doubted that I ever would. Now I know that no one is perfect. And that I am a grown-up, no matter how child-like and silly and playful I can be at times. That you do not have to exchange one life for another is a very, very liberating thought.