“So how will you celebrate
your big day?”
Anne smiled at Agnes. The smile put wrinkles around the grey eyes.
Carmel winced.
“Oh please,
don’t talk about it. Forty years old. It is hardly something to celebrate, is
it?
Anne leaned
backwards. They were sitting in her kitchen, having afternoon tea together. Like
they did every Wednesday.
“Well, it’s
better than the alternative”, she said, with the calm voice Carmel recognized
from her childhood, when Anne’s house had been her second home.
“I know, I
know. I am happy to be alive and healthy. But knowing that from
now on it will all go downhill… I don’t know, I find it scary. From now on my
health will get worse, my parents will need more and more help - they are
almost as old as you are – and if I want to change careers it will be hard.”
Anne put
her thick grey hair behind her ear, still smiling.
“I know, Carmel
continued, “that it seems silly to say that to you. How old are you now?”
“Oh, old enough
not to count. Forty-eight is all I remember.”
“Forty-eight?
You are in your seventies, aren’t you?”
“Yes, I
suppose I am, I was born in nineteen forty-eight so… seventy-one this year.”
“Well, isn’t
lonely to be without your parents? And then your hip…”
“I have
never been happier.”
Carmel’s
eyes widened.
“Really?”
“I used to
worry so much. I don’t worry anymore. There is no point. So, I will die soon?
What else is new? Meanwhile I can enjoy being with my grandchildren.”
Carmel let
her finger trace the rim of the teacup. Anne sensed her embarrassment and gently
caressed her hand.
“I felt the same when I was your age. I was worried about growing old. If I had known then how much I would enjoy it, I could have saved myself so much worry.”
Photo by Italo Melo from Pexels
Jeffrey
Kluger wrote in TIME about “The surprising joy of old age”. Psychologists and
other investigators have found that old age is often a time defined not by
sorrow, dread and regret but rather by peace, gratitude and fulfillment. They
conclude that seniors become masters of “terror management theory”.
How about
not waiting until you get old?
Stop
worrying and make the most of what you have here and now!
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