It’s Just A Number

“67 sounds old!”

I pointed out it was not much older than 66, but my friend said it sounded a lot older! I can’t argue that. Perhaps it is the hard seven rather than the sibilant six.

This past week a neighbor turned 67 and I pointed it out to him. He smiled politely but I think he might have felt that he could have gone the rest of his life without that news.

My husband was 67 when I married him. I thought it was an interesting number but do not remember giving it too much weight. I was SO MUCH younger that his age did not seem all that important.  At the time I figured we would maybe have 10 or 15 years to enjoy. We lucked out and got 26. Our personal final numbers were a lot higher than anticipated.

Age is a construct. Simply a measuring tool we utilize to get through life. The age you need to be to go to school, get a driver’s license, graduate from various schools. Back in the day I had friends who said they were getting married because they were 25, which seemed odd to me because if you just waited you would only be a bit older. You cannot be President until you are 35, but currently we seem to think we must at least double that. People talk of feeling old at 30 or 40. Fifty was a tough one for me. Like 67, it sounded old and then one day someone asked me to do something and I thought “I don’t have to do that, I’m 50!”

On our last big trip with my husband, my girlfriend and I figured out that if we jerked our thumb in the general direction of the car and said, “He’s 90” we could pretty much park anywhere we wanted in England, Scotland, or Ireland.

My mother once told me when I was in my 30s and she in her 60s, that the strangest thing about aging is that you do not have any sensation of it on the inside. You are always some other age that is considerably younger. She was right.

My husband tried to broker a deal with me at the end of his life. He said he wanted 15 more years. I wish I could have granted them, but I pointed out he was 93 and that would make him 108. “It’s just a number Babe! Don’t focus on the number.”

Evidently, I don’t. I heard a story about a man in therapy that was 70 and my thought was what would an old guy care about that for?  Then I realized that I was speaking of a contemporary, not a fogey. Working on picking a number for me but maybe I will just stop thinking about it and be any age that fits the moment.