Getting Old Without Grace.
Something terrible happened in my kitchen. Usually a place of safety and predictability, something absolutely horrible happened.
I couldn’t read the soup can. I needed to see if this soup required the addition of a can of water and out of nowhere the letters disappeared into a fuzz ball.
I was not ready for this development. I mean, sure, I’d noticed it was getting tougher to read some things. I’d get some cheaters I’d bought primarily as a fashion accessory and read the fine print – named precisely because it’s hard to read, right?
But this was a can of SOUP. A can that wasn’t particularly small or covered in fine print.
Right at that moment I realized something.
I’m getting old.
Okay, not old. Older. After all, it’ll take a while to actually get there, right?
Ha.
I always imagined that I’d grow old gracefully, accepting my gray hair and wrinkles as they came along. I’d celebrate each one as a badge of honor, experience manifested on my body in a natural way.
It’s amazing how delusional you can be in your 20s.
The “aging gracefully” bit lasted about a year. To be fair I was going gray a little early, but I was no more accepting of the crow’s feet and wrinkles when they had to gall to show up.
Out came the hair dye, magic lotions, and virtually any other product with the words “age” and “defying” in the description.
I went from the “graceful plan” to the “kicking and screaming plan,” complete with hands gripping the doorframe.
I suppose it came as a shock because we do have such young children. Our life is filled with kid pursuits, with soccer balls, trampolines, swings, slides and toys with much assembly required.
You feel young with little kids around, at least until something rolls under the couch. Or you have to read the instructions to assemble some toy. Or you think all the music they listen to is awful.
So I pulled out my fashionable cheaters (which my daughter loves to wear, ironically), and read that no water was required for the soup.
Now I have to carry these things around with me. Half the time I forget my earrings – how am I going to remember these things? Isn’t memory the next to go?
At least I think that’s what they say…
Yikes!
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