Acting Your Age

Let’s face it. Seniors are often indomitable. If you check out history books or newspapers and  magazines, seniors excel in many things including running a marathon, winning a Nobel prize, and, well, we won’t go into all their achievements. We also do some stupid things like driving without glasses, hunting without a license, climbing a ladder without a safety net. You name it, if one of us can do it, it’s worth a try. Sometimes.

Which reminds me of a story penned by columnist, Deborah Mathis. Now, she doesn’t look like a senior (she’s a mere 49) but she’s an experienced mother (three kids). She titled her article, Pregnant at 60? Oh, Whoopie!  See, it caught my attention. She was reacting to the same story many of us read about the breakthrough news that healthy women in their 50’s and 60’s can now have babies. How? Get eggs from a healthy young woman and let nature take its course (or something like that). Sounds interesting. Imagine having a sassy teenager when you’re 75 or a college sophomore at 80.

But here, let me let her tell about it. “Don’t get me wrong. I’m for motherhood. I’ve done it three times. I wouldn’t change it for the whole wide world and all its riches . . .But as much as I love ‘em (her kids), they’d better thank their lucky stars that, for each, egg and sperm were at the right place at the right time and had a nice meeting . . . Face it. The sweet young things have the hair, skin, abs, the thighs we want and they haven’t been kind enough to share. Well, they may as well keep their eggs, too . . .”

Way to go, Deborah. There are some things that maybe we seniors can do but ought not. Just because it’s possible doesn’t always mean we should. Let me tell you one thing: whoever suggested that being a parent is more suitable for pre-seniors than old-timers was on the right track. Keep up with the Jones is a lot easier than keeping up with a bunch of kids (or even one).

So what do we do? If we decide not to borrow some eggs, we might try to give advice where it might be needed but not wanted. We might think a saucy high school junior would look good in a Beemer convertible but it probably would be better that she walk to school (or take a bus). We might think that just because we’ve had years of experience we know everything worthy known when of course in reality we don’t.

On the other hand, it might be OK to act our age, forget about taking two stairs at a time, give away a ladder rather than defy gravity, and put aside for a rainy day a little bit of what wasn’t spent on a BMW because that former saucy little junior may one day become a charming scholar in search of a degree.

As seniors, we spend an inordinate amount of time sometimes trying to decide what is becoming and what should be going. If this is your lot, welcome to the club.