Celebrating and exploring life at seventy

Diana, Almost 70

Seventy

Yesterday an acquaintance from our little “Science of Mind” congregation was newly limping around with a cane. In obvious pain, he made a shocking declaration that shouldn’t have come from the lips of a long-time Positive Thinking enthusiast: “I’ve lived too long—I’ve outlived my body.” He has been told that his completely worn out right hip needs to be replaced with one made of metal. At 75 his replacement and repair list already features one total knee replacement and cardiac bypass surgery. There was a popular national security motto during World War II that came to my mind: “Loose lips sink ships”. To me, a fellow believer in the power of one’s words, saying “I’ve lived too long” is dangerously loose talk, and he takes the risk of sinking his ship with just his belief in the message.

I hear a lot of similar loose aging talk and do my very best to ignore it. However, I confess, sometimes I forget and mindlessly join in. I’ve had my fair share of parts tinkered with and modified. There have been 3 knee surgeries with hardware and grafts, the last procedure being a total knee replacement at age 60. More recently repair of a badly broken arm with a shiny titanium rod and nasty looking screws. (What was I doing up on that horse at “my age”, anyway?) Do corrective lenses for my sea green eyes since age 13 count? Come to think of it, some of my used up and no-longer-needed parts have gone in surgical garbage cans. Some others are still in place but on a gradual trip South. I’m certainly not
factory-issued any more. But, but does this point to living “too long”?

I believe it is foolish to listen to our culture’s standard language and lore of aging and ageism. I refuse to believe the “It’s all downhill from here” messages that I hear so frequently from friends, family members, and even talkative strangers in the checkout lines at our local grocery stores. I will admit to some obvious signs of physical change; for instance my eyebrows have lately gone wildly weird. And the pesky black hairs on my face have turned white, but still pesky. To top it all off I have no idea what my actual hair color is because it has been “highlighted” and “lowlighted” for so long, a common camouflage technique for women of my age. Physically, I do not consciously feel a whole lot different than I remember feeling at 40. Perhaps I have a memory system that has softened the edges of the results of gradual physical changes, but I’ll take kind and fuzzy memory of physical decline. Or will I? I have a hunch some physical symptoms are trying to get my attention. But, I get ahead of myself.

I’ll celebrate my 70th birthday this month. I am planning to shamelessly exploit this milestone for my benefit. For the month of April 2012 and for the remains of the year I have committed to the thorough and thoughtful exploration of my hopes and dreams for my future. I wish to be no April fool, but yikes! it’s hard to really sit myself down and convince me that this the “final third” or “final fourth” portion of life. I believe it’s a sacred and essential exercise to take a deep look and let it sink in that this, at long last, is “it”. Like so many I have spent so much of my life not recognizing the precious gifts of each day of my life as moments of “it”. I want my dearest dreams and deepest hopes to surface clearly and fairly quickly, for at this wise age I really do realize how fast my life spins by. There is a sense of urgency—a certain sense I have lived not “too long” but “too short”.

There is a life to review and there is meaning to be made.

I have important developmental work to do: a life to complete, and my life’s legacy to tie up and deliver.