Do you remember when you were young and you looked at people who were fifty and thought you would never want to be that old? I remember thinking they all seemed a little strange acting. If you did notice them at all, you probably also remember thinking you wouldn’t worry about it because it was a long time before you would get there.
Ha! Some of us have made it to fifty and it happened overnight, didn’t it?
What we didn’t realize when we were twenty was how much fun fifty was going to be though. I turned fifty a few years ago, nine to be exact. And I have to say it has been the best decade of my life. I don’t have my red hat to wear with my purple coat yet but can’t wait to get them. I think they are going to make my sixties not only more colorful but a lot more fun.
I also haven’t eaten three pounds of sausage at once yet but I have gobbled up all of the samples that Sam’s had to offer in one day. (Don’t you just love that poem?)
At the ripe old age of “almost” sixty, I know I am one of the fortunate who is still healthy and perhaps that is one of the reasons why my fifties have been my best decade so far. Yes, I do have some aches and pains when I get up in the morning, but that is okay, it gives me and my friends something to talk about.
For some, the fifties has been a time when their bodies are falling apart. Sometimes that falling apart is because we haven’t taken very good care of ourselves. But it is never too late to try to turn that around. It may take giving up the sausage for now and taking a few walks but it is never too late to try.
At one time, I didn’t like birthdays but now I know that each one is a gift and should be celebrated. I learned that when I became a hospice nurse seven years ago. The alternative to getting older is to die young. Today is my birthday and all I want is to have another one.
But I have also learned there are no guarantees that I will live to be sixty. So maybe I better go shopping for my red hat and purple coat today. Being eccentric (okay daughters, I mean more eccentric) sounds like so much fun and I wouldn’t want to miss it.
© 2011 Brenda Young
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