Reply #77: When I was an adolescent, [View All]

[LWolf]

everyone thought I was older than I really was. Partly because I was physically precocious; I could pass for 16 when I was 11. Partly because I skipped 1st grade and my "peers" were always older than I was. Partly because I was also intellectually precocious.

Now when I entered middle age, that flipped. Everyone thinks I'm older than I am.

Partly because I stopped dying my hair in my mid-30s, and by 40 was very gray. I got my first gray hair at 19. Throughout my 20s, I "weaved" it, successfully blending in the gray. By my early 30s, weaving wasn't enough. Coloring my hair was a pain in the ass. I decided I was old enough not to care what others thought.

I have earned every damned gray hair, wrinkle, and sag. Our society's disrespect for age is a symptom of our ill health. It doesn't slow me down much.

My mom is a REAL "little old lady." She's not that old yet; 73. But she has slowed down, mentally and physically. It pains me to see how slowly and carefully she moves, and to see her misplace things she knows, and rummage around in her brain to find them.

I'm not impatient. I'm patient, loving, and respectful, and expect my own boys to be the same for me someday.

Still, my 73 yo mom still wields her chain saw, hauls firewood, takes care of her horse, and many other things requiring energy and strength. She does it slowly and carefully, and has some aids and strategies for the heavy parts, but she refuses to stop living.