Made New
On a very typical day this past week, I was struck by some tell-tale signs of age. These signs are becoming more and more apparent and, while some habitual part of me feels youthful and surprised the aging, I can’t realistically say I’ve been taken completely off guard. Yet, this day, as I tried to hold myself together to teach, I felt positively accosted by my age.
This is the shadow side of aging for me. I don’t want to be young. I surely wouldn’t want to do all those phases over again. But I also want my body to be as strong, my hair to be as thick, and my skin to be as smooth as they were when I was 35. And the extra shadowing side is the way these changes leave me feeling like they’re deficiencies to be worked through, problems to be solved. Part of me refuses to let go of the idea that there is a way to “fix” each change if I work hard enough, eat the right things, get enough exercise, take the right supplements, and generally consume enough products to conquer age, and of course it’s companion, death.
Because isn’t that the ultimate fear in the decline? The powerlessness that we are all walking each day closer to death is a fear so common that it’s used against us over and again—so many ways we can overcome this with just the right combination of youth inducing products, foods, and activities.
Of course, the truth is harder than this. And maybe also easier. I am aging. My body is changing. There are ways I can have control over how I feel in this process, and there are ways that I have no control at all.