Sigrid Mac

I didn't have an age crisis at 40. My sweetheart had just died suddenly, and I didn't give a rat's ---- about how old I was or what I looked like. It hit me at 50. I pouted, a lot. I pouted at 51 and 52, and 53. Now I'm 56. And I think, so what, so I'm 56. I see the lines and the sags in the mirror. The hip aches from a snowmobile accident when I was 19. Two of my finger are knobby. I have some white hair - it's turning wavey. I always wanted waves. I don't like the angel wings under my arms or the saggy boobs or the thin rippling layer of blubber over the muscles I work to keep. Even so, these days, I think, so what? So, I'm getting older. Now at family things I'm the older generation.

In my 30s after spending time with Aunt Lottie who was then in her 80s, I thought, when I grow up I want to be like Aunt Lottie. I still do. She lived to be 97. She didn't like her wrinkles either, but I saw the look in her eyes when I shared some of my troubles. She was beyond them. She had learned. She was my hero. I told her so when she was 93.

I'm getting better about the "aging sucks" concept. While I certainly don't like the body parts that are breaking down, I am so much happier now than I ever was at any earlier age. For me it's been about tackling each thing as it came along. Now I love me, but that wasn't always the case. It feels good to feel good about myself and who I am. I wouldn't trade that in on youth.

I'm charging and sometimes hobbling into old age, and in so many ways it's a good thing.

Vi