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“What are you reading?” the woman sitting at the next table with a rollator parked next to her asked. Her eyes, wide and friendly were aimed curiously at me.

I was having a coffee and reading a book recently written and published by a friend.

I told her it was a book my friend had written. I added, “It’s really good”.

“What’s it about?” she looked intrigued.

As I am only beginning to read it, I struggled to describe it.

The little bit I told her prompted a change in her expression.

I felt her pull back; a shadow fell over her face.

“Oh well, I am a realist, ” she said with a sigh of resignation.

“I don’t do fantasy. You see, my husband died three years ago.”

Hmmm, why did she call it fantasy? I thought but kept it to myself.

She tried to learn more about me and every answer increased the look of sadness. I know this look. If it spoke, it would say, “Easy for you to say”.

She continued her line of questioning. I told her what I was doing with Graceing Agefully™; I explained I still work as a Realtor®, I changed careers at fifty, and I’m thinking about it again at seventy.

I told her “I like to defy the rules of aging, I ran my first full marathon at fifty-eight”.

“Oh wow, you’re LUCKY. Do you have children?”I respond with a simple “no”. I am uncomfortable with this question because I know what’s coming.

“AHA! That’s what it is!” now she brightens again.

As her daughter sat down across from her, delivering their coffees, she teased her, “How old do you think she is?”

I hate this question too. I see the look on her face of there’s no good answer to this question, I have to come up with a way to not answer but make this person feel good. (It’s the equivalent of the “do these jeans make me look fat?” question.) She did it well.

“She doesn’t have kids, that’s why!” her mother declared.

“OH, yeah” she sighed heavily, “I have four!” Her eyeroll told me this apple didn’t fall far from the tree. “You ARE lucky!”

Where were they when I was in my mid-thirties, unmarried, trying and couldn’t? Was I LUCKY then?

I have sensors to see through masks. I always have. I sniff out true feelings like a bloodhound tracks a scent.

I see pain in the eyes of an aging beauty. I hear pain in voices trying to maintain the illusion, a reflection of minds cluttered with fantasies unfulfilled. I feel the general malaise of descent into the ideas of old age.

So many of my peers feel gravitationally pulled down into what they BELIEVE is the reality of getting old.

They say I’m intuitive. They try not to hear what I say.

I remember thinking when I was childbearing age: my friends, who are married with kids, mostly complain about them.

Now, they tell me, I am LUCKY because I never had them. They tell me that’s why I’m thriving at seventy, because I don’t have children.

They call themselves REALISTS, the ones who pursued the fairy tale all their young lives.Each time the fairy tale disappointed them, they retreated. Then, they kept trying to get to ‘happily ever after’.

Now, they call themselves realists. They think they don’t believe the fairy tale anymore. When it comes to getting old, they are still in fairy tale belief mode. Remember, the fairy tale was a beautiful young princess, married to a handsome prince, living happily ever after. Don’t forget, there was usually a wicked, or ugly, or evil old stepmother or hag in that fairy tale.

They moan, “My friend’s mother has dementia. She is in a ‘home’, wearing a diaper, and doesn’t know her children who are paying $10,000/month to keep her there.”

These are the examples. To them, these examples PROVE that aging and its associated decline are inevitable. These examples are proof that this version of aging is their certain future.

I tell them the story of my mother. She had dementia and was in memory care for nine years.

I witnessed her living, what appeared to me, to be the best years of her life. Those around her, her caretakers, nurses, and her children noticed.

She died when she was ready, without fear or regret. We were given the gift of witnessing her life to ninety-nine and her death.

“Oh, she had the GOOD dementia. You’re LUCKY!! There it is….I am

LUCKY.

LUCKY.

Here’s how I’m LUCKY.

I always look for anecdotes, not proof. I look for miracles, not averages.

This is where the possibilities lie. I’m a UNICORN hunter.

Yesterday, I saw an article about the eighty year old woman, Natalie

Grabow, who finished KONA IRONMAN, one of the most challenging competitions in the world for anyONE at any AGE. She is the oldest woman to finish this grueling race. It’s the marathon of marathons.

At age fifty-nine, Natalie Grabow didn’t know how to swim. She learned.

(If you don’t know IRONMAN, it is a full distance triathlon (total 140.6 miles). It consists of three parts: Swim, 2.4 miles; Bike, 112 miles, Run, 26.2 miles (full marathon).)

I didn’t think about the decrepitating elders in homes and choose to resign to that fate.

I thought, maybe I could do that?

I’m LUCKY because stories like the Natalie Grabow story INSPIRE me.

I don’t do things to win competitions.

I do things to test my limits.

If someone says it’s impossible and it seems like something I’d be curious to try, I’m in.

That’s how I dared myself to run my first full marathon at 58. It was a huge challenge, twice as far as I had ever run, and I started running at fifty.

My goal was first and foremost to finish. I had secondary and tertiary goals of times. I finished. I made my second goal, to finish in under five hours. I didn’t make the third and I don’t recall what it was.

I crossed the finish line and cried ecstatic tears. It was the greatest accomplishment of my life at that point.

I was nowhere near the “leader board” even for my age group. It didn’t matter. I won!

Yes, I’m LUCKY.

I’m LUCKY I can deafen myself to doubters and nay-sayers.

I’m LUCKY I can steel myself against the ‘slings and arrows’.

“You’re going to destroy your joints. You’ll be getting your hips and knees replaced from all that running!” they would warn me.It’s funny how the ones that spoke the loudest and had plenty of experience with joint replacements were not former runners.

Yes, I’m LUCKY.

I’m LUCKY I have insatiable curiosity to uncover who is behind my own masks.

I’m LUCKY I have limitless curiosity to learn how to change my mind that makes me feel ‘less than’, or ‘old’, or ‘fat’, or ‘ugly’, or ‘poor’, or ‘lazy’ , or ’responsible for anyone else’s fate’.

I AM LUCKY.

I’m LUCKY to have been born a Baby Boomer.

I’m LUCKY to have been born at a time when thousands of others are rising in consciousness, maybe millions.

My predecessors, who saw this coming, were born at a time when they were alone with their ‘knowing’. Their new ideas were called heresy and witchcraft. They were hung and burned at the stake. They were not LUCKY.

I AM LUCKY, but not for the reasons the realists think I am.

Some of the reasons I’m told by realists I’m LUCKY:

1. I have ‘good genes’. (My parents both lived past ninety-four). I do.

2. I don’t have kids. (There it is again!) I don’t.

3. I was born white and middle class in the northeastern U.S.. I was.

4. I have a strong, happy marriage with a husband who adores me. I do.

5. I am comfortable financially. I am.

6. I am in excellent health. I am.

None of these things guarantee happiness, longevity or thriving.

I AM GRATEFUL.

“Luck is what happens when preparation meets opportunity”, Seneca.“THRIVING is what happens when LUCK meets INSPIRATION”, Jennifer Sproul 😉

This is Graceing Agefully™