I have never given much thought to the idea of aging. As much as I bemoaned the idea that someday I would be 35 or, gasp, 40, getting older was something I just did not have time to worry about.
When I did picture myself older, it was as a ripened woman, elegantly attired in a designer suit. Perhaps, I would have the bare beginnings of crow's feet or delicate laugh lines, but they would only indicate that I had lived a life worth living. As I lean softly against a desk, matching gloves in hand, my large-brimmed hat would shade my face, my translucent scarf would fall in luxurious folds around my still-young neck and cascade over my well-postured shoulders. Perhaps I would be wearing stockings with seams, perhaps tiny diamonds would glisten on my dainty earlobes. In short, I guess I thought that when I got older, I would turn into a 1940s movie star.
For the past month or so, halfway through college, real life looming like an ominous pirate ship on the horizon, I have been confronted with signs of my own increasing years. It started when I began to exercise over December break and naively attempted some stretches from my past.
I started swimming competitively when I was seven and devoted eleven years to the sport. But in spite of all those years, six of which were spent as a butterflyer, after just two years without the pressure to excel physically, I have lost a lot of flexibility. My shoulders, the bastion of a butterflyer's strength, were tight.
I was upset -- furious at myself for not staying in shape, angry at life for changing my body. I could still feel the surge of energy that comes as you leave the block. I could still savor the raw, sweet flavor that sweat and chlorine and adrenaline make as they mix in your mouth during a race. I could still hear my coach screaming at me from the side of the pool ("Get her! You've got it! It's yours! Pull! You want it!). I could still taste how pure the feeling of success is when a race is won. Yet time had betrayed me.
So I did what any aging athlete would do -- I defied the new limits of my body. I called my Dad into the room and asked him to push my arms until it hurt, asked him to hold them in position briefly. Each day, I had him push them a little farther and hold them a little longer. In a week, I had a decent amount of flexibility back.
After that, I began to notice other signs of my advancing "maturity." You know you are getting older when you start using moisturizer instead of zit creme. You know you are getting older when you develop a taste for chocolate-covered coconut, a purely adult confection. (Remember all the Mounds you gave to your parents each Halloween?) You know you are getting older when hair that was a sun-kissed gold when you were six is gradually dulling to a ubiquitous brown. You know that you are getting older when it is you, and not your mother, who says, "This room is a pigsty. Do we live in a barn?" You know you are getting older when you start to opt not to go out on a weekend night so you can stay in and have a cool conversation with the "gals."
It could be a depressing thought that at 19, there are things I will never be as good at as when I was 16. However, that is no way to live: By the time I hit 30, I would be catatonic with despair. So, maybe I will never be as flexible or as fast as I used to be ... but I can be close. And I know I can be better at other things, which is why advancing age is something to embrace, not something to disclaim.
Tomorrow I turn 20. (Ah ha, you say, that is why she has become suddenly wistful and melancholy about aging.) It is a birthday that people always say is devoid of meaning: 18 is considered a turning point, as is 21, while 20 is simply a cipher. But I demur. Today is my last day as a teenager. My last day of societally condoned immaturity. I feel as if I have spent half my life perfecting what it is to be a teenager only to have Mother Nature say, "That's it, time's up. Move on."
So what did I accomplish by pondering this? (Other than informing the entire campus that my birthday is coming up, party in my room, all blitzes and cards welcome.) Well, for one thing, I know that the only people who look like 1940s movie stars when they get older are 1940s movie stars. And even if they do look that way, they probably have no muscle tone.
Getting older is not about achieving decrepitude. It is about working a little harder to stay in shape, but it is also about gaining perspective, becoming seasoned, like a fine wine. So right now I am a Perrier, sparkling, effervescent and non-alcoholic, with a twist of lime -- refreshing, invigorating, but not yet comparable to a Chateau Mouton Rothschild. But I have time.
