Wednesday, September 24, 2014

52 and counting

No this is not my 52nd marathon, my 52nd day of dieting, etc...  No I turned 52 years old.  As a social experiment, I have not been on Facebook since June.  Before I left the world of social media, I purposely made my birthday invisible.  Last year, I had over 100 Happy Birthday wishes, this year, three…  What does that mean, nothing but it shows without social media, how many birthday wishes would you get?

I have something to admit…I’m not good at accepting gifts from people. I always have this awkward feeling and try to refute the gift or reduce what someone would like to give me. It may at first seem like this is really noble of me, and I think it was at first trying to be, but really it’s not. In fact, I’m really just putting myself ahead of others.

When I was a teenager, I had the thought that I didn’t want to get so excited about getting presents from people at my birthday or Christmas. This was partly to save myself from any potential disappointment (yet plain black socks…again) but also because I thought that it was good to not be obsessed with “things” and presents embodied “things” to me. So there was only one option, be pessimistic, put on a dower face and not get that excited over what was happening but instead enjoy the people around me more.

Now is that humble! I totally got over that whole wanting stuff thing haven’t I…oh wait. Actually no. In fact, in many ways I was more obsessed by things than ever before…it was just that I had the power to buy them for myself! On top of that I was looking at things legalistically and not acting out of love.

When I got a present I didn’t think about the other person at all I just focused on how I felt and making sure that I was right. I didn’t think about the effort the other person might take in choosing a gift or anything else. This wasn’t just limited to just birthdays but to any gift that people wanted to give me. Every time the same dance would occur “Oh, you shouldn’t have…I can’t accept that etc”.

It was all a power battle and I was more proud than ever before.  I never considered how it might be nice for someone else to give a gift to me and for it to be received gratefully.

So why am I talking about receiving gifts? Well this weekend was my 52nd birthday.  For the most of human history, to be old is a mark of honor.  Today it is a source of fear.  Fear of losing health.  Fear of losing the active lifestyle that made me happy.  Fear of being poor in the retirement years.  I remember when 52 seemed ancient – and now I can’t believe that I am past 50 and relentlessly getting older. I once was a fanatic about what I eat and how much I exercise daily. I would run five to six days a week, work out with weights, doing resistance training a few days a week and a core training once a week. I would go for regular semi-annual medical check-ups to monitor all the signs of health (or lack of it).

Often I let myself totally pig out, and I eat whatever I feel like eating.  I eat out of stress — usually that means a lot of junk food.  I am doing whatever I can to fight the relentless march of time.  But stress of life has changed me!

In celebration of my aging quickly, I Shelley made me dinner and took me to a play.  We went home afterward and enjoyed carrot cake.  We called it a night and I woke early to work on the backlog of items in that duty they call a job.  Not sure why I am so dedicated to doing the best I can in my profession and let myself go?  I often wonder if I could do what others can do for easy pay and little stress.  But that is like stealing.  What I mean is they leisurely work through the day reporting for work at 8:00 AM and taking 30 minutes to get ready for work and at 4:10 PM get everything set so I can bolt out the door at 4:30 without any care.

Anyway, today, I got another gift.  It was a book.  I am not a fiction reader and finding books that make me interested is hard.  It was an unexpected gift. A welcomed gift.  For once in my life I did not feel like “you shouldn’t have” or gees’, thanks so much.  This was a really good feeling.  For some reason, it was really a personal and caring thought that for some reason left me happy and speechless.  That does not happen to me, but it was a welcomed feeling.

Oh the book, it was “what if: serious scientific answers to absurd hypotheticalquestions” and it is a book I will be able to read over and over as it is just not a dead read, but a book that makes me think deep, very deep.





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