My inner editor told me that I had to do a few words for this months contribution rather than just pinch and rehash something I had already written, so for your approval and delight (really?) my first efforts for 2012.
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The dust of Christmas and New Year celebrations has well and truly settled and the feeling of impending doom before the first Monday back at work that I have often felt on a Sunday afternoon certainly doesn't feel any different from that of any other year.
How many New Years resolutions lay smashed in pieces on the ground on the eighth day of the new year? How many smokers have returned to the solace of their tobacco habit, how many dieters have thought that "I'll start the new diet tomorrow" and of course as we all know from anonymous quotations 101 that tomorrow never actually comes. How many filled with good intent have started an exercise regime only to find that it's actually not that easy to change your life in one day?
In 2012 I turn forty seven years old. Or as I like to look at it as master of the cliche, forty seven years young.
Whilst the body doesn't necessarily do everything it used to, and hangovers take longer to recover from, my mind doesn't really take these things into consideration and thinks that I can still keep up with twenty somethings in the physical department. So as I've got older, I still feel the same inside, but when I look in the mirror and see the odd extra white hair and new wrinkle, or the effect of the continual pull of gravity (everything starting to sag...), the outside isn't as great as it once was. A good example of this was when I spent a couple of vintages working amongst young lads in a winery. My work ethic and physical efforts were actually greater than most of those around me (with a few exceptions) yet I don't know of anyone else that came away with a free hernia operation special souvenir and surgery scar to remember "Vintage 2008" by.
I recently spent some time at a party with similarly aged friends who had 'twenty something' offspring, who had in turn invited several other 'twenty something' friends. As a 'forty something' I don't even register on their collective radar. Strange to feel like the invisible man in a crowd of people!
I'm sure that this is all normal. Now I see elderly people and instead of thinking something clever and dismissive, as only the young can, I think; "That person is going through this too for only their first and last time - they haven't always been old, and it's as new to them as it is to you or me."
With some, it's the body lets you down, with others it's the mind.
It's hard to imagine what someone who loses their memory may be thinking. They may be very happy in their own world whilst it's only others around them that feel the pain and upset of being forgotten or otherwise let down. This of course may not be the case. Alzheimer's is a very sad form of dementia which seems to be on the increase. Whilst we live in a world where we can increasingly live to a ripe old age with medicines and procedures that keep us alive and our bodies reasonably healthy, but we are still waiting for a significant remedy for dementia. Encouraging work has been carried out with stem cell research, but even this has its opponents due to its controversial nature.
I recently carried out some work for a man who was in his nineties, who had been a respected scientist in his field, with at least one technical publication to his name. Sadly, he hadn't got a clue what was going on when I visited him, and once the job was complete I had to contact his daughter to let her know what had been done. Whilst speaking to her she confided that he had been assessed eligible for full time care due to his dementia, but he wouldn't surrender his independent lifestyle and go into care. He lived in a remote location, and apparently often calls tradespeople in for minor or imagined jobs, which was costing them a small fortune. Not to mention the worry that he could end up harming himself accidentally, or become victim to some criminal element living alone and so far away from family or neighbours.
It certainly left me questioning things I had never considered before, and although I felt sorry for the old man and his family, I'm sure they are not alone in this or similar circumstances.
So, I guess the moral to the story if there is one, is to enjoy what you've got while you can. Take good care of yourself, but not to the extent that you deny yourself having a good time, and try and live within your means, both physically and financially. Cliche number 298a fits the bill - "Everything in Moderation"
Dr Deepak Chopra prescribes 10 simple rules for ageing with health and happiness in his book: Ageless Body, Timeless Mind - A Quantum alternative to growing old.
It's a good read, and I urge you to find a copy and check it out.
I actually believe that the rules are simpler, and that we need a few basics in place and the rest should follow:
- Something to eat and drink.
- Sufficient money.
- Friends to share with. Love. Friendship. Be nice to each other.
- Something to occupy your time.
- Something to look forward to.
That's my forty-two I suppose - my answer to the great question of life, the universe and everything.
When I started this topic an hour ago I didn't know it was going to lead here, but that's the nature of blogging
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