I feel it most when it comes to basketball. I was a pretty good player most of my life, good enough to play with much better players, including guys who played professionally and in college, but I started gradually fading in my mid-40s, then dramatically faded around age 50, and stopped playing a few years ago. I became a detriment to my teams on the court. And not playing at all hurts far less than playing so poorly.
I noticed this as a runner. 20 years ago, I was whizzing by most of the other runners in the park. Now I’m just an old guy shuffling along, trying to make sure I’m in nobody’s way.
I am older now, but around the time I turned 50 I entered the sort of purgative space (a true purgatory in the literary sense of the word) that lasted for the better part of 15 or so years. The purgation involved giving up almost all of those things our culture idolizes about youth: beauty, athleticism, being willing and able to burn the candle at both ends during any number of socially approved 'youth' activities, like partying, outdoor adventuring, travel, trading up for larger and larger homes in better and better neighborhoods, and filling them up with culturally approved (chic) artifacts. For women, it also involves a gradual acclimation to not being an object of lust, which equates too often with being socially desirable across the board. In terms of career, it involves for possibly the first time being passed over for a promotion or not getting a job you applied for. All, all, initially painful losses that have to be grieved, while at the same time trying to see what might compensate for this as we enter what is essentially an entirely new country. And I am here to report that there are many fine discoveries to be made there, and choices available that lead to bona fide happiness, which while sometimes tangent to former ways of being happy, most often involve letting them go and discovering new pathways perhaps more well suited to who you are once shorn of your former manufactured identities. There are lots of books on the subject, some of them treasures, so I won't belabor the point here, but it's for real. The trick is allowing the process to happen withou overwhelming resistance. Good luck, Ian.
Aging? From someone who has been there (and will presently be lapping you):
"To be reminded of your decay every time you look in the mirror is, as the kids say, low-key brutal...."
-- Looking in the mirror is not really so bad, because your eyes will have developed shock-absorbers for that view. The image to avoid is the one in photographs.
"Let’s be honest: after a certain point—35? 40?—growing older is psychologically punishing. How could it not be? It involves getting a little bit weaker, stupider and uglier every year."
-- This is not something you can emulate, but I had the foresight to be as weak, stupid, and ugly as possible in the first place. Ha.
"You often hear people say 'inside I still feel young.' It’s tempting to dismiss that as meaningless happy talk but actually it’s often true, and it’s one of the strangest things about growing older."
-- Absolutely true. When I'm out walking, I'm not old me; just me.
With so many people saying eighty is the new sixty, you figure sixty must be the new forty. Then you think, Who wants to turn forty?
Err on the side of gratitude. Being part of the world is a great gift.
I feel it most when it comes to basketball. I was a pretty good player most of my life, good enough to play with much better players, including guys who played professionally and in college, but I started gradually fading in my mid-40s, then dramatically faded around age 50, and stopped playing a few years ago. I became a detriment to my teams on the court. And not playing at all hurts far less than playing so poorly.
Play with people your own age.
I noticed this as a runner. 20 years ago, I was whizzing by most of the other runners in the park. Now I’m just an old guy shuffling along, trying to make sure I’m in nobody’s way.
It's not as fun to beat guys as decrepit as I am.
Write more books! I love them.
I am older now, but around the time I turned 50 I entered the sort of purgative space (a true purgatory in the literary sense of the word) that lasted for the better part of 15 or so years. The purgation involved giving up almost all of those things our culture idolizes about youth: beauty, athleticism, being willing and able to burn the candle at both ends during any number of socially approved 'youth' activities, like partying, outdoor adventuring, travel, trading up for larger and larger homes in better and better neighborhoods, and filling them up with culturally approved (chic) artifacts. For women, it also involves a gradual acclimation to not being an object of lust, which equates too often with being socially desirable across the board. In terms of career, it involves for possibly the first time being passed over for a promotion or not getting a job you applied for. All, all, initially painful losses that have to be grieved, while at the same time trying to see what might compensate for this as we enter what is essentially an entirely new country. And I am here to report that there are many fine discoveries to be made there, and choices available that lead to bona fide happiness, which while sometimes tangent to former ways of being happy, most often involve letting them go and discovering new pathways perhaps more well suited to who you are once shorn of your former manufactured identities. There are lots of books on the subject, some of them treasures, so I won't belabor the point here, but it's for real. The trick is allowing the process to happen withou overwhelming resistance. Good luck, Ian.
Excellent piece.
Aging? From someone who has been there (and will presently be lapping you):
"To be reminded of your decay every time you look in the mirror is, as the kids say, low-key brutal...."
-- Looking in the mirror is not really so bad, because your eyes will have developed shock-absorbers for that view. The image to avoid is the one in photographs.
"Let’s be honest: after a certain point—35? 40?—growing older is psychologically punishing. How could it not be? It involves getting a little bit weaker, stupider and uglier every year."
-- This is not something you can emulate, but I had the foresight to be as weak, stupid, and ugly as possible in the first place. Ha.
"You often hear people say 'inside I still feel young.' It’s tempting to dismiss that as meaningless happy talk but actually it’s often true, and it’s one of the strangest things about growing older."
-- Absolutely true. When I'm out walking, I'm not old me; just me.
With so many people saying eighty is the new sixty, you figure sixty must be the new forty. Then you think, Who wants to turn forty?
Err on the side of gratitude. Being part of the world is a great gift.
https://thefamilyproperty.blogspot.com/2024/09/if-i-should-die-before-we-wake.html