Aginess

(To borrow from Stephen Colbert and his coined word "truthiness.")

Age, wrinkles, and crepey skin. (No, not creepy: "crepey." Like crepe paper. Even though the spell-checker doesn't recognize it as a word, pop-up ads inform me that is undesirable and unsightly, and therefore I am self-conscious about it.) It has been creeping up on me in recent years. (See what I did there?) I notice it when I'm doing yoga. When I do down dog, the skin on my thighs is loose, like cellular shades--I mean the window coverings. Pull them up, they're pleated; let them down, not so much.

As for the face? How is it that I have the skin of a 70-year-old, and other women my age do not?

I identify a number of factors: 1) I grew up in L.A. in the '60s and '70s, when tans were attractive. And if your skin type didn't readily tan, you could always let your skin burn, and that would fade to a tan. 2) I am of Scandinavian stock. Scandinavia includes territory north of the Arctic Circle, where the sun disappears for two-to-six months of the year. Who needs sunblock? 3) I didn't sleep well for about ten years.

Whatever the reasons or excuses, I still avoid looking in the mirror, and when I do I'm quite disappointed. Is that really me? If I squint or dim the lights and smile, then, yes, I recognize myself. (For the record, all those expensive products that claim to reduce deep wrinkles, they obviously haven't been tested on one such as me.)

I know: first-world problems. First-world, privileged white-woman problems.

Anyway, what I mean to say is, I find myself looking into the faces of old people (oldish, meaning 50+) and try to picture how they looked 20, 30 years ago. I can't do it. People are who they are; they have always been the age they are now. At least that's how it seems. Look at the photo of Jimmy and Rosalyn Carter on their wedding day, July 6, 1946. Seventy years ago. How handsome they both are, how strong, how vital. You can see who they will be in their faces--or who they were.

President Carter is 91. My dad would have been 92 last May. He kept a photo album of those years, the '30s, '40s, 50s. That's who he was: so tall and slim and handsome, so capable, so adventurous. A baby son in his arms: how young he was!

And some day, if all goes well, I'll be in my 90s, thinking back to my 50s and how strong I was, how active and healthy.

Just random thoughts, really. And now I have to go look after a couple of three-month-old puppies, who run like there's no tomorrow. Or like there are lots of them.