“Mummy, in the olden days, what were dolls made of?”
“What exactly do you mean by the “olden days”, darling?”
“The 90s.”
…
Am I that old? Evidently, I am. It reminded me of a university professor friend of mine telling me how she was now lecturing kids who were born after 9/11.
Time. Why is it so important? What if we just changed the word “ageing” for “changing”? Would we mind less about seeing an older face looking back at us?
I can honestly say, it’s not something that really bothers me. Maybe that’s because I was born 40, so now my looks simply represent what I have always felt on the inside. But I probably feel about 55 now, so feel really sprightly when I see a young woman looking back at me in the mirror. Clearly, perception is everything.
Last weekend, I did my first (aided) backflip. I wondered why I’d never tried before. I wondered if this is what it meant to play like a child. I’d never really done that either.
As I get older, I realise how I feel in my body is the most important thing. It’s not about being fat or thin, rather about feeling strong and light. This is a feeling that a backflip gave me. It also made me realise just how much the human body is capable of, how much we don’t use it - much like our minds.
Einstein was said to have used more of his mind than the average person does. Hmmm. He got old too though. Not that he seemed to mind either.
That acceptance of the passage of time and our own mortality. I will die soon and I want to enjoy what I have now, this body, this mind, this intellect, this everything.
This is what I am consciously doing now, now that I am aware that we are on this Earth for a few short decades.
I now delight in singing, learning a new instrument, practicing cartwheels and nourishing my mind with the kind of books that I race through while savouring them.
Something feels like it’s on fire, as if time is running out, knowing that this moment, these times, are the best of my life. Every moment is the best of my life and recognising it as so makes it so.
We all have been given the gift of a human birth and we have chosen the path that we are on. I find this incredible. No, that word does not do it justice. It is mind-defying. I don’t have the words. I cannot find the words. This is life. This is where we are. This grand experiment that we have chosen to be a part of.
So time…it doesn’t matter. It really doesn’t matter.
All we have is now.
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