Turning 50

I am spending my last few days of being 53. On Sunday I turn 54. It’s just a number and not a very significant one as far as age goes. I was remembering turning 50 and how great of a party that was, and how it seems like it was just last year. So in honor of saying good-bye to 53 I’m reposting the following.

In forty minutes I will turn 50. I have been anticipating this moment since January 1, 2009.

I thought it would somehow make it less traumatic if I were mentally prepared. I may have been wrong. It’s not that it’s hard in a wringing my hands or gnashing of teeth sort of way. Nor am I crying or dreading the moment the clock strikes midnight…I simply don’t know where the time went.

It seems as if something memorable should happen as the hands pass over the 12 on the clock…fireworks; a beam of light shining down from the sky, or a hallowed rendition of the Hallelujah chorus, however, my guess is that as I watch the hands slowly but steadily move to 12:01 I will neither hear nor see anything differently taking place except for a few “Happy Birthdays” and an “I love you” or two from the ones my family members.

As I sit here waiting, watching and saying goodbye to the 40s, I ponder the many things I remember from my childhood, things that seem as if they took place last year instead of decades ago. I guess that’s how it was meant to be…the steadiness of time passing, not significantly so, but significantly nonetheless.
I remember having a conversation with my grandmother when she was in her 70s. She told me she still felt like she was 18 years old…on the inside. How can one grow older in such a visible manner and remain the same on the ‘inside’?

It’s spiritual in nature and that it why it is what it is, a simple, gently passing of time.