I was having a conversation with a woman who has frequented my performances for over 10 years.  She was with a dear friend of hers.  They had a nice dinner somewhere in the metropolitan area.  A few days prior to seeing her at my gig, she had checked out my website to see where I was playing.  As I spoke to the woman and her friend during my break, the topic of a significant birthday was mentioned. 

Through my years have seeing this woman and my gigs and conversing with her, the topic of age had come up before.  Each time it was mentioned, she would shudder a bit.  When I would ask her what her age was during these conversations, of course, she would  never answer.  Sometimes I would try and sneak the age question within another question to cause her to slip her age, but as you can suspect, it failed.  On this particular night, the conversation about her upcoming birthday and her obvious dread of this fact, struck me in a different way than it has before.

I’m 46 years old.  If all goes well, I’ll make 47 and beyond.  The fact that I’m 46 isn’t something I dread.  The fact that I’ll soon be 47 isn’t something that frightens me or causes me to reminisce about the glory days of my youth.  Perhaps my lack of reminiscing is due to the fact that I didn’t have many glory days prior to mid-twenties.  I was a person that had talent and glimpses of something that perhaps could result in something, but for the most part, I was a floating with no real direction.  The most shocking fact for me about being 46 is how good I actually feel. 

When I was 20, I thought a 46 year old man was old, damn old for that matter.  I don’t feel old, but I know that as a 46 year old man, I ain’t young anymore.  I don’t want to be young anymore.   I sure don’t want to be 20 again, I sucked at it.   I was in a band that was barely working. I was living at home.  I was broke most of the time and I had no direction whatsoever.  I like being 46.  Maybe it’s different for men than women, it probably is.  But when this woman mentioned again about her dread about getting older, my reaction to her was different than it was before.

As hard is this may be to believe, occasionally, even at my age, I get interested looks and comments from young women half my age.  Let me preface this fact by saying that when this happens, it happens when I perform, not when I’m just walking down the street. The stage can distort things and make the object of your affection seem more interesting than they really are.  Despite that clarification, I do get hit on sometimes by young women.  

While it’s flattering and I’m certainly not immune to their beauty, the overwhelming feeling I have when this happens is puzzlement.  During this puzzlement, my inner dialogue asks these questions; “Why would someone so young be interested in me?”  What could I possibly have in common with this woman?” and the big one, “Why is someone 3 years older than my daughter hitting on an old guy?”

 A lot of men ask themselves when they are faced with this situation the question, “Where were these women when I was there age?” That question really means, if these men had it together back in the day like they do now, those women would be crawling all over them.   For me, that question means something quite different.   Where were these women when I was there age?  They were just learning how to walk and learning how to wear big girl pants instead of diapers. 

 It’s that interpretation of that inner dialogue question that gives me the insight to know that a woman half my age being interested in me sexually is completely and utterly absurd.  That kind of insight doesn’t happen when you’re twenty.  It only has the chance of happening when you’ve had some years on this planet and you’ve lived.  I have experience and I have knowledge that others who are younger don’t have. Not because they aren’t intelligent or fascinating, but just for the mere fact that I’ve seen things that perhaps they will see someday, but as of this point, by no shortcoming of their own, they just don’t know yet, because they haven’t been around as long as I have.  That fact is comforting to me and I think it should be comforting for my friend who is worried about getting older.

My friend is a professional woman who does a job that helps a lot of people. She is very good at it.  I’m sure she is better at it now than she was 10 years ago.  My friend was attractive 10 years ago and she is better looking now.  In 10 years from now, she will be better at her job and she will still be attractive.  She won’t look like she did 10 years before that, but she’ll still look good because she cares about her appearance.  She’s getting older.  We all are.  What’s the alternative?

I could quite easily die in my sleep.  So could you.  I could quite easily choke and die on a Saturday afternoon chomping on my favorite snack, Ritz Crackers with Peanut Butter and Jelly, or taking too big of a bite of a burger at my favorite burger joint.  The point is, every morning we wake up alive is a blessing.  We are fragile while at the same time being tough as nails.  We can handle enormous strain and pain in our lives, but it can be taken away from us in a second and we will have nothing to say about it, we just have to take it.  The alternative to feeling bad about getting older is to embrace the fact that you are still around to get older in the first place.  It really is that simple if you let it be.

For men, I call this rational embracing your “Inner Forsythe”.  You know the actor John Forsythe who used to be on the show DYNASTY?  Now that is a good looking man with one hell of a head of gray hair.  He’s got older, but he made it work for him.  He didn’t die his hair or try and act 20 years older. He got older and we all went along for the ride because he embraced, well, his own Inner Forsythe I guess.  For women, the only equivalent rational I can think of is, well…. let me see…., I don’t really know.  There are too many botox, skin care products and hair products to appear younger available to women. 

 My recommendation is this; women for the most part are so much wiser than women at an earlier age.  That means that as they get older, they continue to be wiser than men.  My friend who is getting older needs to embrace this fact.  As cold as it sounds, she could be bedridden, or crippled, or horribly disfigured, or a thousand other things that would make the fact that she has to experience another year of pain, truly a nightmare.  Or she could realize that she has been blessed to live on this earth another year and given opportunities to do unlimited things for herself and others because of the knowledge and life lessons learned by living another year.  

So, Happy Birthday my friend, whenever it is and however old you are on this birthday you dread so.  How you celebrate that day and the days after are up to you.   Just remember how lucky you are to celebrate it in the first place.