Do you remember wanting to be old enough for kindergarten? Old enough to stay home alone? Old enough to babysit? Old enough to drive a car? Old enough to vote or drink?

Remember when you thought forty was old?

One of the best things about age is its relativity. I was mother to a 3-year old. My nephew was riding in the car with me. “Aunt Deb, you could pass.”

Looking around, I saw no other vehicles, “I could pass what?” I asked.

Motioning to my hands on the steering wheel, he said, “You could pass for a teenager.”

I was 19!

Do you remember the Ivory liquid commercial with the teenager and her middle-aged mom comparing hands? In that commercial, the mom’s hands could pass for those of a teenager because she used the correct dishwashing soap!

I am now old enough to know my hands could not pass for those of a teenager.

I’m glad.

I sometimes miss seeing my younger self in the mirror. I am surprised by the crepey skin.

I’m glad I’m old enough for more important things.

I’m old enough to choose comfortable shoes.

Remember the pointed-toe spiked-heels?

I am old enough to value women friends.

Gone are the days of blowing off our girlfriends because we got asked out by a boy.

Old enough to be honest about what we want. That was quite an adjustment.

“No, I’m really not comfortable with thus and so; given the choice this is what I’d do or where I’d go.”

I remember the summer morning in 1995: robins singing, sun streaming through the window. I sat on the sofa and I knew—with every fiber of my being—I was going to spend the winter in Tennessee bonding with our new grandchild who was due in October. “I am going to go to Tennessee for the winter,” I later told my husband, “I hope you can get your ducks in a row so you are able to go with me.”

Gloria is in her 90’s. Buried her son when he was in his 50s. She says about that, “By far the hardest thing I’ve done.”

Nancy’s in her 80s. She takes her therapy dog to hospitals and schools three days a week and still maintains her house and garden.

I’m not yet 70, but I’m old enough. Caroline Myss writes, “But now I feel that I have reached that age where I can speak more openly about the hidden realm, mysticism, and the wonders of all things holy and Sacred.”

I am old enough to know I would rather be close than right. I would rather be honest than accepted.

I am old enough to know that just because not everyone one talks to dead people doesn’t mean I am crazy because I do. After all, I don’t just talk to them, they talk to me.

And I am old enough to know we don’t have to agree to agree to be kind and compassionate.

Ah, yes, old enough for that….

1/15/2017 ~ Debra Basham