50 Tents

I’m turning 75 next week. To commemorate this historic occasion, I’m raising money to buy fifty $18.39 two-person tents that can be given to homeless people who seem to be on their last legs coping with living outside. I could shoot for 75 tents but that carries the risk of failure. And how would it look to fall short on one’s 75th birthday? As if there hasn’t been plenty of falling short in the preceding years.

I thought of having a party. But it would be a lot of work and carry the risk of having people look at me all evening. I had a party once to celebrate an award that I got from my alma mater. My husband rounded up guests to peel shrimp in the kitchen and then, because he claims to have read the recipe wrong, he used raw chopped garlic as a garnish on a chopped liver canape. This was some years ago, seventeen to be exact, but I’ve not forgotten the teamwork he inspired in the kitchen nor the endless fodder for jokes and kidding created by his garlic escapade. I remember people dancing in the living room.

I once threw a surprise party for my husband. Because his last name starts with an “S,” I rented a Superman suit for him complete with tights and a cape. After the initial shock of seeing his friends and colleagues, he trotted upstairs and put on the suit. I was amazed by that. I shouldn’t have been, since I rented the suit, but somehow, I thought it would stay on a hanger hung on the dining room chandelier. People can surprise you.

I’ve thought about what to do on my birthday. I’m thinking of having a really fine lunch and then going to a water park and floating in a big inner tube (or what we used to call an inner tube) but I wish there was an adult floating place where I could have a rum and Coke in a cupholder while I floated around. That would be deluxe. I used to own a flask, but, regrettably, it’s been misplaced.

I’m not sad about turning 75, but I am amazed. I do not seem that old from the inside looking out, but the reverse is not true. By any objective measure, I am coasting on the downside of life expectancy. My friend, the other day, commenting on a friend’s recovery from some malady said, “You know, none of this ends well,” which I took to mean we are headed for the grave, but that’s true if your two or seventy-five. There’s no dodge ball here, no winners of immortality.

In all of this, in all of the impending doom, and sideways glances of younger people, and growing list of things that might be too late for me to do, the knowledge of what I have and can still do is exhilarating. It is a choice to think this way. There is another choice, but I won’t make it. I choose buoyancy. I choose 50 tents. I am glad to be 75 and to be a person in the world.