Aged

Age has bedeviled me this past week but I am getting my second wind.

I am inspired by 92-year old Mathea Allansmith who became the oldest woman to finish a marathon. It’s in the Guinness Book of Records, formally recorded after a year of documenting a feat witnessed by hundreds of people. I get it. It is kind of unbelievable.

My great grandmother lived to be 99. Her picture was in our small town’s newspaper the day of her birthday. She was bedridden but cheery. She’d had a good long life and there was cake. I have her rocking chair in my office. It is small, like a doll’s chair.

Last week, I went to the guy who cuts my hair. I told him I needed a cut that would make me look current and cool. The time before I told him I wanted a cut like Jamie Lee Curtis’ and the time before that a cut that would make me look fierce, prison matron fierce. Things happened in my life that had to echo through my hair.

At the event that necessitated the current and cool haircut, I asked my husband to take my picture. Then, I sent the picture to the guy who cuts my hair. At that very moment, I had to communicate with the one person who got it.

“Thank you for the boost this haircut gave me,” I said. “You look AMAAAAZING,” he said. He said more, but along those lines.

The guy who cuts my hair was sent here to get me over this rough patch.He doesn’t know this but I do.