The entry where The Archer gets old

So, it was my birthday yesterday. I have historically not really celebrated my own birthday that much. It was just not really a thing when I was growing. Maybe when you turned a consequential number like 16 or something, but I think we had enough Calvinist in us that birthdays were kind of viewed as exercises in narcissism, and so were not quite discouraged but certainly something that was usually only for little kids. "Dignified people did not have birthday parties." At least that's what I remember from my childhood. 

I tell this to people, and they are often horrified. By that I mean they physically recoil when I regale them with this story, like I had been horribly abused as a child or else I was an escapee from some weird 'reject modernity' cult like in M. Night Shyamalan's The Village. (The Village often got panned when it came out, but I thought his last really good thought provoking film before he lost his mind and completely forgot how to direct.) In actuality though, I really harbor no bad feelings about missing the whole "birthday" thing growing up. The whole concept of birthdays and parties, particularly for adults, still mystifies me a bit to this day.

Yesterday, a friend asked me how old I was. I honestly had to stop and think for moment to do the math because the concept of how many rotations around the sun I have lived through still seems a curious thing to keep track of. I admit my brain does not sometimes operate like other people's brains. I see the world in weird ways no one else seems to. I am a fiercely independent thinker, and I am fine with that.   

Not to be relativist, but I do think age is really a thing often in the eye of the beholder. I know 90 year old women who still run around with their girlfriends and play cards several times a week. I also know men my own age that I went to school with that are bald, white bearded old cranks that you would think are retirement age or gunning for a new career as Santa Claus.

In fact, I always love looking at photographs of people from World War II or earlier. They would put on their WWII uniforms with their slicked back hair and metal framed glasses and look like they were 35 but in reality were maybe 21 years old. Now we have TikTok videos of people clubbing and bragging about not having kids while trying to appear to be 25, and you can tell even through the filters that they have crow's feet and must be at least 40+. 

There is always a latent sadness in those TikTok/Youtube videos though. They put on a good front to try to be an influencer, but you can tell when the booze wears off they are miserable. I do not need to try to convince people via self promoting video promos that I am living my best life if I actually am living my best life. If you are happy, you are content. Contentment is not contingent on how my "likes"or views I get on anything I post on social media. People like that really have a fear of being alone. They say they don't, but you don't post on social media unless you are trying to actually be social.

I was pondering all this over the last week. Partly it was trying to figure out the disconnect this year that was going on with me and the season of Lent. Partly it was the fact that the day after Easter was my birthday. Partly because I noticed in the mirror my beard suddenly has a lot more white hairs in it that I had previously noticed. I am still at the point where I can trim them or hide them if I so desired, and no one would largely be the wiser. While I am going bald, the hair I do have is still largely quite dark, but like the joke goes if I suddenly won the lottery...there will be signs. Sadly, those signs are becoming more prevalent. 

Let me be clear, however. I don't feel old. I don't feel young anymore, but I don't feel old. But, I am to the point where if I get out of a chair too quickly, my joints pop. I have to be careful eating all the goodies that turn up around Easter or Christmas. I probably couldn't bound up 4 flights of stairs with several bags of groceries like I did 20 years ago when I was living in a 4th story apartment with no elevator. In fact, I marvel that I would haul a bicycle up to the 4th floor every day to keep in my apartment for the days I would ride my bike to my first job as a Anglican curate. I think I could largely still do the biking to work, but the thought of hauling my red Pee Wee Herman style bike up 4 flights of stairs every night after work would be unpleasant. 

I am not complaining or whining about any of this. Please do not take this blog entry as such. But, as I just watched my daughter turn 16 and drive off in my wife's old car, it did give me pause. I was sitting on the porch and watching this spectacle. My wife came out, and we sat for a while. She finally mentioned how odd it was seeing our daughter and her friend driving off to get a burger by themselves. She casually asked if I was ready for her to go off to college. I said that no I was not, but probably not for the reasons she expected.

She asked me what I meant by that, and, in all seriousness, I blurted out with, "Empty Nesters are old people!"

I think everyone in their mind has what they consider to be the threshold of when someone becomes an "old person." A few generations ago, the Hippies said, "Don't trust anyone over 30!" which was all fine and good until they all turned 30. It seems the current younger generation seems to think that getting married and having kids makes you an old person. A recent Youtube clip I happened to blunder into was this 30 something women pretending to be thankful she didn't have kids because she'd be having to "spend her $8 on her kid instead of her Starbucks coffee." 

While it was just a stupid viral video, I did feel sorry for that woman. I am sure she would be offended that I was referring to her as a woman or a lady. No doubt she would see those descriptions as euphemisms for being old or, dare I say, grown up in the same way some people seem to get offended if you refer to them as "sir" or "ma'am." Being from the South where you call every adult that as a matter of being polite, that offense mystifies me.

I think it is this current culture where no one wants to be perceived as an actual grown up, i.e. the dread horror of being, and being perceived by others as, an actual functional adult. In a world where 30 or even 40 somethings are wanting to be treated like 21 year old single frat boys or sorority girls who go on disco clubbing benders like that is somehow normal adult behavior.

Some people talk about having a mid-life crisis. I don't think that is anything other than pop psychology nonsense, but for sake of argument, let's go with it. Maybe my mid-life crisis is actually acknowledging that people over 21 need to be treated like adults. Maybe it is time for me to call that out. Maybe I need to acknowledge that I have turned into a cranky old man. 

Or, like a functional adult, I can just keep on keeping on and sip my coffee (that I made at home) and realize that with age comes wisdom. At some point, these people will learn that being an older adult is not the curse they think it is. That maybe the materialistic world that so enthralls them is leading them to a place of darkness and loneliness. I just hope they realize that before they find themselves alone in an empty house with only their bottle of antidepressants to keep them company.