We Were Invincible

It feels like a destination: Next stop, 62!

It is most definitely a journey. And every time I think I’ve contemplated this enough; I think of something else to say. I want to say something that will give young Black women a way to understand what may happen to them when they are my age. A couple days ago I officially became social security age at a time when the social security that many elderly folks rely on is being threatened. And, yes, I will have mine now…please and thank you. But this is not about that.

Remember when you could not imagine being an old lady? Old ladies were frail, they smelled of liniment oil, and their eyes were sometimes cloudy with that mysterious, thin, gray circle around the pupil. Their hair was wiry, or they wore rolls of flesh on their arms and bellies. They were sometimes mean, in their muumuu dresses, always sweeping the floor, and quoting the bible. Sometimes they were scary, especially at the thought that you might one day become them. It was funny to think that they had ever shopped in Victoria’s Secret for themselves.

Though we often like to think of change as happening suddenly–as in, and just like that, I was an old lady–it wasn’t sudden at all. Over time, we become a different person, if we’re lucky, and it takes time. Sometimes that person is our mother, our grandmother, and the pieces of all of our matrilineal line. And sometimes it is none of them. And there is a moment when it hits you, and you can’t remember the little girl you were anymore–when every story you know about yourself is no longer a memory, but another life…someone else’s life. Who was that? There are times when I wonder: Did that really happen, or was I dreaming?

In Ageless Body, Timeless Mind: The Quantum Alternative to Growing Old, by Deepak Chopra, (his most profound book in my opinion), he talks about how all of our experiences are stored in our cells in the form of memory. I’m paraphrasing here because it’s been a while since I’ve read it, but our physical bodies are literally shaped by our experiences–our joys, our pains, our hurts, etc. So, it would do us some good to, as soon as we can in our lives, turn the rolls of flesh, the backs aching and curved from the weight of the world, into a healthier, more joyous version as we age by changing how we see the world; how we see ourselves, and how we treat ourselves.

We were invincible once, but now, we are timeless. Just as we are often filled with anxiety at the thought of death and what comes after this life, the older we get, the more peace we have as we face these inevitable milestones. So, because of my religious and spiritual upbringing and soul searching over the years, I started quoting the bible a long time ago. My muumuu’s are silky and more artful than what my grandmama wore. But if you come to my house on a day when my knees are predicting rain, you’ll get a whiff of Bengay as I walk past. And you too will know, that I am timeless.