Stupid numbers. Why do some matter more than others? Shake fear into us. Terrorize us. Cause us to cross streets or run screaming when we hear them called out at a deli or they pop up on the calendar. 13. 6-6-6. 1040. (Oh no, the taxman cometh!!!)
And then there is this one: 44.
Hear it? Despicable. Slimy. Terrifying.
The last one is the number of years I’m turning this week. And for some stupid reason, that stupid number is getting to me. Intimidating me. It’s like it carries weight. Baggage. More so than his cousin 43, or even some of his more advanced relatives like 46 or 47.
Why? Why is it that some numbers — and especially ages — do this to us? Bring added significance or added pressure. Or a special feeling of doom!
When I tell people the number I’m turning, I say it with disdain and contempt — a little bit of trepidation. A shiver curls up and down my spine.
I just don’t like it. I don’t want to be it. It sounds … “mature.” Advanced. Like you’re getting somewhere you don’t want to go. “All aboard the train to Fiftyville … Next stop: reading glasses, back pain and plaid golf pants.”
Stupid number.
I don’t feel it. I feel great! I feel young and youthful and like I still have the world ahead of me.
I led a bunch of college students on a volunteer project to help out at the Horse Haven Ranch last weekend. We were assigned the duty of busting up a 10X10 slab of concrete so they can expand a horse grazing area. We were presented two sledgehammers — one a 20-pounder — and told to get ‘a bustin’. “What, no dynamite?” I asked, looking reluctantly at the mighty sledge that seemed to weigh about the same as I do. “We have to lift this thing above our heads!?! It’s inhumane!”
But along with my younger counterparts, I swung that thing until we beat the pitiful slab into manageable bits and pulverized rocks. Ha-ha! Take that, concrete.
I felt like a strong man. A young man. One who isn’t (cue blood-curdling scream) about to be 44.
My hands hurt the next day. In fact, my poor, numb knuckles struggled to grip my toothbrush. There was a funny pain in my lower back that seemed to be tapping something in Morse Code (W-H-A-T-W-E-R-E-Y-O-U-T-H-I-N-K-I-N-G-M-O-R-O-N-?) Maybe I had been kicked by a horse and hadn’t realized it?
“Dang, I’m getting old,” I said into the mirror.
Then I reminded myself: Your back hurts because bustin’ up concrete is back-breaking work. If it wasn’t, they wouldn’t need you and a bunch of college kids to take out your pent-up aggression on it.
So, I’ve decided I’m not going to let 44 scare me. I’m assigning it to the harmless, youthful and fun-to-be-around bin. It’s nothing but a toddler’s age … if you’re starting to get double vision. Which reminds me: where did I put those reading glasses?