A co-worker was complaining that he had injured his foot after landing funny. He figured it happened after jumping off a short wall. A very short wall. <\/p>\n
\u201cMan, this is what happens when we get old, right?\u201d he said. <\/p>\n
He is in his late 20s. I thought about bludgeoning him, but the only thing in reach was a box of tissues. \t<\/p>\n
\u201cNo, bean sprout,\u201d I told him. \u201cIt\u2019s not \u2018what happens when we get old.\u2019 Just when we have the coordination of flopping fish.\u201d <\/p>\n
Maybe it hit me hard because I\u2019m turning 43 next week. And like most of us, I don\u2019t like this idea of growing older. That certain things are out of our control. My philosophy on age has always been that it\u2019s all in your head. The more you get consumed by the notion that you\u2019re getting older, the more you start to feel it. And the more you feel it, the more you fall off of walls. That\u2019s my theory, at least. <\/p>\n
So I go around looking at the world the way an 8-year-old might: I see butterflies and rocket ships everywhere. I eat a lot of ice cream. I never take the garbage out until I\u2019ve been asked 22,000 times.
\n<\/p>\n
Try it. It works! You\u2019ll be young forever. <\/p>\n
But the older I get, the more I worry about the soundness of my theory. There have been a few cracks recently. Take my eyesight. I\u2019ve always had 20\/20 vision. The only one in my family. (I\u2019ve held out hope that this means I was adopted and don\u2019t share DNA with any of these crazy people.) <\/p>\n
This year, though, I started worrying my vision wasn\u2019t what it used to be. I hold books and newspapers farther away from my eyes, and sometimes I strain trying to read this or that. I hadn\u2019t been to an eye doctor in years, and I wondered if \u201cage\u201d was starting to degrade my view of the world. \t<\/p>\n
So I set up an exam and mostly got good news. My eyesight is still 20\/20. I can get away with the slightest of reading glasses, and only need them for really small print. Hooray! <\/p>\n
But then the doctor walloped me \u2014\u00a0like a box of tissue to the top of my head. \u201cEnjoy it now,\u201d he said. \u201cIt won\u2019t last. It\u2019s what happens when you get old.\u201d <\/p>\n
Ouch, doc! Way to let a man down easy.<\/p>\n
My world shattered in front of my eyes. I could see THAT pretty clearly! It was the first direct hit to my \u201cage is all in your head\u201d theory. That maybe no matter what I do, or how I think about things, I won\u2019t be able to beat this one. <\/p>\n
On the verge of 43, the eye doctor left me slightly bruised. But I\u2019m recovering. I haven\u2019t picked out those reading glasses yet. I\u2019m not quite ready to give in. I\u2019m too busy seeing crystal-clear rocket ships wherever I look \u2026 and not injuring myself when I jump off walls. <\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"
A co-worker was complaining that he had injured his foot after landing funny. He figured it happened after jumping off a short wall. A very short wall. \u201cMan, this is what happens when we get old, right?\u201d he said. He is in his late 20s. I thought about bludgeoning him, but the only thing in reach was a box of tissues. \u201cNo, bean sprout,\u201d I told him. \u201cIt\u2019s not \u2018what happens when we get old.\u2019 Just when we have the coordination of flopping fish.\u201d Maybe it hit me hard because I\u2019m turning 43 next week. And like most of us, I don\u2019t like this idea of growing older. That certain things are out of our control. My philosophy on age has always been that it\u2019s all in your head. The more you get consumed by the notion that you\u2019re getting older, the more you start to feel it. And the more you feel it, the more you fall off of walls. That\u2019s my theory, at least. So I go around looking at the world the way an 8-year-old might: I see butterflies and rocket ships everywhere. I eat a lot of ice cream. I never take the garbage out until I\u2019ve been asked 22,000 times.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":4,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[554,557],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-1287","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-2016-nutshells","category-getting-old-er-older"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.nutshellcity.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1287","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.nutshellcity.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.nutshellcity.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.nutshellcity.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/4"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.nutshellcity.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=1287"}],"version-history":[{"count":2,"href":"https:\/\/www.nutshellcity.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1287\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":1326,"href":"https:\/\/www.nutshellcity.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1287\/revisions\/1326"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.nutshellcity.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=1287"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.nutshellcity.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=1287"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.nutshellcity.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=1287"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}