{"id":2636,"date":"2013-10-13T23:38:54","date_gmt":"2013-10-14T03:38:54","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/www.katrinakenison.com\/?p=2636"},"modified":"2013-10-13T23:38:54","modified_gmt":"2013-10-14T03:38:54","slug":"55","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"http:\/\/katrinakenison.com\/new\/55\/","title":{"rendered":"This is 55"},"content":{"rendered":"

\"HI<\/span>\u2019ve been fifty-five for a little over a week now. Rounding this corner, finding myself squarely in the long-shadowed afternoon of my own life, has given me pause.<\/p>\n

I\u2019ve spent a lot of time lately gazing out the window in my kitchen, watching the sunlit leaves float from tree to ground.\u00a0 The days, the hours, even the moments, feel ripe and full — time to be cherished rather than rushed through.<\/p>\n

And so, on this autumn afternoon I shut my laptop.\u00a0 For the first time in years, I pick up a pad of paper and a pen instead.\u00a0 I grab a sweater and head outside to write.\u00a0 Perhaps what I\u2019m yearning for is a different kind of knowing \u2013 words that come from the still, silent place in my soul, a glimpse of my own depths, some intimation of my rightful place in the world now that I\u2019ve crested the arc of life and begun my descent down the other side.<\/p>\n

55.\u00a0 How strange it feels to write that pair of fives, to associate them with me. Have I really been alive that long, half a century plus five?\u00a0 And what exactly am I, now that I\u2019m no longer technically middle-aged but not exactly old yet, either?<\/p>\n

I turn to a fresh page, brush a stray leaf from my hair.\u00a0<\/p>\n

T<\/span>his is 55. . .<\/p>\n

Fifty-five is being aware there are fewer years left ahead of me than I\u2019ve lived already.\u00a0 It is understanding, in a way I couldn\u2019t have at twenty-five or even forty-five, the bittersweet truth of impermanence. It is knowing that tomorrow isn\u2019t a guarantee, that every plan is provisional, that life isn\u2019t a promise.\u00a0 Fifty-five is dreaming less of the future, dwelling less in the past, and learning (yes, still<\/i> learning) to be here,<\/i> in the now.<\/p>\n

Fifty-five is realizing that being present is my choice to make, again and again and again \u2013 not always the easiest choice for me, but always the best.<\/p>\n

Fifty-five is asking the same \u201cWhat next?\u201d question I was struggling with when I graduated from college.\u00a0 It is knowing there are an infinite number of answers.\u00a0 And that none of them are wrong.<\/p>\n

Fifty-five is two sons in their twenties.\u00a0 It is still-fresh memories of motherhood as it used to be: intensely physical, all consuming, endlessly challenging, viscerally satisfying.\u00a0 And it is finding my way, day by day, into this new, arm\u2019s-length role of mother to young adults. Fifty-five is holding on to faith in their best selves and letting go of fears for their well-being.\u00a0 It is holding on to all I love in each of them and letting go of my need to have them under my roof.\u00a0 It is holding on to a vision of their destinies and letting go of my ideas about how they should get there.<\/p>\n

Fifty-five is not knowing where my children are, who they\u2019re with, what they\u2019re doing, what they ate for dinner, or what\u2019s on their minds.\u00a0 It is resisting most of my impulses to text or call. Fifty-five is learning to worry less and to trust more.<\/p>\n

Fifty-five is pride and delight in the two young men who come home to visit us. It is laughter around the dinner table and help with the dishes and crowding together on the couch to watch The Daily Show.\u00a0 It is honest, heartfelt conversations and easier partings. It is growing used to empty bedrooms. It is being in the home stretch of paying for college.<\/p>\n

F<\/span>ifty-five is being a couple again.\u00a0 It is having the central task of our marriage \u2013 raising a family \u2013 completed.\u00a0 It is re-invention, re-negotiation, and renewal.\u00a0 It is a different kind of commitment.\u00a0 Fifty-five is looking at my husband\u2019s nearly sixty-five-year-old face and seeing, even now, the same face I fell in love with all those years ago as a girl of twenty-three.<\/p>\n

Fifty-five is twenty-six years of marriage. It is routines and rituals, family traditions and jokes told a thousand times. Fifty-five is knowing my husband so well that his story has become my story.\u00a0 It is a mountain of photographs, none of which are organized.\u00a0 It is realizing I\u2019ve lived more of my life alongside this man than I lived before I knew him.<\/p>\n

Fifty-five is not sweating the small stuff (the ice cream scoop left on the counter, the toilet seat left up, his tendency to talk too loud) and being grateful for the big stuff (loyalty, forgiveness, humor, love).<\/p>\n

Fifty-five is feeling the ten-year age difference between us in the slowing pace of our morning walks and not feeling it at all when his arms are around me. It is less about trying to change the man I married and more about loving him as he is for as long as I can. It is knowing the words \u201ctill death do us part\u201d will one day come true.<\/p>\n

Fifty-five is passion transformed into tenderness.\u00a0 It is the end of \u201cthe quickie.\u201d\u00a0 It is love that\u2019s long and slow and unguarded.\u00a0 Fifty-five is less often but with more feeling.\u00a0 Fifty-five is less self-conscious and more trusting.\u00a0 It is less awkward but more exposed. \u00a0Fifty-five is still good.\u00a0 Fifty-five, my husband says, is better than ever.<\/p>\n

Fifty-five is discovering that my heart has no notion of time or propriety.\u00a0 It is admitting that love can still surprise me.\u00a0 Fifty-five is my pulse quickening at the touch of a hand; the blood rushing to my cheeks at the sight of a smile; a funny flip-flop in the pit of my stomach at a sentence in a novel that puts into words everything I never dared say out loud.\u00a0 Fifty-five is invisible when I\u2019m walking down the street.\u00a0 Inside, fifty-five is as chaotic and as confusing as fifteen.<\/p>\n

F<\/span>ifty-five is tears and laughter every day; sometimes, it\u2019s both at once.\u00a0 It is joy and sorrow intertwined.\u00a0 It is shadow and light. It is admitting I\u2019ve learned as much from my losses and failures as from the gifts that have been laid at my feet.<\/p>\n

Fifty-five is going to bed in pajamas and fleece and socks.\u00a0 It is being stark naked at 3 a.m.\u00a0 It is my husband knowing better than to mistake this for an invitation.\u00a0 Fifty-five is hot flashes and night sweats and Swiss cheese for a brain.\u00a0 It is bedclothes off and on and off again. It is sleepless nights and staring at the ceiling and Tylenol PM and earplugs.\u00a0 Fifty-five is getting by on fewer hours of sleep than I ever thought possible. \u00a0Fifty-five is standing outside in the wet grass, watching the sun come up.\u00a0 Fifty-five is being astonished, still, by the resurrection of morning.<\/p>\n

Fifty-five is jeans that stretch, bras that lift, shirts that cover, and shoes that don\u2019t pinch.\u00a0 It is knowing I\u2019m too old for the Gap and not rich enough for Eileen Fisher. It is throwing the Victoria\u2019s Secret catalog in the trash on my way back from the mailbox.\u00a0 It is one pair of good black boots.<\/p>\n

Fifty-five is making peace with my habits: a cup of dark roast coffee every morning laced with half and half, a glass of wine with dinner. \u00a0It is saying yes to champagne and no to mixed drinks. It is cooking meat for my family without ever being tempted to eat it myself. It is drinking extra glasses of water, taking \u201cWiser Woman\u201d vitamins, skipping dessert more often than not.<\/p>\n

Fifty-five is standing in front of the mirror and drawing the sagging skin of my neck up and back.\u00a0 It is glimpsing the possibility of looking a decade younger. It is considering getting a little \u201cwork\u201d done.\u00a0 It is turning away from the face that looks too old to be mine and getting on with the day.<\/p>\n

F<\/span>ifty-five is accepting there are some things I used to do that I may never do again: downhill skiing, rollerblading, galloping across a beach on a horse, hot yoga.\u00a0 It is realizing how much I long to do some other things before it\u2019s too late:\u00a0 sleep outside under the stars, swim naked in the dark, sit by a campfire, hike the White Mountains, visit my best friend from college in Santa Fe, wear a cocktail dress and heels, take a trip with my mom.<\/p>\n

Fifty-five is knowing that some of my secret, youthful fantasies aren\u2019t ever going to come true: living in a cabin by a lake, spending a month in Paris, learning French, writing a best-seller. Fifty-five is realizing I\u2019ve outgrown those fantasies anyway.<\/p>\n

Fifty-five is talking less and listening more. It is choosing less screen time and more real time. It is saying \u201cno\u201d to things I don\u2019t want to do. It is craving solitude. At the same time, it is a willingness to be more open, more intimate, more vulnerable with the small handful of people to whom I\u2019ve entrusted my soul .\u00a0 Fifty-five is knowing what makes me happy: time alone, time in nature, time with dear friends, time with my family, time with a book.<\/p>\n

Fifty-five is reading glasses and wrinkle creams and concealer for the dark circles under my eyes.\u00a0 It is a root canal.\u00a0 It is a basal cell removed and a new, worrisome place on my forehead.\u00a0 It is a groin pull.\u00a0 It is a stomach growing softer and shoulders growing rounder.\u00a0 It is a pair of tweezers kept in the glove compartment for plucking the stray black hair that sprouts from my chin, which I discover (always) while sitting at an intersection waiting for the light to change.<\/p>\n

Fifty-five is also twenty-six miles walked with friends to raise money for cancer research.\u00a0 It is a three-minute plank pose.\u00a0 It is breathing deeply in headstand.\u00a0 It is running just for the fun of it.\u00a0 It is two strong legs and a strong will and an undiminished sense of adventure.\u00a0 Fifty-five is still going strong.<\/p>\n

Fifty-five is knowing what it is to lose a friend.\u00a0 It is being there right till the end.\u00a0 It is death growing more familiar and hitting closer to home.\u00a0 It is grieving with a mother who\u2019s just lost her son, a boy I\u2019ve known since the day he was born.\u00a0 It is an email bearing news of a diagnosis.\u00a0 It is a loved one calling from the hospital.\u00a0 It is a new understanding of the word \u201crandom.\u201d It is learning that finding meaning where there appears to be no meaning is part of our spiritual work.<\/p>\n

F<\/span>ifty-five is two parents just shy of eighty.\u00a0 It is the joy of still allowing them to parent me.\u00a0 It is knowing that one day I will be there to care for them.\u00a0 It is a whispered \u201cthank you\u201d for every family gathering, for my dad\u2019s grilled turkey on Thanksgiving, for my mom\u2019s handmade cards, for their voices on the other end of the phone.\u00a0 For all that was and all that still is and all that someday will be no more.<\/p>\n

Fifty-five is finding my sense of purpose in unexpected places.\u00a0 It is teaching yoga after years of thinking I could never be a yoga teacher.\u00a0 It is writing for the joy of writing rather than to be recognized as a writer.\u00a0 It is sitting on the floor, feeding our old dog by hand. It is helping my son hang a shower curtain in his new apartment.\u00a0 It is proofreading another\u2019s son\u2019s job application and not changing a word.<\/p>\n

Fifty-five is sitting quietly with someone in pain and it is celebrating another\u2019s joy as if it were my own.\u00a0 It is driving a neighbor to the doctor, making dinner for the millionth time, answering a letter from a reader, cutting sunflowers and putting them in a vase.\u00a0 It is holding hands with my dearest friend, heart brimming.<\/p>\n

Fifty-five is ordinary.\u00a0 It is the relief of not being exceptional.\u00a0 It is recognizing what is precious and beautiful in someone else. It is choosing not to live in drama but in harmony. It is less ambition and more appreciation.\u00a0 It is gratitude for things as they are rather than grasping for something just out of reach.\u00a0 It is seeing the futility of comparing and judging and craving.\u00a0 It is a deepening sense of compassion. It is gratitude. It is plain and simple.\u00a0 It is less clutter.\u00a0 Fewer words.\u00a0 More love.<\/p>\n

Fifty-five is learning to approach each day as a blessing, each word as a benediction, daily life as my practice. It is being open to what comes, offering prayers of hope and healing for the universe, trusting there are forces at work here that are larger than I am.<\/p>\n

Fifty-five is the joy of waking up each day and taking part in this great, ongoing human conversation. It is mystery.<\/p>\n

How old are you, and what does your age mean to you? \u00a0I’d love to know!<\/strong><\/em><\/p>\n

(With thanks to Lindsey Mead<\/strong><\/a> whose post This is 38<\/strong><\/a> inspired me to gather up these thoughts.)<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

I\u2019ve been fifty-five for a little over a week now. Rounding this corner, finding myself squarely in the long-shadowed afternoon of my own life, has given me pause. I\u2019ve spent a lot of time lately gazing out the window in my kitchen, watching the sunlit leaves float from tree to ground.\u00a0 The days, the hours, […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":15183,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"nf_dc_page":"","om_disable_all_campaigns":false,"_monsterinsights_skip_tracking":false,"_monsterinsights_sitenote_active":false,"_monsterinsights_sitenote_note":"","_monsterinsights_sitenote_category":0,"_genesis_hide_title":false,"_genesis_hide_breadcrumbs":false,"_genesis_hide_singular_image":false,"_genesis_hide_footer_widgets":false,"_genesis_custom_body_class":"","_genesis_custom_post_class":"","_genesis_layout":"","_jetpack_memberships_contains_paid_content":false,"footnotes":""},"categories":[17,22,23,30,33,34,38,39,8,11,14],"tags":[62,130,178,198,226],"class_list":{"0":"post-2636","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","5":"has-post-thumbnail","7":"category-acceptance","8":"category-change","9":"category-compassion","10":"category-gratitude","11":"category-impermanence-soul-work","12":"category-joy","13":"category-marriage","14":"category-midlife","15":"category-parenting","16":"category-parenting-young-adults","17":"category-soul-work","18":"tag-aging","19":"tag-compassion-2","20":"tag-fifty-five","21":"tag-gratitude-2","22":"tag-impermanence","23":"entry"},"jetpack_featured_media_url":"https:\/\/i0.wp.com\/katrinakenison.com\/new\/wp-content\/uploads\/2018\/10\/600x600.png?fit=600%2C600","jetpack_sharing_enabled":true,"_links":{"self":[{"href":"http:\/\/katrinakenison.com\/new\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/2636","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"http:\/\/katrinakenison.com\/new\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"http:\/\/katrinakenison.com\/new\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/katrinakenison.com\/new\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/katrinakenison.com\/new\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=2636"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"http:\/\/katrinakenison.com\/new\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/2636\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/katrinakenison.com\/new\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/15183"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"http:\/\/katrinakenison.com\/new\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=2636"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/katrinakenison.com\/new\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=2636"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/katrinakenison.com\/new\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=2636"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}