It’s Friday, October 18th, as I begin this column. The morning of my sixtieth birthday.
Sixtieth. That’s a strange-looking word that sounds even stranger to my ear. Maybe if I write it over and over again – and say it out loud a few more times – it’ll seem normal. Sixtieth. Sixtieth. Today is my sixtieth birthday. I am now sixty.
Outside my door, the sound of chain saws. We’re having two enormous water oaks removed from our yard today, which was not my first choice of birthday presents. The wretched deed was supposed to be done October 4th, but then Helene blew through and our tree guys had so much emergency work they had to postpone.
So now I’m losing two beloved trees – something I’ve been dreading for months – on the day of my 60th birthday. On top of that, while out walking this morning, a black cat crossed my path. Literally.
Despite all this overt symbolism, I am surprisingly cheerful.
I friend just texted me and said, “Welcome to the youth of old age.” I thought I’d reached that threshold in my 50s, so I guess I’m already broken in. Which is good, right? Somebody else informed me that I now get Thursday discounts at Harris Teeter. Score!
I’ve never been big on observing my own birthday. Ask anybody who knows me. It always made me uncomfortable, even when I was young. I love to celebrate other people’s birthdays, but mine? Nope. Most of my friends don’t even know when it is.
It may sound odd, especially from somebody who’s been a professional navel-gazer for almost 25 years, but focusing that kind of attention on myself – for the mere fact of my existence – has always embarrassed me. Maybe I have an inferiority complex, or, in today’s parlance, a dearth of “self love”? Who knows? That’s just the way it’s always been.
Until today. Today I am sixty years old. And it feels like a big deal. Almost an accomplishment. I am uncharacteristically compelled to commemorate the occasion.
When you get to be my age – Gee, I’m now somebody who says “when you get to be my age”– you’ve seen a lot of change. And I’m not just talking about your image in the mirror.
That can be jarring, I assure you, but thank God – or Mother Nature – your eyes accommodate that changing image by slowly losing their power to see up close. It’s such a splendid adaptation, one can only marvel at the genius of evolution!
But I’m mainly talking about cultural change.
For instance, I am of the generation that vividly remembers a world without internet. My daughter can scarcely fathom my tales of the Before Times, when students did their homework using a strange, mystical set of volumes called The World Book Encyclopedia, and men were sometimes forced to “ask directions” – even against their will – while driving to unfamiliar locations.
She shakes her head in wonder when I speak of an ancient world of just three television networks, and three news anchors who – and here’s where her mind really boggles – all reported the same news from roughly the same perspective. Americans were walking around under the same set of assumptions, with the same basic narrative of reality.
It was madness!
She hardly believes it when I tell her that all my friends listened to the same few bands, on the same few radio stations, or that we waited a whole week to watch the next episode of our favorite TV show, and it wasn’t even hard. It was actually kind of fun. We bonded over delayed gratification and common cultural touchstones. Her generation barely has any of either.
My daughter seems wistful when I speak of a time when you could disappear for hours – just check out altogether – because you didn’t carry a phone on your person, and nobody else did, either. Or when I tell her that a “community” was once a diverse group of neighbors, living in proximity to one another – and interacting regularly – instead of an abstract group of strangers, connected mainly online, by a shared racial, sexual, or ideological identity.
But I’m not here to reminisce. I’m here to celebrate my sixtieth birthday. Sixtieth. I am sixty.
To tell you the truth, I’m kind of stunned I made it this far. I always had this niggling feeling – this fear in the back of mind – that I would die young. And now, that fear has been laid to rest! I, too, will be laid to rest one day, but when it happens, I won’t be young.
I am now entering the age of the Wise Woman. The Elder. The Crone.
Yes, I aim to take back the word “crone.” If you hear that word and immediately think “ugly old hag,” think again. In pagan myth, the Crone is a powerful archetype representing wisdom, knowledge and experience. She is one of three aspects of the Triple Goddess, the other two being Maiden and Mother. I find her fascinating and even beautiful. I aspire to embody her energy.
How does this pagan goddess stuff jibe with my identity as a Methodist-turned-Presbyterian living in the American South? It’s complicated, but for now I’ll just crib from my man Walt Whitman and say, “I am large, I contain multitudes.”
(This is something one well knows by the time one hits sixty.)
Most of all, this morning, I find myself filled with gratitude for the gift of this long life. It hasn’t always been easy, but it’s been good.
I’ve loved and been loved in return.
I’ve laughed and made others laugh.
I’ve had my say, sounded my barbaric yawp, won my share of praise and criticism for it.
I’ve coaxed flowers from the earth, lured painted buntings to my yard, enjoyed the loyalty of cats, sung Handel’s Messiah with a choir, played Ophelia on a community stage, walked along the Seine at night, lit a candle in the Hagia Sophia, watched the sunrise on a Tennessee mountain, and raised a marvelous child to adulthood.
That’s just for starters.
I’ve been blessed beyond measure for sixty years. A lifetime. If it all ended tomorrow, I would die happy and immensely grateful.
Every day from here on out will be gravy. Whipped cream. The cherry atop an extravagant hot fudge sundae I could never have dreamed of or deserved. Pure grace.
Today I am sixty. Happy Birthday to me.
