How to Get Older Without Really Trying

I was recently asked to give the keynote address to a group called “Austin Up”. I was happy to be asked because as we know I am a wordy gal, a talker, a writer, and a real yapper.  The group focuses on creating community actions and policies that support the aging population in Austin Texas. This would indicate that my being asked to address said group is evidence that I am a woman of a certain age. That I am older. Old.

Dang.

This is how I got older.   I was just going along not feeling any particular age, not putting much thought toward it.  Just humming happily along and then this happened:  I looked at myself in the rearview mirror at 3 in the afternoon on a sunny California day.   Do not do this unless you are prepared for what you might see, because peering at myself in the harsh midday light left no doubt.  I was older. I got older and I wasn’t really trying. 

Double dang.

I was in my late forties then and this would not do, so I summoned as much denial as I could muster, which was quite a lot back then, and managed to put the unfortunate incident behind me.  I forgot all about being older until I turned 58.   I had been rolling along in my 50’s thinking, “Well this is no big deal.  Nothing major has changed.  My boobs haven’t fallen off or anything.” Thank God for hair dye because it made me feel like I looked pretty much the same.  I was cool with being in my 50’s until …

58.  The day after my 58th birthday I looked around and there was 60 sitting in the corner eyeing me intently.  She had a knowing smile on her lips, one finger crooked in my direction.

 “ Any day now,” she said.  “ You will be mine.”

Boy, that lady wasn’t playin’.  I am 63.  Might as well admit it because as we have discussed before … the damned Google knows.  Anyone can learn my age in 20 seconds.  The Google knows and it will tell anyone, it doesn’t care who is asking.

So yes I am 63 and grateful for it.  Like so many of you, I have dear friends and family who did not see 60 or much beyond it anyway.  In my book, anybody past the age of 50 is a card-carrying member of the “ducking lucky” club and this is the month of May to boot.  May is Older Americans Month.

How about that?  We’ve got our own month!

I recently signed with a modeling agency.  I am a “Senior model” There was no category for a thing like that before but “Senior model” is a thing now . This is due to the fact that there are gobs and gobs of folks getting older.  By the year 2030 every member of the baby boom generation will be at least 65 and well in my case .. woo doggy…  I’m not telling.  Ask Google.

The good news is that as a group we are big business.  We can buy stuff and they want us to buy stuff, hence senior models to sell their stuff.  Works for me. I am in.

 I can be located on Kim Dawson's agency website in the  “Classics Division” Now you gotta love that! Has a nice ring to it. If you are over 50, I would like to invite you to join me there. I hereby declare that we are all of us in the “Classics Division.”

Happy Older Americans Month to all!  If you are not “older “ yet don’t worry you will be…. you won’t even have to try. 

I say take a month of happy however you can get it.

On we go …