The Reality That We Are Getting Older

Today was my first day of spring break without hosting my parents at my house. To fill the void of company, my friend Kim (who co-authored a previous post) came over for dinner - a dinner in which I have also blogged about before (insert: see post about making frozen food better). Tonight, I just didn't feel like cooking, so I knew that even though I still had to make something tasty for my guest, I left it to revamping frozen food.

As we finished our meal and sat down on the couch, ready to unwind and catch up over a glass of Pezzi King Zinfandel, we began to talk about the "parent's age". By this, Kim defined it as the age you always think of when you think of your parents. It has no number, and doesn't belong to a decade, but belongs to the role they play. It is ageless. What happens with this is that as the kid, we lose sight of what their actual age is. "I still picture my dad as 40," Kim said, "even though he has heart issues and can't do the things he used to do... and he forgets things!"

At a dinner with my parents the previous night, we talked about the foreseeable domino effect of losing the dogs, Wrigley (age 13) and Ginny (age 9) with knowing my parents would later follow. I said to Kim in a joking way trying to hide by concern: "You know the book Everyone Poops? Well, everyone dies." Kim is someone I can talk to about this without an eye-roll, but she brought up a good point. You can't put off the time you have with those that are aging. "How might you cherish the extra time and appreciate the limited time differently?" She said. "Be intentional with it so it doesn't get wasted."

As we are young, you can look at your day to day life knowing you aren't going to sit around and dwell in this notion, but it's good to know that our existence here is finite. We have options, we have choice, and we can be intentional about the time we have. That's on us.

Kim blames this deep thought on the Podcast "On Being", but she is someone who is in tune to these thoughts, and I appreciate her friendship and insight on this.

Plus, she is always willing to taste test my food.