Generation Fabulous, the premier place for women bloggers of a certain age to connect with each other, is celebrating it’s new website with another blog hop. This is my fifth time participating. So far, there’s been:
- John Barrowman: My Celebrity Crush
- Pleated Jeans
- How We Met
- Letter to Me, Age 20
This month’s topic, in celebration of the new website is “What Does Aging Gracefully Mean to You?” I fully embrace the concept of Aging Gracefully and I can break that down by the words.
Let’s start with Aging. Every decade of my life has been better than the previous one. I’ll turn 51 this year and I’m already on pace to make that statement as true for my fifties as it was for my forties. I have every intention of making it true for my sixties as well. Each decade comes with more confidence, more understanding of myself and others, greater dreams and more abilities to make those dreams come true.
Is it realistic to expect I might be saying the same at age 71? I have no idea–I’ll be happy to make it that far.
Joy, Bertha Hoover, Sara Weese
I don’t have a date for this photo, maybe 1988. I was 26; Grandmother was 93; Mother was 51. Grandmother would live to two months shy of 100, but my mother died at age 68 from complications of diabetes. I have longevity genes, but I’ll have to live my life more like my farmer ancestors and less like my information professional parents if I’m going to get the benefit of them. In spite of the fact that I’m sporting a farmer’s tan in this photo, I had many years of information professional jobs before I started balancing that lifestyle with daily exercise and home-grown, home-cooked foods.
Now, Gracefully. I’ve come to love all the forms of the word grace — gracious, graceful, moments of grace. I want to do everything as gracefully as possible, including grow older like these beautiful women:
Rosa Parks (Rosa Parks by Wil Mara) lived to age 92. Eleanor Roosevelt (Eleanor Roosevelt by Kem Knapp Sawyer) lived to age 78. Katharine Hepburn (The Private World of Katharine Hepburn by John Bryson and Katharine Hepburn) lived to age 96. In aging gracefully, I would be happy to achieve some part of the courage of Rosa Parks, the leadership of Eleanor Roosevelt, and the passion of Katharine Hepburn.
Aging Gracefully, to me, means seeking opportunities to create and serve at every age.
Watch this space — I’ll link to the blog hop when it’s up and running so you can read what other midlife bloggers have to say about Aging Gracefully.
