Life After 60
It is like everyone says: "the old fifty is the new sixty and the new fifty is the old forty. After this sentence you won't hear the word "old" because that word is not in my vocabulary. I ask myself and I ask others the same question: "What does old mean?". For me this word is obsolete and it means nothing but a way to insult someone who is over forty and often times by someone who is 26, someone who has not lived long enough to understand that old is as old is and as old gets. In fact what I know now is that there is no such thing as old. Old is when a piece of furniture is broken and we need to replace it with a new piece. We don't need to replace people as if they were an old car that needed to be towed to the junk yard. Hence I have decided that the word old does not apply to human beings. Old applies to objects but never human beings, especially not ones like me. Let me explain.
I have lived on this planet for sixty years as measured by the month, day and year I was born: 1954. I consider myself a relatively nice looking specimen and I take very good care of myself including my appearance. I wear skinny blue jeans with jackets and sweaters and on occassion I add a hip scarf around my neck. I don't call me old and if I were to give me a label, not that I want one, I would call me "seasoned". I am seasoned like a fine wine is seasoned and what I feel is that I get better with each passing year. I will be as "old" as I want to be and as old as feel I am. When I look in the mirror I see a handsome man who is seasoned and loves to have a good time. I don't see an elderly man or a man of sixty. I see Elliott. I see a person who happens to be sixty but who happens to feel like he is forty, sometimes thirty five. But what I see most is simply a specimen of a person who can carry a tune and still loves salsa music. A guy who can wear a black shirt untucked with black pencil legged pants and a pair of ankle boots. That guy who still has his groove and moves to it.
Life after sixty is fun if you would like it to be fun. One can have exactly the same amount of fun and joy as the kids in their twenties, maybe more. Because now that I know better I can do better at being cool, hip, fun, funny and witty. Life after sixty means that now I have it down baby. I got it together and I know what I want. I move like a gazel and I sting like a bee. Life is so much more clear to me now. I know what I want, where I want it and how I want it. I wear those red and black gloves like I mean it and when I wear the red and black scarf people notice that I am wearing it for real, to the hilt. That's what happens after your sixty.
But the point of my endeavor today is not to convince you that I still have it. Oh no, not at all. I am showing you and everyone else that I have it without having to say one word. I am ageless and timeless and so are you by the way. Whether you are sixty or seventy you are timeless and your beauty and your impact has noting to do with age. In fact you are ageless. We are ageless once we learn to walk, talk, work, cry, grieve, dance and play. We have already learned what we need to know and once we can dance then there is nothing else to relearn. We are set. We are timeless and not only are we timeless we are brave and we are compassionate. We don't need anyone's approval anymore. We are our approval. We are stamped "Grade A" and there is really nothing else to talk about.
Life after sixty is a life filled with colorful experiences, travel, new experiences and more crayola markers to play with. Life after sixty is life with a colorful pair of socks and talks with strangers in parks and on benches, in Chicago and in India. Life after sixty is profound as it is going to get folks. This is when you take no prisoners and you don't make any excuses because you don't have to. This is the day you go out and buy a silver pair of high heels and you pair them up with jeans and a sparkly tunic top or leggings. This is the time to really live it up and say it like you just don't care.
All this talk about age is meaningless when you think about all the wonderful things that you can be and do in your life here and now. This could be the time of your life, a time that is so marvelous that you cannot compare it to any other time in your life. This is the time to become ageless and begin to live like you are priceless. Throw your skirt up over your head, learn to belly dance, go on an excursion to Africa, audition for an extra in a movie in NYC and learn to tap dance while you are at it. Fear not this thing some call "old" for you my dear are ageless.
I have lived on this planet for sixty years as measured by the month, day and year I was born: 1954. I consider myself a relatively nice looking specimen and I take very good care of myself including my appearance. I wear skinny blue jeans with jackets and sweaters and on occassion I add a hip scarf around my neck. I don't call me old and if I were to give me a label, not that I want one, I would call me "seasoned". I am seasoned like a fine wine is seasoned and what I feel is that I get better with each passing year. I will be as "old" as I want to be and as old as feel I am. When I look in the mirror I see a handsome man who is seasoned and loves to have a good time. I don't see an elderly man or a man of sixty. I see Elliott. I see a person who happens to be sixty but who happens to feel like he is forty, sometimes thirty five. But what I see most is simply a specimen of a person who can carry a tune and still loves salsa music. A guy who can wear a black shirt untucked with black pencil legged pants and a pair of ankle boots. That guy who still has his groove and moves to it.
Life after sixty is fun if you would like it to be fun. One can have exactly the same amount of fun and joy as the kids in their twenties, maybe more. Because now that I know better I can do better at being cool, hip, fun, funny and witty. Life after sixty means that now I have it down baby. I got it together and I know what I want. I move like a gazel and I sting like a bee. Life is so much more clear to me now. I know what I want, where I want it and how I want it. I wear those red and black gloves like I mean it and when I wear the red and black scarf people notice that I am wearing it for real, to the hilt. That's what happens after your sixty.
But the point of my endeavor today is not to convince you that I still have it. Oh no, not at all. I am showing you and everyone else that I have it without having to say one word. I am ageless and timeless and so are you by the way. Whether you are sixty or seventy you are timeless and your beauty and your impact has noting to do with age. In fact you are ageless. We are ageless once we learn to walk, talk, work, cry, grieve, dance and play. We have already learned what we need to know and once we can dance then there is nothing else to relearn. We are set. We are timeless and not only are we timeless we are brave and we are compassionate. We don't need anyone's approval anymore. We are our approval. We are stamped "Grade A" and there is really nothing else to talk about.
Life after sixty is a life filled with colorful experiences, travel, new experiences and more crayola markers to play with. Life after sixty is life with a colorful pair of socks and talks with strangers in parks and on benches, in Chicago and in India. Life after sixty is profound as it is going to get folks. This is when you take no prisoners and you don't make any excuses because you don't have to. This is the day you go out and buy a silver pair of high heels and you pair them up with jeans and a sparkly tunic top or leggings. This is the time to really live it up and say it like you just don't care.
All this talk about age is meaningless when you think about all the wonderful things that you can be and do in your life here and now. This could be the time of your life, a time that is so marvelous that you cannot compare it to any other time in your life. This is the time to become ageless and begin to live like you are priceless. Throw your skirt up over your head, learn to belly dance, go on an excursion to Africa, audition for an extra in a movie in NYC and learn to tap dance while you are at it. Fear not this thing some call "old" for you my dear are ageless.
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