{"id":37676,"date":"2023-03-11T00:01:44","date_gmt":"2023-03-11T08:01:44","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/barbarafalconernewhall.com\/?p=37676"},"modified":"2026-06-06T05:58:39","modified_gmt":"2026-06-06T05:58:39","slug":"old-and-getting-older","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/server.stagingweb3.net\/barbarafalconernewhall\/old-and-getting-older\/","title":{"rendered":"Old and Getting Older — The Octogenarian and the Four-Year-Old"},"content":{"rendered":"
\"a-4-year-old-girl-is-old-and-getting-older\"<\/a>
Old and getting older: Four-year-old Christina Newhall showed off how old she was. (Notice how her left hand is doing back-up for her right.) Photo by Barbara Newhall<\/em><\/figcaption><\/figure>\n

Ask a 4-year-old how old she is, and she’ll raise four fingers and burst out, “Four!”<\/p>\n

Ask an octogenarian the same question —<\/p>\n

Well, you wouldn’t ask that question, would you? That would be rude. Which is why your neighborhood octogenarian is reduced to volunteering the information on her own from time to time.<\/p>\n

She’s old, you see. And she wants you to know it.<\/p>\n

She’s survived childhood, childbirth, at least one husband, and 40 years on the job market.<\/p>\n

And now she’s come out at the other end — creaky-kneed and foggy-brained — but for all practical purposes, intact.<\/p>\n

What’s more, if she’s lucky, she’s overcome the shame of aging<\/a>. Her newly sprouted white hair and unreliable knees have forced her out of the closet. There’s no getting around it, she’s old and getting older.<\/p>\n

No use trying to pass for middle-aged any more, let alone youngish. Why not cash in her longevity chips, she reasons, and take advantage of whatever pleasures old age bestows upon the American woman these days.<\/p>\n

One of those pleasures, I’ve noticed, is the license to brag a bit — like the 4-year-old — about how old she is. About how she’s made it this far through sheer grit and stick-to-it-iveness. She’s still alive, and there’s no stopping her.<\/p>\n

Old and Getting Older at the Gym<\/strong><\/h5>\n

I still wear a mask at the gym, and I still go to the trouble of putting my yoga mat down next to an open door. (As of this writing, covid-19 still lurks, and most of the folks at the gym are too young and too blithe to feel the need of a mask.)<\/p>\n

And so, the other day as I maneuvered my mat a little away from the woman next to me, I felt her studying me.<\/p>\n

“Do you feel sick?” she said.<\/p>\n

“No. I feel great!” I said, good and loud. “I’m just old<\/em>.”<\/p>\n

Laughter arose from yoga mats all over the room.<\/p>\n

I didn’t mean to be funny. I meant to be reassuring. But in belting out the words, “I’m old,<\/em>” I seemed to have cheered up all the not-yet-old people in the room.<\/p>\n

In 21st-century America, old age doesn’t get you much in the way of status. But it does get you the proverbial wisdom of age. Which in this case was: Don’t worry. Some of us are getting a kick out of getting old.<\/p>\n

Get it while it lasts.<\/p>\n

More about old people at “A Manners Challenged Kid Who Became the Apple of His Grandma’s Eye.”<\/a>\u00a0 \u00a0Also, “Shopping for a Mother-of-the-Groom Dress.”<\/a><\/em><\/p>\n

\"pole-dancing-old-and-getting<\/a>
Getting a kick out of being old: I was pushing 80, but I wasn’t too old for a little pole dancing during the shuttle bus ride home from a friend’s wedding. Barbara Newhall photo<\/em><\/figcaption><\/figure>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

\"4-year-old-girl<\/a><\/p>\n

Some old people, including me, are a lot like little kids. We like to brag about how old we are. Read more.<\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":49077,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[10,14],"tags":[103,1030,146,34,2362,82,2276,1632],"class_list":["post-37676","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-a-case-of-the-human-condition","category-widowed","tag-aging","tag-birthdays","tag-christina","tag-dont-miss","tag-old","tag-on-the-funny-side","tag-pole-dancing","tag-weddings"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/server.stagingweb3.net\/barbarafalconernewhall\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/37676","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/server.stagingweb3.net\/barbarafalconernewhall\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/server.stagingweb3.net\/barbarafalconernewhall\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/server.stagingweb3.net\/barbarafalconernewhall\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/server.stagingweb3.net\/barbarafalconernewhall\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=37676"}],"version-history":[{"count":2,"href":"https:\/\/server.stagingweb3.net\/barbarafalconernewhall\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/37676\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":49080,"href":"https:\/\/server.stagingweb3.net\/barbarafalconernewhall\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/37676\/revisions\/49080"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/server.stagingweb3.net\/barbarafalconernewhall\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/49077"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/server.stagingweb3.net\/barbarafalconernewhall\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=37676"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/server.stagingweb3.net\/barbarafalconernewhall\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=37676"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/server.stagingweb3.net\/barbarafalconernewhall\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=37676"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}