Growing old does not look like a lot of fun. I find it difficult to watch my parents, my uncles, aunts and my grandmother getting older every year. Many times I talk to the older people in our family they tell me about their aches and pains and health problems. This is not something I am looking forward to.
I guess in kind of like a child like fantasy way I want everybody to stay young, strong and healthy. I want to think that I can always see them happy and full of life. I suppose there can be something beautiful in growing old gracefully but as I watch the old ones heading further to the end of the path it makes me sad to see them succumbing to arthritis, diabetes and heart problems.
On the other hand I am learning that there seems to be a wisdom and contentment that comes over people in their later years. Older people seem to always have the time to sit on talk. They seemed to have a different outlook on life after having survived so many years. They don’t seem to be as wrapped up in the daily details of getting on with life but more they have a perspective that the little things that should not upset people.
I like to hear stories of older people I know. They have decades of life experience and tell me about times and places that I know nothing about. I also learn a lot from my elders and I try to take advice in a good way.
Sometimes I find pictures of the elders I know that show them as children. I find it so strange to see these people I know now who are at the dawn of other life in slim young bodies and with bright eyes in a time and place long ago. I wonder what it would be like to know them as younger people. Would we have been good friends? What would we have done together?
It seems like the older people get, the more mellow and understanding they are. Most people are a real joy to be around and that is especially true for those who have their health. There seems to be something unfair about growing old. It is almost as though the concept of old age is with us to make life more interesting. Still, sometimes I wish all the old people in my life could just stop time and continue to be around as I prefer to remember them, happy, in good shape and with no end in sight.
