Age Is Only A Number By Dr. Juan Harrison
Age Is Only A Number
I’ve often asked people what age they felt in their minds. For me it always seemed to settle somewhere around 30. They say you’re only as old as you feel. The numbers of 70 and 80 don’t compute in my mind until the temperature is headed toward 100 or some ailment gets to nagging my joints, then I feel every day of it.
The mind likes to wander back in time reliving those younger days when I actually was 30. I know better but something about getting older brings out the good memories when energy was endless and dreams were unlimited. I think a lot of what we call living as we grow older is just this process of reconciling the dreams we had with what actually occurred.
Maybe more important to our peace of mind is coming to figure out if what we really settled on for our life’s goal. What did we set out to be or to accomplish? Like picking careers and settling on a major in college, sometimes the road to success can get a little crooked. Life happens. Opportunities arise. Doors and plants close. Jobs peter out. We might even find ourselves getting pushed or nudged into starting our own business. Sometimes we find out that being our own boss has its own headaches, so we head back into the world of employee land settling for paid retirement and other benefits.
I feel a little sad as I see those benefits us baby boomers banked so heavily on going away for our offspring in many cases. Ozzie, Jim Anderson, and Andy Taylor took it all for granted. The youngers today are having to rely on more individual responsibility with their financial planning.
I can’t count the times my wife and I have heaved a sigh and agreed how blessed we’ve been to benefit from a retirement system of guarantees and promises that still seem to be likely to be fulfilled for our generation. Time and inflation stop generations trying to hang onto jobs or supplement retirement with some kind of activity to bring in a little income as electric bills and just about everything else seems to be sneaking up taking bigger bites out of nest eggs and cash flow.
I like to remind us all what a great place and time we’re in. No country in the world takes so small a part of our income for food with fast food places offering some economical burgers and drinks. Gasoline has been looking like a bargain lately as prices continue to slowly edge downward. Each day I just thank the Lord for the clarity of mind and ability to live independently. It won’t always be that way, but until then I’m gonna stay thirty in my mind and smile when I think back about life without Absorbine Junior or bifocals.
By Dr. Juan Harrison
