“Age is not important unless you’re a cheese.”
This view on ageing from the “First Lady of American Theatre” — the incomparable Helen Hayes, sums up the topic nicely and succinctly. Age is only what we let it be. And I, having begun the trek down the hill, am letting it be no big deal.
I look around me and see a lot of young people who are in worse physical shape than I am. I know ‘youngsters’ who dodder around like stereotypical old ladies. I, on the other hand, still like my music loud, my nights late and my wine plentiful.
Certainly there are times when I feel every one of my several decades. For the most part though I refuse to accept that what my mind feels isn’t what my body might be able to handle. I’m not ready to settle in to a rocker just yet.
Keeping this perspective can be interesting working in the environment I do. There are five women in our office, our birth years representing five different decades. For the most part, the traits of our gender bring the disparity of experience closer. But, the fact that I remember Trudeaumania, the Kennedys and Camelot, Vietnam, Charles Manson and the British Invasion, that I could care less about electronic music, Game of Thrones, and a bunch of other things I don’t listen to when discussed here, imposes a gap I can’t ignore.
It got me wondering one day how far apart our tastes might be. Since we work in the business of images, I thought it might be fun for each of us to come up with a few of our favourites to see how they might differ. Here are the results:
