Like a Badge

            So many times I hear people lamenting their age, “I’m so old!” they’ll say, or “I can’t believe I’m turning (fill in the number)”.  Know what I say?  Wear your age proudly, like a badge.  Proclaim unapologetically that you are __ years old!  I am turning 53 this week, and I am happy to have survived this long.  It’s pretty amazing that any of us survive for long at all, considering that we all start as two little specs invisible to the naked eye that come together against all odds.  Then there are diseases and childhood in general to survive, not to mention those crazy teenage years during which many things happen that could  shorten our lives by quite a few years.  Not that I’ve had any life threatening health events or accidents, but really, sometimes life is so random and nobody ever knows which will be their final year.  So I say, the more candles on the cake the better—well, figuratively speaking anyway. You really have to be careful how many candles you put on a cake, depending on its size.  It would perhaps be better to make a rule that you must invite one person for each of your years in age to partake of cake with you so that you have a cake large enough to allow proper spacing of the candles.  I speak from experience.  There was the year that my husband turned 49 and, being a smart alecky kind of gal, I put 49 candles on a cake just big enough for the four of us.  Turned out it was too small for that much combustion.  After the first 20 or so candles were lit, they began lighting each other rendering my matches unnecessary.  Breathless from laughing and mild panic, my daughter and I called my husband into the kitchen to blow out the cake.  There was a lot of smoke, and a lot of wax on the slightly candle broiled frosting.  It’s a memory that I chuckle at every time I retell the story.  But I digress from the original subject which was age.  Be happy with whatever age you are, isn’t it great that you’re still here?