Thoughts on Turning 62

What I wanted for my birthday was snow.  I woke up this morning and there it was.

However, we forgot to get applesauce yesterday for my birthday dinner of brisket and latkes (Thank you, Cole).  I wish the dogs were bigger; we could harness them to a sled and drive down Green Road to Heinen’s.

All year, I thought I was already 62, but until this morning, I was really 61—or, as my dad would say, “Until 1:30, when you were born, Ba’nann—no birthday until you’re born.”  So, even these musings are a few hours premature.

My brother used to say I was the worst Christmas present he ever got because Mom had to stay in the hospital over the holiday.  I had a lot of hair; Mom held me up to the window, so Rod and Lili could see me from the parking lot.  I do not know if there were enough dark curls for a bow.

I wonder how my father managed Christmas that year. Mom had already wrapped the presents, I suspect.  How she loved Christmas.

As a little girl, I was jealous of those with summer birthdays, and, as a young woman, I found the round of family gatherings that surrounded Christmas slightly tiresome—cocktails with the Rothermels, Christmas Eve Dinner at Aunt Anne’s, which I barely remember; then at Aunt Marim’s and Aunt Dodo’s, Christmas Day lunch at Grannie’s followed by the trek to Montclair. Now, I would be thrilled to travel back in time to see and spend time with all those relatives.

Now, I like having my birthday jammed in next to Christmas—it feels like a multi-day celebration.

Seth likes giving me one sock for my birthday and another sock for Christmas. I have grown to accept this pattern.

The absence of lights (and blow ups) on the front lawn of Lyman House this year because of Seth’s surgery makes me appreciate even more deeply the magic he typically makes for all of us.

When my mother was 62, I thought she was really old.  I suspect my children think the same of me.

I thought when I turned 62, I would feel different—seasoned, maybe, like a cheese or a fine wine. So far, I feel pretty much the way I did yesterday.

Do I feel 62? What is 62 supposed to feel like.

“You’re as young as you feel,” goes the cliché.  How young is that?

“You can’t teach an old dog new tricks,” my dad used to say.  That enraged me.  “Yes, you can, if the dog is willing,” I would shout inside my head. I want to keep learning new tricks.

Age, I am beginning to think, minus the aches and pains, is another social construct.

But age is also feeling like a gift—as in having another year to celebrate, as in having the opportunity for memories that stretch back decades.

I have been a schoolteacher since I was 21 in 1982.

2 years at NMH.

20 years at Chapin.

19 years at Laurel.

We started ETC when I was 23; we married when I was 24 and Seth was 26. We were babies—lucky babies to grow up together. We ran a version of ETC for 27 summers.

Miranda was born when I was 32.

Cordelia was born when I was 34.

Atticus was born when I was 43.

When Miranda turns 30 next month, I will have been a mother with at least one child at home for 30 years—that feels like a long time, but, as Emily in Our Town says, “It goes so fast…Do any human beings ever realize life while they live it — every, every minute?”  The Stage Manager tells her few people do.

Miranda hung a tiny wooden stocking on the tree last night that my mother had made for her for her first Christmas.

Our Christmas ornaments—and there are a lot of them—chronicles the history of our family. 

I used to think it was so strange that my mother would talk about events that had happened decades ago. Now, I do the same.

I started writing, for real, about a decade ago.

The author of Lessons in Chemistry, Bonnie Garmus, was 65 when her novel was published. There is hope for me, still, and for this memoir.

Feeling glad I am 62—for real.