Brag about Age - Celebration Plan Which Works

I am a woman born in 1955.

This means I have one foot in the ridiculous Eisenhower era of house-wifery and one foot in the era of Women’s Lib and beyond.

I also occupy a third era: the techno-information one. And, I plan to keep living and aging with gusto for a long time!

My very earliest years were influenced by my stay-at-home mother and all my friends’ stay-at-home mothers as role models. Homemaking as a full-time endeavor was de rigeur for female adults in our area. Amazingly, the federal government (I recently learned) surreptitiously promoted this practice because it wanted to covertly remove the selfless Rosie-the-Riveters from their jobs so that returning WWII veterans would have work. Sheesh.

One of the norms of the 1950s through perhaps even today was that it is extremely RUDE to inquire what a woman’s age is – very impolite, very ill-bred, etc. Furthermore, a tandem practice existed that a woman did not divulge her age – I think some sort of shame was attached to aging of females. Maybe the Baby Boomer generation's valuing of eternal youth arose in part from this.

As you will see, I reject this thinking.

Women’s Liberation, People’s Liberation, Black Power, Civil Rights, Gray Panthers, and reasonable skepticism mark my generation and those which follow. With these movements and changes, Americans gained awareness of inequality and demeaning situations in our society.

We learned that if men in the workplace are “men,” then females in the workplace are “women,” not girls.* We learned that it was ok to be ourselves whether that means curly hair, afro-able hair, or gray hair. Short is ok. Ethnic is ok. We do not need to remake ourselves into Ozzie and Harriet (a television program centering around a white middle class family with a working father and a stay-at-home mom.)

Enter the approach of my fiftieth birthday.

I knew I wanted to take control of it as a meaningful date and not become a wussy crybaby over it. I had no particular dread of being age 50, however, my 25^th birthday had taken me by surprise with accompaniments of fear of being “a quarter of a century old,” thoughts on living, dying, aging, the whole shebang. My 30^th and 40^th birthdays were fine, but I just didn’t know whether I would again be unpleasantly surprised by hidden thought patterns on my 50^th birthday.

Thus the plan hatched: I chose to take a full year to celebrate age 5-0, starting the year before.

I announced my request that every friend with whom I got together during this time would indulge my wish to thrust a birthday candle for myself into our dessert. Because they are my friends and accept that I am iconoclastic and creative, they supported me. Bless them! This provided for much merriment and silliness. I am deeply grateful to a long-distance galfriend who actually mailed a card, a gift, and frivolous candles and supplies. KB, I still have them!

I was a public school teacher at the time in a middle school. I wanted all my pubescent charges, especially the girls, to know that turning age fifty is a good thing. (Turning any age and being healthy is a danged good thing!) To display this value, I ordered enough bakery cupcakes for all my sections of math, my English section, and my homeroom. These students were going to see that turning age fifty as a female means treats! On some subconscious level, I hope it sunk in.

When the actual fiftieth anniversary of my birth arrived, it was anticlimactic. I had been partying heartily for a good year and was quite accustomed to the number and the notion. It was a rather routine and unremarkable day. And that was excellent.

If there is any particular landmark age which has significance to you, and particularly negative overtones, I suggest you consciously re-think. I share these ideas because they worked for me. Use or modify any of them.

The important thing is to make yourself happy in your own celebrations!

* I am sad to report that in Berks County, Pennsylvania many individuals in the workforce continue the archaic, insulting practice of calling mature, utterly professional, female workers “girls.” Sweet Jesus, when will it end?