A LIFE IN PROGRESS
By Ray Lucas
A RACE FOR THE AGES
A s I grow older , I frequently have a reoccurring conversation about feeling like I ’ m at least 10 years younger than my actual age indicates .
Whenever this topic of age comes up , it appears this is a common experience , as others agree they feel the same way . It seems most of us are growing older but still feel young at heart .
Each birthday , the number of candles I ’ ve just blown out doesn ’ t seem to fit . At 21 , I still felt like I was in my teens . When I was 32-years-old , I still felt like a college student in my mind , ready to go out to Bardstown Road . Even now , unless I ’ m looking in a mirror , I still see myself as being in my mid 30s .
The effect is even more pronounced when I ’ m around high school buddies as we fall right back into our teenage stories , humor and ways of seeing each other . In my eyes , my best friends are still wearing their satin Silver Creek school jackets , 50 pounds lighter and have full heads of hair . When did age become so relative ? Like Einstein ’ s general theory of relativity , I feel I have stumbled onto a nearly universal phenomenon that age bends and contracts just a certainly as light does around a black hole .
I remember as a kid sneaking out of bed to watch my parents play cards with friends one night around our kitchen table . At about eight years old , I recall thinking that this is what really old people do : play cards , laugh too hard and stay up late on Fridays nights .
As I reconstruct that memory , I now realize that my parents and their friends were about 28
at the time . I had seen them as being so old , but in reality they were still kids themselves . In the strange cosmic way that age works , I ’ m sure they probably felt 18 at the time .
These days , I don ’ t typically feel my age of late 40s . I guess I thought I would feel differently as I grew older . I assumed I ’ d be wiser than I am . I was sure I ’ d be more sedentary , in my recliner chair watching Matlock . Instead , I find myself throwing football in the yard with the kids , playing cards with friends on Friday nights and attending musical festivals with concert goers half my age . Heck , I recently climbed a tree . This is 40-something ?
Don ’ t get me wrong , there are days I do feel my actual age . I have learned about the triple crown of mid-life health maintenance in the past year as I tend to dental crowns , cholesterol and colonoscopies . So far I ’ m doing OK on the three “ c ’ s ” and the only age-related health issue has been a recently bruised ego .
Over the winter my 17-year-old son was preparing for a jog when I blurted out , “ I ’ m sure I could still beat you in a race .” I ’ m not sure what possessed me . I was joking – kind of .
“ Dad , there is no way you can beat me in a foot race ,” was the response of my confident and objectively more fit son . Still , I wasn ’ t completely convinced that he could beat me . “ I used to run track ,” I countered . “ Well , I ’ m sure you used to weigh 150 pounds , too , but that doesn ’ t really help you now does it ? I would crush you , Dad .”
My son went out of his way to show his amusement at my wild claim . And with that
110 EXTOL : APRIL / MAY 2018