Age Ain't Nuthin' But A Number

Three weeks ago, I stood in front of an audience of 1900 strangers and admitted that I'm seventy years old. I had to work up to the admission for a month before the event. I had spent some years already telling people, "I'm really, really old." But I couldn't typically find the nerve to casually admit my age in conversations. Except with my doctor. Or a very close friend. And then only in a whisper.

I cracked jokes about it in front of my students in class. "I would tell you how old I am," I'd say, "but I'm afraid they'd come make me retire." Or I'd quip on a different occasion, "I'm perfectly fine with getting old. There's only two options, you know: getting old or getting dead -- and I'm not nearly ready to get dead yet."

But the fact is that we don't any of us know exactly when that red letter day will come. There was a five-month-old baby in the obituary column in the local newspaper this morning. And a 26-year-old victim of a hit-and-run the other day. While I'm still chugging along.

The thing is it's not just staying alive that we hunger for. It's quality of life. That's the reason we love to be in love, to belly laugh, to sing along with the radio in the shower, to smell good food and to eat it if we can. Then along comes the Diabetes Monster and rains on our parade and makes us think there's nothing left to live for.

Since I've been diagnosed with diabetes, however, I've created quite a niche for myself in my local community as a social change activist. I've had a marvelously handsome boyfriend -- and gotten over him. I've visited my daughter in New York City four times. I've been to God knows how many plays and jazz concerts and movies and art exhibits. I have a gaggle of adoring college students who run up to me out of nowhere everywhere I go to tell me how much they love me. I've created and maintain three blogs. And I've just published my second book (the first one being on managing diabetes and the new one on race relations in America). I wouldn't miss this life for anything. And certainly not voluntarily.

So what's my point? Don't throw away the gift of your life. Make it better like I did. It's an option or I couldn't have done it.