Getting Old

Getting older isn’t nice, is it? I’m always happy if someone said that I’m still like a teenager or a student. My heart always flies if my new friends were surprised and said “ What? Do you already have two big children? Are you kidding? You look so young!” I smiled gleefully when I walked with my children, met with other people and they said,”Are they your nephew and niece?” Or even worse they would said,”Are they your brother and sister?” What? My children? Brother and sister? Oh come on, I’m not that young, they are my children, indeed! Even though I was a bit insulted but there was a pleasant feeling crept, deep in my heart.

But, if I looked at the mirror, saw a white-hair in my head, my heart would trembling. If I touched and noticed a large lump under my belly skin, my heart would screaming. If I realized that the age of forty is crawling to me in the upcoming years, I was scared. All of those fact saying that being young always makes me glad, but being old is a nightmare. I wish I could live forever young. I wish I could drink every pills that could prevent my aging time.

Sometimes, when I woke up and realized that I’m getting older, I sat still and pondered,”Where am I now? What I have been doing in my life? I just feel like I was still studying and enjoying my youth, but that was 15 years ago. And it seems that I just married and was cuddling my first baby, but that was 10 years ago. Hmm, the next 10 years my children should be in the university and the next 15 years perhaps I will have a grandchild. Oh God, how fast time flies! Then, my heart pounded and my stomach lurched. I sank in an anxiety feeling, the fear of being old.

Terrible, isn’t it? But, that is women. Ups, oke, not all of women of course. At least, that is me, a woman who suddenly have those feeling on her birthday. Luckily, I’m surrounded by love so I can get out from my worry. My husband always ‘wake’ me up and my children always cheer me up. When my daughter made a wish for me, she said,”Ya Allah, I hope my mom will still alive after her thirty six years old.” And my son continued,” Ya Allah, I hope my mom can still kind and beautiful always.Amin.” I smiled and giggled, what a beautiful wishes. I couldn’t imagine it came out from the lips of my two babies who look so mature now. Then, they made a small party for me. Each of us threw a balloon up with our left hand and the other hand tried to fall down others balloons. We jumped, ran, screamed and laughed! I laughed and felt so grateful. “Hmm, being old with all of what I have is not bad, actually,” I murmured.

A while later, when my children had slept, I lied in my bed and remembered what was happened a day before at 12 o’clock in the night. Here came besides me, a man whom I shared all of my live in the last 12 years. “Happy birthday Honey, I wish your dream come true. I don’t know why, but with our happiness and sorrow that we have been going through, with your struggling to live with me here that I know is so hard, day by day, I love you more and more. I wish we will always be together, forever.” My heart was melting. My tears was hovering in my eyes. We hugged to each other so fast as if we will never be apart. Then, we talked about our past time that we have been going through together. We smiled at our sweet memories; tears of our sorrow, difficulties when nurturing our kids, our traveling, our spiritual journey and our age that getting older, and then I said, ”You are the best birthday present in my live, I’m so grateful to have you. I never regret spending my last 12 years with you, even though there are a lot of bitterness, but there are always sweetness in the end.”

That night was so sweet as a happy ending story in an Indian movie. But our conversation then make me realize that being old together with him, raising my children together with him, watching our children growing together, and reaching our dream together is a bless. How if I should live alone and getting older without someone besides me? Having a family is a gift because not everybody can build a family. I should thankful with what I have. So why should I worry about getting older then? Yes of course, because I’m not a holly man that have no worried about the future. But, well at least, I realize more now that my family is my germ. I shouldn’t worry about being old, I should worry if I’m getting old but I can’t be a good spouse for my husband and a lovely mom for my children. As Plato said,” The spiritual eyesight improves as the physical eyesight declines,” getting older means that I should be a better person inside even though I loose my beauty outside.

So now, am I happy if my belly getting bigger and there is no more people say that I’m look young? Uhm..I’m afraid…I’m not that good. Again, I’m not a holly man who doesn’t care about more wrinkle and the tummy fat. But, well at least, now I can say that getting older is a fact but looking older and getting rotten inside is a choice. And I choose not to look older nor get rotten inside. I hope, I’ll try…