You’re Only As Old As….

The day the new Microsoft age guesstimater program came out Russ, being the early adaptor nerd that he is sent me a furious text that the program had guessed him to be 50 years old. “What are you so upset about?” I asked. “You are 50.”

I was not going to tempt a bad mood and ask some program probably written by people who are young enough to be my child how old it thought I was. Then tonight Carter put her picture in and came up with 27. For sure I was not going to ask. I was not happy that my teenage daughter could pass for someone who should have graduated from college. Then just to get me, Carter put the picture of me we took at dinner last night.

“Oh, No!” I thought. A really recent picture with hardly any makeup. 37 was the age it thought I was! What? What !!!! I love this program. This was not making the rest of my family happy. Russ took a new picture and tried again. 49. Hey, at least he got a year back. I was not about to try again. I was holding on to that 37, but then again…

I don’t think I would trade my age for anything. The 17 years that I have on my picture represent the whole time Carter has been alive. If I were 37 again I would not have discovered the joy volunteering for the Food Bank has brought me, or all the friends I have met in the last 17 years, the thousands of hands of Mah Jongg played, the hundreds of needlepoint Christmas ornaments made (and that is just the last three years) as well as the friendship of the Stitching Advisors.

If I were 37 again I would weigh a hundred pounds more, would not have joined Westminster yet, or volunteered one day at Durham Academy, or snuggled with sweet Shay Shay. I would not have been published since Durham Magazine did not exist 37 years ago and all my darling colleagues I work with at the Magazine were probably still in junior high school. I would not have found my voice in a comedy diet blog since the idea that someone would write a public diary everyday for the whole world to read sounds absolutely crazy.

I would not know all the exciting work Russ would do and see him grow his little company with his one partner Rich into a big company with lots of people all over the country. Mostly I would not have been through my life as a mother, I would not know those moments when your child comes in your room in the middle of the night and asks if she can sleep with you because she had a scary dream, be it with a three or sixteen year old.

So thanks Microsoft for miss guessing my age, but I am really happy with my 54 years. I don’t mind that I can see them on my face, even if you can’t. Those wrinkles around my eyes represent a lot of great laughs with friends, squints looking for my girl riding a horse in the sunshine, and a few tears when I’ve lost a friend or loved one. You just can’t program a life.