It startles me to think that next year I am going to complete my 60th year on Planet Earth. Absolutely mind-boggling. And I remember a while ago, I was thinking, ‘Wouldn’t it be FUN to do sixty new things before I reach sixty?’ but I think that was when I was 58 and I convinced myself that I shouldn’t start this sixty before sixty thing whilst there was more than a year to go, as it would a) be tantamount to cheating and b) defeat the object of the challenge.
And so I didn’t give the idea much more thought, other stuff getting in the way and occupying my mind.
This evening, I thought about it again. The thought was triggered by watching Sarah Hadland on ‘Strictly Come Dancing’ talking about women of a certain age being very good at telling themselves they couldn’t do something when, in fact, they jolly well could if they tried. And although Sarah is six years younger than me, I thought, ‘She’s right. Women of a certain age are often left to moulder on the scrap heap once they lose the capacity to have babies or be useful in the workplace.’
I’ll admit to feeling a bit ‘scrap heapy’ myself over the last couple of years. Like I had been made redundant from society - ‘Just go and sit in that corner, there’s a dear, and don’t bother anyone else whilst you fade into insignificance.’
Of course, having worked through a lot of head stuff, I know this to be nonsense now, but I don’t want to denigrate how I felt because I suspect a lot of other women in their fifties have felt the same, too.
I digress. The sixty before sixty thought has been reignited! I took out my notebook and began to jot down ideas. I ran out of ideas after Number 4. I have to find another 56 ideas. Which is quite annoying because I thought generating ideas would be more of a doddle. But the REALLY annoying thing is that I’ve just realised that I’ve only got another fifty weeks until I reach sixty because it has been two weeks since my birthday and Time is already a-flying.
I’d better crack on…
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KJ
KJ