ART & ENCOURAGEMENT BY PAUL & KATHY BOECHER

“70 is the new 50” was undoubtedly coined by someone in their 70s. Growing old means you are now one of those blue haired church ladies. It means you have achieved a lifetime of memories – good and bad. When you’re in your 70s you should have matured like a fine wine, but chances are you have already gone sour.

The pull of gravity has taken its toll. Everything from the top down has sagged or grown wider. You believe that you’ve shrunk over the years, and everything has fallen down around your hips.  Your mind tells you that you can still do what you did in your twenties while your body can’t wait to turn in at 8 PM each night. You go in search of something only to forget what it was when you get there. You can remember the names of the kids you went to school with, but now you may forget the names of your grandchildren.  You may beknown to call one of them by the dog’s name.

You spend more time in a doctor’s office than your mother did. In fact, you have become your mother! You thought you would be retired and sitting on the beach in Maui, but instead you continue plugging along trying to get by on your Social Security check each month. The thought of changing anything in your life becomes monumental so you refuse to consider it. Your hearing fails along with most of your other senses. You’ve lost your youthful glow. You’re so much crabbier, because you don’t have to prove anything anymore. You’ve been there and done that.

Actually, I remember my fifties, and they were a few of the worst years of my life. Now I’m in my eighties and I feel a lot better than I did back then.   Age has its advantages.   I feel so distinguished!

“So we do not lose heart. Though our outer self is wasting away, our inner self is being renewed day by day.” 2 Corinthians 4:16.