《The Wondering of AGING》a New Approach to Embracing Life After Fifty

Taking Your Census in the Desert

 (This is the first of the short, written meditations that will appear at the beginning of each chapter. Over the last decade, I have written approximately one hundred of these, some in first person, some in second person, some including dialogue with God. When I write them to “you,” as is this first one, the interlocutor certainly includes my Self, but also includes anyone else as well. I hope these pieces inspire your creativity, as well as thought and dialogue. The themes in each piece will thread through each chapter.) 

Have you found what you are looking for? Are you singing a song of praise? Have you fully allowed your spouse, your children, your partner, your lifework to open your heart to life’s warmth? Have you arrived at the adult self you’ve been working toward, the one that promises the joy of “This is who I am?” 

There is a time in every life when the road ahead of us becomes shorter than the road behind. At this time, we are each invited to stop walking and hear life whisper, Have you found what you were looking for? This is a time to take a census of our treasures and set a future course. 

So I stand at the mirror in the morning, with my fingers pressed to my reflected face, squeezing back the lines of love and pain. My face mask looks like my mother’s, my father’s, but is now surely my own. I am the person whose life has been put more “in my own hands” than ever before.

Have I found what I am looking for?