Climbing trees

My son, we have established, thinks I am regressing. So when a friend posted a bit of daftness on Facebook last night… a ‘what’s your mental age’ quiz, my initial response was, “about 3 according to Nick.” Then, of course, I clicked and joined the fun.

According to this bit of silliness, I had a mental age of 29. Which undercut most of my friends considerably and I wandered off chuckling at the ensuing exchange of comments to answer the phone. It was my son.

It goes without saying that I had to tell him he was perfectly right. I was regressing. I awaited the inevitable riposte. He is, he says with deathly seriousness ( and an odd, laughing quiver in his voice) quite worried about this situation. As he gets older, and I get younger. After all, he said, I have been his role model for years and years and he has (only metaphorically he stressed) looked up to me. The mental and emotional upheaval of having to look down on me in ways other than the physical could be severe and traumatic. Though, he said, there are already moments when he is aghast at odd things I say or do…

Personally, to borrow a much abused word from his generation, I think that’s awesome.

I have no problem with growing older. Life can write its story on my face and body, mapping experience and adventure as it will. I would not choose to return to the angst of the teenager, the insecurity and fragility of the younger me. I rather like the assurance and serenity that has come with ageing, as I have learned to be comfortable in my own skin. Even the bits that are not quite where they used to be.

I could, I admit, live without the aches and pains, but then, they make me appreciate the good days more, and also make me slow the pace of life to a speed where I can take time to savour it. Sometimes. Well, occasionally.

If you had asked me thirty years or so ago I would have probably imagined myself by now very much like Auntie Gwen… a ramrod backed, well upholstered Yorkshirewoman, wielding severity like a sergeant-major, probably with a rolling pin.

Yet instead I have, it seems, developed a penchant for mischief. Not that I lacked it before… just that I would have simply wanted to do things and lacked the courage or feared disapprobation. Now, I don’t give a bugger. Winter waterfalls, laughter and snow… rollerblades the other day… and tonight we climbed trees, the dog and I. Well, I did and she watched with her head on one side and a long-suffering expression. I’ve wanted to climb a tree all week for some obscure reason.

I have mentioned before the process of life being stripped back over the past year. With the corresponding growth of the work with the School. I don’t think that is a coincidence somehow. Nor do I think it coincidence that as we work with the levels of Being, I am growing into mine. There is something in what we do that feeds the soul in a curious manner and opens all many doors within. Life has taken on the vivid hues of our robes.

There is a time for silence and a place for dignity. In ritual and meditation, other doors open, though the inner bubble of joy seldom subsides. But in the outer world I shall simply go with the flow and grow old disgracefully.