TURNING 60

The Sky Gets Dark, Slowly 

“…Many elderly speak as though they know everything, but of old age they are in fact as ignorant as children. Many elderly are in fact, completely unprepared for what they are to face when it comes to getting old and the road that lays ahead of them."

---- Mao Dun literary prize winner Zhou Daxin

Does reaching the mature age of 60 mean that we know everything and have all the answers to the problems that we will be facing after this age? No. 

There are quite a few situations to keep in mind so that we can be prepared for what is to come and we try not to panic.

1. The people by your side will only continue to grow smaller in number. People in your parents’ and grandparents’ generation have largely all left, whilst many your peers will increasingly find it harder to look after themselves, and the younger generations will all be busy with their own lives. Even your wife or husband may depart earlier than you, or than you would expect, and what might then come are days of emptiness. You will have to learn how to live alone, and to enjoy and embrace solitude. The most difficult to do in life.

2. Society will care less and less for you. No matter how glorious your previous career was or how famous you were, ageing will always transform you into a regular old man and old lady. The spotlight no longer shines on you, and you have to learn to contend with standing quietly in one corner, you must overcome the urge to be envious or grumble.

3. The road ahead will be rocky and full of precarity. Fractures, cardio-vascular blockages, brain atrophy, cancer… these are all possible guests that could pay you a visit any time, and you would not be able to turn them away. You will have to live with illness and ailments, to view them as friends, even; do not fantasise about stable, quiet days without any trouble in your body. Maintaining a positive mentality and get appropriate, adequate exercise is your duty, and you have to encourage yourself to keep at it consistently.

4. Our mothers brought us into this world on a bed, and after a journey of twists and turns and a life of struggle, we return to our starting point – the bed – and to the state of having to be looked after by others. The only difference being, where we once had our mothers to care for us, when we prepare to leave, we may not have our kin to look after us. Even if we have kin, their care may never come close to that of your mother’s. Be mentally prepared to be cared for by nursing staff who bear zero relation to you, wearing smiles on their faces all whilst carrying weariness and boredom in their hearts. Lay still and don’t be difficult; remember to be grateful.

Before the sky gets dark, the last stretches of life’s journey will gradually get dimmer and dimmer; naturally, it will be harder to see the path ahead that you are treading towards, and it will be harder to keep going forward. 

As such, upon turning 60, it would do us all well to see life for what it is, to cherish what we have, to enjoy life whilst we can, and to not take on society’s troubles or your children’s and grandchildren’s affairs on for yourself. 

Stay humble, don’t act superior on account of your own age and talk down to others. As we get older, all the better should we be able to understand what respect is and what it counts for. 

Hardly the day started and ...  it is already six o'clock in the evening.

Barely arrived on Monday and it's already  Friday.

... and the month is almost over.

... and the year is almost up.

... and already 50 or 60 or 70 years of our lives have passed.

... and we realize that we lost our parents, friends.

----and we realize that it is too late to go back ...

Let's take full advantage of the time we have left 

Let's put color in our greyness ...

Let's smile at the little things in life that put balm in our hearts.

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