Recently I was buying wood stain at Walmart. If you’ve ever bought paint or stain or anything that has fumes and could be used to get high, then you know it triggers an age check at the checkout. Here’s how my age check went…
The Walmart clerk comes over to bypass the age restriction. As he’s typing a code into the system, I’m looking at the screen, and I can feel him staring at me. To break the awkwardness, I ask him,
“Do I look old enough?”
“To the question they are asking {referring to the pop up question of is the person over 21}, yes. How old are you?”
“45,” I say.
“But you have braces.”
Yes, yes, I do. He then proceeded to ask my expert opinion on whether or not he needed braces. That’s a story for another time.
The dichotomy of age.
In 2021, within the same month, I got braces and had my first colonoscopy. Maybe a little too old for one and a little too young for the other. Or was I? Sure, there’s something that happens sometime around your mid-40’s that no one tells you about. Your body starts working a little differently, food affects you differently, your eyes need a little extra help, your muscle strength starts to wane. These signs of age can easily make you attach the word “old” to your identity. I’m trying hard not to do that.
As I do my best to take care of my body that’s getting older each and every day (because we all are, right?), I’m purposing to live life to the fullest that I can, embracing new seasons with grace and positive anticipation.
Moral of the story…it’s never too late to get braces, even and especially when you have a metal mouth like a thirteen year old.
