applied mathematics

The other night at supper, my younger son piped up—completely out of the blue—with the following statement:

“Mom, in 16 years you’ll be 54 and Dad will be 56.”

I stopped chewing. After a painstakingly slow mental math check—yes, he ran the numbers correctly—I looked at my husband and exclaimed, “Why, that’s nothing! Fifty-four is … young!

My oldest is two years shy of sixteen. Just think what all a person can do! learn! experience! in sixteen years. Why, I could practically live an entire lifetime in sixteen years!

Suddenly, my aging angst was violently reconfigured. “Sixteen years more and I’ll still be young” is an entirely different perspective from “Thirty-eight and one foot in the grave.”

Moral of the story: teach your children math.

***

Photo series, courtesy of my older son.

This same time, years previous: my nieces, fatira, whoopie pies, and snickerdoodles.

4 Comments

  • The Domestic Fringe

    Oh, goodness. I've recently been realizing just how old I am and I'm not liking it one bit. I don't feel old, so it's usually not a big deal until someone puts it in perspective. Kids have a knack for doing that.

  • momma-lana

    Hubby and I are 53 and 56. We don't feel old! In fact since all 5 of our kids are out on their own we feel quite free and young! And our kids claim we are having way TOO much fun 🙂

  • ShelahN

    'Old' keeps getting older, the older I get.
    I feel as good as and probably even better here in my forties than I did in my twenties.
    But,
    Here's a wet blanket:
    My dad was 56 when he died. 🙂
    Sobering, I know.

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