Being Fifty

Whoever said turning 50 was a piece of cake, has no idea what they are talking about. It takes several kilos of the cake (or pie or pastry), across numerous years, to help turn you into the obese, grey haired, jaded, worn-out, unrecognisable person. And it isn’t a one day phenomenon, you know like when you wake up one bright summer morning and realise- gosh- I am never going to be 40 again! It is a notoriously slow process, that begins when you are born and slowly creeps up on you to the inevitable and irreversible day. 

So a few months ago I turned 50. And COVID happened. Haven’t quite figured out which is the bigger disaster?  Or maybe it is Trump. Tough times, difficult choices. Like all self-respecting middle class people, I had to celebrate that occasion, marking the end of my prime youth and beginning of my expected sedentary life. If people can celebrate breakups, I can celebrate ageing, so nothing really wrong there. So I did, with pomp and show, sailing through the middle east, and sharing a handful better selfies with the world in general. 

Nothing drastic has happened since, world is still the same, mornings are as bad as ever, save for a few tell-tale signs that are an eye opener. Yes, they remind every day, you are old dear, and the quicker you realise and accept it, the better. Thought of sharing the learnings – so if you intend to forget your age- bingo! I will not let you.

Sign no 1 : You find workout videos very inspiring, especially the ones that say – for mature people (or older adults or however you term yourself like How to feel 25 at 50). You try to prove (more to yourself ) you are better than the lady in the video who does all these twists and turns with unbelievable ease, but they did not tell you about the invisible wall between your foot and your hands and bend as hard as you will, you cannot reach your foot, the only twist that happens is the one in the back that makes Combiflam a must. Finally to save your dignity, you mumble- all doctored and fake videos!

Sign no 2 :  You fundamentally stop caring about the sign no 1, what matters is the cake that looks so yum, the buttery naan, and the all so yummy food we ended up cooking during all these lockdown months inspired by the plethora of mouth-watering recipes that have flooded the internet. The increased inches on your anterior that makes it impossible to look down and see your balance body parts and the post lunch lethargy leading to lay-downs are just side effects. So what if the jeans needs to be loosened or the belly button peeks out from between the shirt buttons. Looking good is passé, feeling good is what matters, The Divine Revelation. And  despite that- people will tell you – How nice! Beautiful pic! (And you look so good “for your age” ) As soon as you post that selfie with wrinkly double chin and fizzy hair (after 99 retries) on social media. Bang! All the aforementioned revelation disappears into thin air and you start hunting for a better picture to post after 10 days.

Sign no 3: Everyone you meet is half your age. Now that is rum, I mean you talk to people and realise they are your kid’s age, (who isn’t a kid anymore and the family is already talking about his foreboding marriage). I mean why is the world population so young? It makes me feel literally -old. Ancient, one and a quarter foot in the grave which is also decayed. This sign is also strengthened by another one- in order to find your year of birth on any online application, you need to scroll for the year and by the time you reach the correct one, it is another year gone. It is like the kid you babysat once is now your doctor. And that makes it almost impossible to flirt with him because you memories of him are of that crawling diaper-clad drooling baby.

Sign no 4- your essential ornament is the one on your eyes, life is hazy without it. Literal blindness. Can’t read the back of the medicine strip, the recipe on the masala sachet, the latest meme on Facebook and the word document that comes on WA. I mean documents are supposed to be read on a computer, my mobile screen with the largest font isn’t the place for it. And spectacles with masks is a spectacle in itself, first dealing with the frost and then not being able to breathe. I know masks and spectacles are the saviours in these times, though in disagreement with each other. Despite that disability, I am able to better recognise idiots from far off (and fend them off), now that I am 50.

Sign no 5: You stop giving a !@#$. You actually start that in your forties, slowly but surely. Enough is enough. Live on your own terms. And conditions (and use the aforementioned spectacles to find the fine print). Who is getting perturbed by what you say, whether the house is immaculate, if what you are wearing is befitting, if the socks match, what is the world contemplating, are worries of the past! You have no qualms being opinionated, showing complete intolerance for fools, forgetting names unashamedly, using the banned words you never used in your youth, flirting with boys (anybody 10 years younger is still a boy), watching the forbidden with eyes wide open, and then some..

Sign no 6: Maybe it is the men-o-pause thing, but all men (and some women) suddenly develop a morbid taste for the  “ghanta gyan” (worthless !@#$) accompanied by the most unrelated, unnecessary, unrealistically posed and buxom (I prefer to say fat) middle-aged ladies. And they are the same people who are simultaneously mesmerised by the size zeros. I get it now- it is the kind-of-women-who-may-still-take-interest-in-me-despite-my-potbelly-and-baldness, as an intelligent Choudhary remarked. I wonder why I never see such forwards with a juxtaposed guy? Let me also have my bit of fun!

Sign no 7: You become invisible to people of the opposite sex and to people half your age, except when they need free advice. They stop including you into nonsensical activities because “they think you can’t handle it”. And if by mistake they do ask- you can always make the excuse since you are too old. Men stop flirting with you, and if they do, it is out of pity. Some amount of attention will do you good, somebody needs to remind the inattentive I-am-watching-videos-with-my-new-bluetooth-earphones-spouse. But you can emit loads of free advise starting from children to panellists in a talk, doesn’t matter you’d never trust yourself if you were you, just don’t tell them that.

Sign no 8: Cherry on the top. Some things are free or discounted – like colonoscopy- ugh. And being called “grandma” and the art of coughing, laughing, sneezing and peeing at the same time, the period pain without the period. Things that should be taut and projectile going limp and free falling with gravity, (I am talking about your skin, buddy). But the fact remains that you can still count. And you have your brains intact. You can laugh at others and at yourself. Realising that none of it is under your control anyway, and never was, was something not taught by meditation but only by being fifty.

The ramblings of a frozen mind

And then there was lockdown. Who would have thought that me, who would fly every other month to another city, country, continent, would be stuck in her own home. Yeah, after around 25 years of marriage, it feels just that. Along with an equally old husband and an adult kid.

I have been perpetually tired of being told not to do something (করোনা as spoken in Bangla). So I decided, now I am going to talk of Corona, and have everyone get bored to death. Speaking of which, what is the latest stats like? Everyone is suddenly a statistical analyst and mathematician and probability guru (oh they call them wisdom consultant now) who know exactly what the graphs look like, what the phases should be, and how to flatten the curve, doesn’t matter we still prefer curvaceous options to flattened ones. I mean, how does it really help me to know the curve theory- an upward swing most definitely- especially in the gastric region, burrp, since one is perpetually hungry at home.

The grey cells are working extra at creativity, I am forever creating new recipes (most will be looked upon with distain and like- can we order from outside, anything but your cooking, mom!), or discovering new ways of reducing the number of utensils that need to be washed- you know eating straight out of the pot in which the cooking happened – that is what one pot meal is meant for, right- (no, no, don’t go there, there are pots and then there is the pot). How to use fingers in lieu of spoons. How to get away with cleaning home once a week. And how to avoid a brewing fight between three utterly frustrated people vying for the solitary relaxing chair. See the depths to which I have sunk, with imagination stuck at pots and dishes.

When this whole funda started about working from remote, I was quite delighted. Ah, to be able to avoid the traffic for a few days, gain back those couple of hours to and from office (little did I know the actual gain would be a few kilos). Maybe I can join that yoga class finally. And walk I definitely must- at least 5 kms a day and get back into shape (round was not the shape in my mind then). All quite noble thoughts and ideas. I will have all the time in the world. Maybe also write the next bestseller. The stark reality of the situation had yet to hit.

And then the noisy Sunday happened (I have been warned- don’t call it noisy, clapping is not noise, it is motivation- yup, I do agree). So – as the Sun rose on the motivating Sunday, the maid fell- I mean not really, but into a slumber of “Bhabhi, I can’t come today, we need to clap”. No issues, Sunday is one day, I can manage, I thought self-righteously. And manage I did with a lot of culinary delights appeasing the palate. And then after the cacophony and jingles, came the lockdown. And all hell broke loose (maybe the sound waves were responsible).

Week 1 was, continuing from the previous day euphoria, Oh I will manage. But somehow the days seem to stretch, work expanded to fill all the time, whatever Murphy said turned true, before you could blink it was evening. The routine just became – make breakfast, office work, make lunch, more office work, make dinner, even more office work, with in between time slots for other mundane stuff like eating and cleaning the home.

The next week was decidedly less ambitious. One curry was enough for the three of us, lentils was merely an accompaniment that can be replaced by curd. Bread does not need to be toasted, why does milk need boiling? Work distribution started in earnest. The bad mummy and bad spouse in me woke up and devised a devious scheme that ensured my husband would no longer sit idle and at least spend one hour a day less on whatsapp. My vicious and cruel intentions included my son, who had to do a few chores too, complain if you must, but just do it. Ignoring the fact that I can do whatever it is better, parking the ego in the closet, think of the ROI, saving the 10 minutes from doing another chore is priority number 1.

Self- righteousness at its peak. Netizens remind us we should have gone back to our roots, how much better the environment is, how you can see Pluto, the last planet, if you squint a little; folks are creating traditional recipes religiously, for want of a chef (and unless you put it on social media, it isn’t complete). Every smart person in the world is getting better at whatever it is they do, and they have to tell the world and disrupt the limited peace of poor old me (need to give them a piece of my mind), teaching and preaching, you must come out of lockdown with a new skill! Online classes, oh the mouthwatering recipes, the challenges, Am I the only one who is seriously tired of the information overload pushed down my throat? Really, the only skill I seem to be learning is how to delegate more work to the unsuspecting mortals at home. I must be getting better by the day as the husband has started volunteering for tasks too.

And then my husband decided (to be completely honest, I decided for him), that he would take the bold step of removing all his hair on the head. It is important to be location specific here. And then I finally learnt a new skill, the art of using trimmers and razors on a round, sometimes uneven surface, and removing the sparse population of hair on his head. I am happy I did quite well in fact, just made a couple of nicks where blood spouted. Not too bad for a first timer.

With all the heinous hair-raising experience behind me, I have been giving broad hints to my son as well, but he refused to acknowledge it. His hair and beard are all over the place and he keeps giving examples of one celebrity after another in defense – if they can keep long hair, I can too. Is it that he doesn’t trust my deft hands to do the needful or he really wants to look like the wild guy from the wild!

The last straw was when after a few weeks, I decided to take a stroll along the walking trail, and the looks I got along with – madam – it is not allowed, the police are checking. So back home, with

we and Netflix ,

burgers and a drink,

busting stress in the thrillers,

on the couch with the Millers.

Amidst the fast and the furious

Mind it, the situation is hilarious.

So what if it is the lockdown?

I still need to calm down.

Work or no work

I am going berserk!

Fighting with the family

Is what I’d do even normally

Peeved at being @home

with pocha and a broom