50

Well ...... here I am. 50. Yes, 50. What is there to say about 50?

Well, it is a ... contradictory age. I am happy to be here but it also sucks to be here, not because I want to be anywhere else but because I am here. Am I sounding slightly unbalanced?

People say "Oh come onnnn age is just a number" but no, it is not just a number it is a real passing of time and accumulation of experiences that makes it not JUST a number. Yes, we may all feel 25 in our heads but we are 50, we have had 50 years of life or LIFE!! depends on how you see it and lived it.

Biologically however, I have to sadly break it to you, 50 years means shorter telomeres, less XXs, big time cellular apoptosis, mitochondrial oxidative stress, reduced cardiovascular endurance and reduced or maybe even lack of neuronal plasticity. Yep, cells age - so in the end, it is not "just" a number.

I met an old friend a few weeks ago who I had not seen in a very very long time. As she was coming up the stairs I said: "Come here I want to give you a 15 year old hug" and she says: "Actually it is a 35 year old hug, I did the math" We had not seen each other since age 15!! So this is what 50 is - it is that WTF? moment in life when you can say the last time you did something was 35 years ago!!!

50 is walking into your office and seeing the new resident or fellow and realizing that you are 50 because you are no longer Elena and will forever after be Dr. Lopez. And while you are proud that you have become knowledgeable and respectable you would also like to be part young, cool and hip, and while you can probably still achieve the cool hip part the young part is out of reach.

50 is realizing you are now saying forever goodbyes. Not temporary 20 year old,  I'll-see-you-at-age-40 goodbyes but more like: I-hope-the-rest-of-your-life-is-amazing-goodbyes. At 50, you begin to lose people permanently due to circumstances, work, relationships, geography or disagreement.

50 is occasionally running into little kids (read patients) who think they should help "old ladies". 50 also is running into someone that says "You know what? You are pretty sexy for 50" which should sound like a compliment except for the "pretty" and "for" part. In other words, 50 means that compliments sometimes need a qualifier.

50 is beginning to develop a serious case of "onism". Which to quote the Dictionary of Obscure Sorrows  is: "the frustration of being stuck in just one body that inhibits one place at a time, which is like standing in front of the departure screens at an airport flickering over with strange place names each representing one more thing you'll never get to see because, as the map helpfully points out, YOU ARE HERE".

Buuuuut ..... 50 also means that YOU. ARE. HERE. And I mean the fabulously mindful take-a-deep-breath I. AM. HERE. See the contradiction?

Here's the kicker of age 50, when asked what age would you want to go back to, you sit there and ponder ...... well, 25 would be nice, but then I wouldn't be in Canada. So then you think ok, 35, then but then I would not have Benjamin and that would suck. Fine then 40, well.... no because I would not be where I am now in my career. And so on and so on ... Thankfully, knowing where you are now makes you not want to go back so you start getting used to the idea of 50 being okay because you actually have no choice.

Here I am, beginning the 6th decade of life, needing to now check the 50-55 age box - exciting, happy, awesome (in not in the awesome duuude way but the real AWEsome) but also scary.

I recently read that impermanence can be startlingly beautiful. Maybe the passage of time, that ultimate measure of impermanence, is truly poignant, truly sorrowful, truly mournful but more than anything, truly beautiful.

So, here I go, taking the next big step and surrendering to beauty.

Practicing love

I have two children, both boys, both now teenagers. It is a household of males where emotions and talk of feelings  or "looooove" is received with a massive roll of the eyes, a derisive smirk and a long drawn out moooooooooooother. 

Over time they have come to tolerate my diatribes and indulge my questions but I can sense their aggravation at what they consider a "girly" emotional sentimental conversation.

We have had numerous conversations about sex. Believe me, these two are well informed. We have even in the past talked about whether a place to practice sex would be a good business (see previous blog Sex and Minecraft), because practice makes perfect. Or at least it should right? Yet they never ask about love. They probably feel that love doesn't need to be taught, that they will figure it out. That it will just happen.

Because of this, I've been wondering, when someone breaks their heart, as it will inevitably happen in life, will they one day come to me asking about love? Will they come into my room one day, sit down grief stricken at the end of my bed and sigh? Will they one day come to me heavy hearted and heartbroken and ask: "Where do people go to learn about love? Where do people go to learn how to love?" "How can I practice love so I can be good at it?"

I will then have to say: You have been practising for many years, it started as an infant when you learned how to love me and your father. You practised when you loved your brother. You have practised when you loved your grandparents and cousins. You have practised some more when you loved your friends. 

On and on and on, you have practiced every time you encountered someone new that you liked and tried to love. You have been practicing for years, the problem with heartbreak is that love is not always reciprocal no matter how good you get at it.

I'll have to explain that the reason it is so hard to be good at love is because it comes in many shapes. I'll have to explain that there is that first love that washes over you like a sudden storm. There is love that embraces you like a warm hug but there is also that lustful love that makes you gasp and catch your breath. There is also that cryptic evasive love that leaves you always wondering where you stand.  There is forlorn love that makes you feel like you will always be empty. There is that unrequited love that makes you have to pull the car over to hold your heart but there is also the daily kind of love that makes you feel safe. 

I'll have to say that no matter how many times you try at love, every time love ends, regardless of how much practice you have put in you will always have to start again from scratch. I'll have to explain that after heartbreak love often does not look like love anymore but more like friendship and I'll have to explain that maybe friendship is the end result of all of those years of practicing love. 

  

Nature porn

I have always had a thing for natural disasters.

When I was in Grade 4 we had to write a science assignment and I chose to write about the eruption of the volcano Krakatoa. To this day I remember it as the coolest research I have ever done. To think of the awesomeness of Earth and our lack of control over it was just humbling.

My interest grew from there, living in Mexico City it was always easy to be in awe of the Earth's movements as we had tremor after tremor and then the BIG earthquake of 1985. My second year in Medical School and a baptism of sorts in emergency-do-anything-you-can type of medicine. Needless to say it was evident that we were, are and forever will be at Earth's mercy.

Since then I have been captivated by this big blue planet's forces. On my weekly runs I will often stop to watch the ocean in awe or as I did yesterday to be mesmerized by the fog bank that grew as I was sitting there watching it roll in. Enthralled by it's swift formation and movement.

In the past I have been pinned to the TV and watched endless hours of footage of both the Indonesia and the Japan tsunami. I will watch every tornado chasing show there is and my bucket list of things to do includes a Tornado Tour. I am, thanks to friends in the East currently being barraged (on facebook) by unimaginable photos of snow, huge snow banks and white out conditions. Yesterday while watching the news I even got snow THUNDER! Me and that Cantore guy would make the perfect couple I'm thinking we both like nature's misbehaviour or should I say natural behaviour. It was like nature porn!!!

Rain even "torrential natural disaster type rain" though, maybe due to overexposure, does not do the same for me. I don't find rain inspiring or enchanting or any of those pretty adjective one can use. I'm glad it rains don't get me wrong but somehow it is not AWE inspiring like other MUCH cooler tricks that Earth can do. Rain provokes more of an okay-you-are-here-again-good-friend kind of feeling. Nothing exciting about it.

We have sun in the Rainforest today and we did yesterday too. Now the sun is not an natural disaster but I'll take it, be happy, and enjoy it's lovely warm charm.

Tell me your story

A little over a year ago I lost a good friend. I knew it was coming.

I had just finished a restorative yoga class when the phone rang and it was another friend to tell me that they were discontinuing care and it was just a matter of days. My reaction was to sit in the middle of the Kits Yyoga stairwell and cry.

While I was sitting there most people walked around me but one guy in blue shorts and a gray hoodie (this is all I remember) sat next to me on the stairwell and said nothing. Absolutely nothing for a long while, he just sat there keeping me company. After a while he asked: "Is everything okay?" and I said: "My friend is dying." He responded by saying "I am so sorry. You want to tell me her story?"

I sat there and I did. I told him her story. For about 20 minutes I talked to him and cried.

Last week my cousin died unexpectedly in a helicopter crash. I found out first thing in the morning through facebook and shortly after that my Dad called to give us the news. His wife and kids, his family, his friends, they all shared stories about him.

Yesterday the local newspaper in Monterrey featured him and his friend, who also died in the crash, and there were numerous wonderful and funny stories about him. Everyone remembers him as a good friend who went out of his way to make people laugh and feel comfortable. Someone who enjoyed life and appreciated every moment life had offered him.

In the end, here is the lesson: leave a story behind and make it a good one.