Slow Reset from Chaos

A spirited reflection on aging, wrinkles, resilience, and why we should never resign from living.

Aging does not exactly knock politely, does it? It barges in with receipts, wrinkles, prescription reminders, and a few unpaid emotional invoices. Still, I refuse to treat age like an eviction notice from joy. If anything, it is my GPS recalculating the route, reminding me to keep moving, keep singing, keep laughing, and keep living before the next number shows up on the dashboard.

“It’s only numbers.” Really? Those digits change as quickly as the prices on gas pumps. The fewer bags I carry out of the grocery store, the less change I have in my coin purse. Forget the wallet; paper money does not last long enough to live there. A steady income is when you are still working, while Social Security allows you taxable income so everyone else can have a steady income. But listen, we are never useless at any age. Don’t tender your resignation to life just because your numbers are bigger in denomination. It is not about life. It is about living. If you belong to a Catholic Charismatic Family, you need energy when you sing, “Buhay, Buhay, Buhay Kailan Pa Man. Si Jesus ay buhay, buhay kailan pa man!” And no, we don’t flounder limp on the ground. Get your religious mind straight!

That is the thing about age: it keeps counting, but it does not get to define the whole story.

Frail! Of course we are. If we receive aging well, we will wear our wrinkles well. Our courtship with age is no different from when we were dating. Save the best for last. NEVER on the first date. There were a lot of “nevers” and “don’ts” for everything, weren’t there? And sometimes, our worth feels diminished by the decisions we make. But that does not mean the worth is gone.

Ride the roller coaster if you must, because soon enough it becomes a freight train with a caboose. Not everyone will always have a first-class seat, but in the end, it won’t really matter. Always remember, there is an expiration date for almost everything. Trends don’t last. Beauty fades. We slow down. Hey, even canned goods have expiration dates!

But here is where faith interrupts the expiration-date speech.

Well, I lied! There is something that does not expire. It may bury itself in a grave for a while, waiting until someone really special carefully lifts it up. It is resilient. It is strong. It is hopeful. When the pieces are put back together, it’s incomparable worth doubles and triples, and then keeps growing. And when God pours gold into the cracks to mend it, it is amazing. The Japanese Kintsugi artisans have perfected this truth. Treat a broken vase with gold, and it becomes unique and exquisite. I know. When our heart is broken, when our soul is fractured, and when our spirit has the energy of a sloth, we need something. No matter how strong or resilient our heart is, it can still break. Only affection helps us heal. That guy, my guy, He is amazing. I’m not preaching; I’m dealing with it. A broken heart cannot love with unguarded affection right away. Love is not a throw-out-and-away, conditional word. We can always have a big heart, but that does not mean it is harder to break. It just means it is more sensitive.

You know, every night we do our thing; we pray. Our Mother Mary always makes sure I am well behaved. I pray not for myself first, but for everyone else. Maybe that is the real secret to turning of age: not pretending we are untouched by time but letting time teach us where to place our heart. We may slow down, we may wrinkle, and we may need a little more grace getting up than we did sitting down. But as long as we can still love, laugh, pray, sing, forgive, and begin again, we are not finished. We are simply being redirected—with faith as our compass, affection as our gold, and God still holding the map. So when age recalculates, I will not panic. I will listen, adjust, and keep going. The destination is still life, and the route is still grace.