Hey Amber, I am going to tag your piece and speak to it (I write about this stuff) but from the other end. I hear the fear, and I might have some positive thoughts. In the meantime, if you will forgive the delay, I am about to head out and run about 3000 steps here in Denver at 6000 feet. Yeah. That’s what I do. I’m 67, do adventure travel (and will be returning to it as soon as possible) and didn’t even begin to do this seriously until I was 60. And kindly, Amber, I’m not that much of an outlier, either. While I am well aware that little I say will alleviate the fear, when we start looking at role models (kindly, that is not a request to point at me but simply for good examples in all our lives) of people doing amazing things after fifty, that changes the conversation. My life is full of unbelievable examples of effing badass women doing ridiculously badass things later in life. And while yes, we take care of ourselves, we stopped worrying about crow’s feet years ago. To that I might offer one of my funnier articles about online dating at this age which speaks directly to that:
Being a badass isn’t confined to athletics. Jane Goodall is no athlete. She is a badass. You can I could find endless examples of what it means to age like a Supremely Extraordinary Woman. The good men love us as we are, not as nubile 20 year olds. Because at that age, we don’t have character carved into us yet. And that is what ultimately makes us truly beautiful.
Gotta run stairs.