Ticktock, not tocktick

humour

It is something that all of us are doing all the time, and yet, we choose to deny it.
This came to mind once again with renewed force when I met my friend S after considerable years.

The initial hellos and hugs over, we settled down, facing each other for a long chat. That was when she submitted me to a lengthy scrutiny and  exclaimed, “Oh, you’ve aged. Why don’t you dye your hair?”

My hand flew to my snowy halo, and I answered lightly, “Ah, I don’t believe in that. As the saying goes, only cowards ‘dye’ many times before their death.”

“You are still as impossible as ever,” she retorted, “Well, at least in that way you haven’t changed.”

It could well be that I am impossible, but, unknown to S, I have this habit of keeping my own counsel. Beneath her crown of jet-black hair, S’s face advertised a tale no different from mine. Her share of crow’s feet and wrinkles were there for all to see. Either her mirror lied to her, or she did not see well enough.

I must admit that heeding the message in the mirror does not always yield happy outcomes.

Not long ago, my husband peered at his reflected image, and decided it was time for a makeover. There was more salt than pepper in his locks. That had to be remedied pronto. He pursued his objective with zeal, painting them now here, now there.

The results were gratifying. He realised, however, that his wife (me) was in need of the same treatment. I refused to give in though, whereupon he told me with asperity, “Don’t you see, I will soon start looking younger than you.”

“Well,” I retorted, “All these years, I have looked younger than you. It could be your turn now!”

Children see adults as they are and not how they would like to be seen. They perceive that beneath the carefully constructed exterior lingers the true you. This was brought home with devastating results to an aspiring grandmother.

She had been inveigled into buying anti-wrinkle and age-defying creams and was engaged in the process of rubbing some of it on her face, when her little grandson entered.

“What are you doing, grandma?” he asked.

“Oh,” she answered breezily, “I’m rubbing the cream in to make me young and beautiful.”
Then came the crushing reply, “Then why doesn’t it?”

It is one of life’s great ironies that the young desperately want to look old, while the old want to look young. My friend of 70 believed implicitly that he was very young at heart and was an ideal playmate for his four-year-old granddaughter. Those two spent hours playing games. Came the day when they were going through her mother’s wedding album.

“Oh! How pretty amma looks,” the child remarked.

“We’ll see that you look twice as pretty on your wedding day,” said her companion. The little one patted her grandfather’s hand and said, “Don’t you worry about that thatha. You won’t be alive then, you see.”

Cacophonous voices around us try to make us believe that ageing is ugly and avoidable. Its so-called unseemliness is often hidden under a mask of clothes and creams. But as with many things in life, ageing too becomes enjoyable when looked at square in the face and accepted wholeheartedly.

Wisdom lies in remembering what Bernard Shaw, the king of waspish wit, said: ‘Age cannot wither her because she has never bloomed.’