Golden Years ?

Into the 3rd week in March and I've only posted 2 blogs ! Clearly the blogging Muse has abandoned me.

Writers of successful blogs (in terms of visitor numbers at least) tend to post regularly, if not daily. I've never been one for doing that as I never intended my blog to be any sort of online diary. I said a few weeks ago that I'd try doing that but as you can tell, it hasn't worked. My daily life just isn't that interesting....even here in sunny Buttonwood Bay.

Specialist blogs do well too. Dieting, cooking and crafting seem to top the list and no doubt any blog dealing with celebrity, real or made up, will also get thousands of visitors.

So as I don't diet, can't cook, am not crafty and have never met a celebrity (except for some actor from Emmerdale when he came out of Leeds Costco), my blog post topics are somewhat limited.

I thought that travel posts would be cool and even helpful but they take so much time to create that I quickly lose interest in doing them. I've still a few holiday posts that have never been completed and I really have little enthusiasm for returning to them now. Take it from me, Italy, France and Spain are all wonderful and we had great times there. Done.

Oh that felt so liberating.....as if with those unfinished posts out of the way, I have a fresh canvas.

Right, in keeping with that artistic image, my brush is poised and I'm all set to go..........

Ahhh....ummm.........sighhhhhh......dammit Muse, hit me with something ! ANYTHING !!

Well ok, a "funny" thing happened on the drive back from golfing on Monday. Jack and Barrie, along with new member, Jerry, were discussing ages. I think this came about after Jerry suddenly decided to give us the results of his recent prostate test, something I could've done without knowing.

Despite being a good result, the subsequent chat revolved around the well known fact that ANY prostate result is a bit meaningless when you're around 80 years old as you're likely to be dead from something else before a dodgy prostate takes you.

Anyway, ages were mentioned and I said something like "God I'm playing golf with a right bunch of old farts." Said in a compassionate and caring way of course.

"Why, what age are you" came the response.

"59"

"OMG you're a youngster."

Now considering I've been somewhat dreading the rapid approach of my 60th birthday in June, this was like music to my ears. Seriously. Music. I suddenly DID feel young. I know, crazy eh ?

You see it's all relative. In this park, the average age is probably in the 70's. I mean you have to be 55 just to get in ! There are probably 3 of us out of about 2,000 who are under 60 and we all live in this house ! Dennis is my age and Debby is even younger.

Back in the real world, my approaching 60th birthday will cause people to believe that I'll be senile, over the hill, geriatric, and possibly a bit useless. Yet apart from losing several thousand memory cells, being a bit physically slower and napping during daytime tv, I feel better than I did 20 years ago.

But the age 'number' is hard to fight against. Most people have preconceived ideas when they hear you are 50, 60, 70 etc. We get told we live in a young society where old relatives are not valued for their life experiences but actually ignored, treated as nuisances and plonked in front of the tv from dawn till dusk. If nothing else prematurely ages a person, that will.

Here in this park, and many others like it, retired people generally live to ripe old ages because they keep active, keep involved and look out for each other. Every few minutes, residents are walking or cycling past my window. The small gym is full by 7am and water aerobics sessions are going on around the same time to keep hearts pumping and arteries unclogged. Tennis and other games are in full flow and indoors, all forms of dancing and manual dexterity crafts are in progress to keep the effects of arthritis at bay.

But the boost I got by hearing myself called a youngster the other day proves that a lot of how you feel physically is determined by how you feel mentally.....and right now I feel great.

60 ? Bring it on !

I donno if we have parks like this in the UK but we should have. Yes we have caravan parks and holiday parks and so on but do we have parks for retirees ? Before I came here I'd have doubted their usefulness but now I'm a convert. If only we had Florida style weather in the UK.

Buttonwood Bay proves the old adage that "you are as young as you feel" and I have to say that being around people older than me and who are just as active as me, if not more so, has lessened my dread of being 60.

In just over 5 weeks time I'll be back in the real world again and back in the UK where I'll be made to face my age in a much different way. I just hope I can take the BB energy and positivity back with me.

One positive note will be that when I reach 60, I'll qualify for free prescriptions. See, it's not all bad !

On the down side however, any water aerobics might have to be done in my shower.