Fifty-three Cents Richer!

I have recently discovered aging is not everything it is cracked up to be and it can hurt the ego just a teeny tiny bit. I genuinely feel blessed for every day I get to spend on incredible planet earth, have never been embarrassed of my age but happily own it, and am grateful to have lived 52 years thus far. The alternative is death, so I am pretty darn happy with each new day that pushes me toward old age. That said, I am not 100 percent happy with the aging process and like many, I’m desperately trying to find those magic creams and potions that are going to erase the meandering lines on my face or melt away the double chin that seems to be sprouting underneath the original one. I pay my hairdresser hefty amounts of cash every couple of months to cover the gray hair that insists on pushing itself in between the blonde of my youth. I’ve tried to stay as current as possible with fashion while also acknowledging the need to find clothes that fit my now pear-shaped body. The orthopedic doctor has recently told me a hip replacement is in my near future, which sounds a little more painful than a bikini wax, but I am slowly accepting it as part and parcel of having older bones. And while I recognize I am not the spring chicken I was and concede everything is not as firm and tight as it once was, I was not prepared for the senior citizen discount.

On Tuesday afternoons before my daughter’s gyrotonics class, we always stop for a snack at one of any number of popular teenage eating venues (Side note: Until recently, I had never heard of gyrotonics, which focuses on rotational multidirectional movement. From what I have observed, I would say it combines Pilates, swimming without water, and ballet. It is fascinating to watch, and it has helped her strengthen and lengthen. Happy to help you learn your “something new” today!). On this particular Tuesday, we first stopped into Playa Bowls for a pink pitaya smoothie (apparently, pitaya is an electric-pink cactus-fruit hip new thing), and then we headed into the Dunkin’ Donuts where she ordered a half dozen assorted donuts because despite what you hear, ballerinas can put food away better than any other type of athlete. I ordered an iced coffee. The very kind and sweet cashier rang us up and as my eyes focused on the register gauging just how much this after school snack was setting me back, my brain slowly made out the words “senior discount”, despite their being upside down on the monitor. My “I can’t be quite that old” brain thought “WHAT the $#@&?!” I humbly paid with cash, left with my head lowered and my receipt in hand, double checked the printed evidence, and sure enough, I had received a $.53 senior citizen discount!

Now friends, I am all for discounts. My favorite place to shop is Marshall’s because I love looking at the item’s original price, then the Marshall’s price, and doing the quick math to see just how much I am saving. I hoard coupons the mailman insists on leaving in my mailbox, hoping I might use just one at some random moment in time. And I get giddy when I fill up my gas tank at the Shell station and get cents off every gallon because I have dumped hundreds of dollars into groceries at the local Giant supermarket. My mother raised me to never buy anything at full price (unless I am purchasing a gift for someone else, in which case, I should never buy discount), so you can begin to appreciate just how ingrained discount-loving is for me. But this discount?! This discount stung and definitely made me feel “less than”. It took the wind out of my sails. It made my frown lines deeper and more distinct. I left the store with a little less pep in my step. But why? Fifty-three cents is not chump change. It is seven cents shy of a first-class postage stamp, and it gets me thirteen minutes on the parking meter in downtown Bethesda. The discount-loving me should have been rejoicing! What I realized is the discount stung because I am not a senior citizen YET. Depending on the retailer, theatre, or restaurant, I have a minimum of three more years until I am officially a senior citizen (eight years for places that use age 60 as the cutoff), so I believe I was cranky because I was being admitted to a club I do not yet want to join. Don’t get me wrong. I will happily own the Senior Citizen moniker when I am officially 55 and older, and I will be first in line to cash in on every single discount for which I am eligible. But my surprise and slight discomfort from this experience came from being pushed into something for which I am not quite ready. I am aging. I am doing it. Let me do it though, gracefully, and in good time. Please world, don’t rush me!

So, what did I learn from this? I learned there is humility that comes with aging, and the best thing I can do is embrace it! I also learned that with aging comes a well-developed sense of humor, and so despite the sting, my daughter and I laughed; a premature senior citizen discount is kind of funny, especially to a teenager! I also learned I will absolutely continue rubbing creams into my face to smooth out my facial lines, I should probably get the hip replaced sooner rather than later so I hobble less, I definitely need to go shopping to purchase clothes that read age 45 more than 55, and maybe get a button to wear that says, “not a senior citizen yet”! And I learned to focus on the greatest positive of the Dunkin Donuts experience. I am now fifty-three cents richer!