Why save the best until last?
The predicament of waiting until tomorrow to live the life we want today
Things don't always turn out how you imagined. Actually, more often than not, they don’t. On a recent family holiday, we had not one but both of my in-laws through A & E, and for the first time, I realised they are getting older. And I was struck by the unfairness of it all.
Ten or so years into retirement, that magical time when we're told we can finally pursue our dreams and enjoy our time. Pursue every interest and hobby we had kept putting off, like a bedside reading pile of all the things we want to do but will probably never get around to. Because as time passes we want different things or we see things differently or the slow wear of time makes some of them impossible or at the very least more difficult. I loved going out until late into the night in my 20’s and early 30’s, but now into my 40’s I prefer to be tucked up at home before dark. Content that I had made the most of those nights when I wanted to.
All our lives we work, to both, live and to be able to support ourselves towards the end of our lives; when we are no longer quick enough or sharp enough to be our most productive selves. When, aside from our spending power, we are not deemed valuable to society. And there is a deep sadness in this realisation. You’re not working to enjoy the time to yourself as you imagine it to be when you were younger. Because it's not the same. It’s slower, devoid of newness and peppered with ill health, and limited mobility. It’s smaller somehow. Both in your footprint within the world and the people you love who inhabit it.
Conversations transition from you’ll never guess what they’ve said to me now and the making of memories to last words and childhood memories. From how to make enough money to retire to how to spend it all before the end. Life inevitably gets smaller at the same speed as time is running out.
I’ve been staying with my in-laws for the past week. While my mother-in-law starts to recover from a fall. They live just north of Manchester in a sleepy village. A small culdesac, where each house is identical; the kitchen in the same place faces onto the garden and the living room faces the street. Windows big enough to capture a glimpse into the lives of the older couple in the house across the street. To see their daily routine play out every day. Breakfast at 9, afternoons spent reading or watching television, the curtains drawing closed as darkness falls. Their lives played out in a series of rooms, perfectly contented.
As the calendar turns this week into another year of my own life, from 42 to 43, I’m focusing more on living for now rather than for tomorrow. Because it won’t be the same; to wait to live later, to shelve plans, to hold things back. If you want to do it, do it now, live life now, and don’t wait for ‘a time when’. That time is now.
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Which examines the hidden rules & stories that shape our lives. In particular her Friday instalment entitles The Coulds a weekly round up of inspiration, links and resources around a single theme. This week she explores curiosity, one of my favourite topics.Also on substack I’ve recently Joined a Writers Room set up by
A wonderful group of people at varying levels of their writing journey. Farrah shares her own wisdom from years of editorial experience across cosmopolitan and Elle and also brings in some amazing guest speakers too. If you are curious about writing in any form I encourage you to check it out.
I wonder, what are you curious about this week?