The other day I spent a few hours visiting with a very wonderful lady who has become a very close friend in just a few short months. She is a true Earth Angel and has taught me a lot about myself, my spirituality and, indeed, about life in general.
Although I had always known that she is younger than me, I have to admit that it came as somewhat of a shock to find out exactly how much younger than me she actually is. She’s still a baby, for goodness sakes!
So, after some consideration on the subject, I wondered……. at what age does age become just a number?
When we have children, we are often taught to judge their milestones based upon their age,
“My little Timmy was walking at 10 months.” Well, bully for Timmy, I’d always thought, when my angel was still bum scooting at 12 months. But I digress.
The age when we begin to realize that other people have feelings and that the world does not revolve solely around us, I was taught in psychology class, is age 5. Some people, I’ve learned, never learn that the world does not revolve around them.
The age that we officially become teenagers is 13. We can begin driving at 16, begin voting at 18 and begin purchasing alcohol at the ripe old age of 19 (where I live).
We are considered a senior citizen at age 65 and are then entitled to everything from discounted meals to pension plans. A person that lives to age 70 is considered is considered old, if you make it to age 80 you are well preserved and at age 90, well, congratulations.
But what happens in the in between years? Can someone with as few as 28 years on this planet have as much wisdom as someone with, say, 60? And why do we automatically assume that being older makes people wiser? I’ve known some older people that could definitely learn a thing or two.
Now, I’m not in any way, saying that older people are not wise and should not be treated with respect. My mother did not raise me that way. But that isn’t what this is about.
I think that age really is just a number. Although the number is important in some way, for some reason, to everyone, when it comes to friendships and wisdom, age has no place. Wisdom is about the things you’ve been through in your life. Your ability to recognize that there will always be people that know more than you, but what you do know is important.
Friendships are supposed to be based on mutual respect and mutual interests. That you both can still laugh because someone said “I will do just about anything for some wood” like it’s a dirty joke, has nothing to do with the number of years you’ve been on the planet. It has everything to do with the fact that both of you have minds that spend a significant amount of time in the gutter.
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