I have a favorite coffee mug which says:

Like Fine Wine,
I Get Better with Age

Admittedly I was feeling quite facetious
at the time I purchased this mug, but
facetiously serious, if that makes any sense ...
I love coffee mug wisdom ... and t-shirt
wisdom, and those bumper sticker emails
that go around ... we laugh, or we roll our
eyes, but more often than not, we respond
because the words can be so true ...

I do get better with age ... in my younger
days, I knew that I hoped this would be true,
but 'aging' seemed too far away, something
that other people did, and wasn't I going
to be 'young' forever ... it seems so long
ago sometimes, yet at others like it was
surely just the other day ... or was that
last month ... my grasp of time can be
tenuous ...

When I think about it, though, don't we all
get better with age ... every day we practice
at being whom we are from moment to moment, so
shouldn't we get better at it, and continue
to do so each and every day ...

And then I think about whom I am today ... have
I been touched with light, busy, or dreamy …
have I shared a smile, or laughter, or have I
left something less positive in the wake of
my journey … what have I savored today that
I want to take with me to tomorrow ... and what
do I want the rest of this one to reflect tonight,
when I'm drifting off to sleep ...

I get to choose ... I get to incorporate those
choices into whom I am ... surely by knowing
these things I am, as my mug says,
'getting better with age' ...

© Shelley L Flynn
June, 2003

Midi playing: "Only Time" © Enya