Friday, January 7, 2011

On the blues of grays

      Aging is a difficult process. I used to think, why can't people age gracefully? But I admit I swallowed hard when I spotted a gray hair in the mirror. I quickly scanned through the rest of my hair like a maniac and sure enough, found a couple more. In an instant, my mind scuttled through a myriad of solutions for the problem. All the advertisements for hair color that I had seen flashed before my eyes. Because I'm worth it.
      Lots of people have grays as early as their twenties but there are times when I feel that the grays in my hair speak for my age. Like when the other day, I walked down the cosmetics aisle and from the corner of my eye I spotted the nail polish section. I almost lingered. My heart reached out for metallic green nail paint and my hand almost followed suit. But even my mind winced at the loud giggles emanating from bunch of teenagers trying out nail polishes. My feet hovered mid-step for a mere fraction of a second before I scurried along.
      I have reached an age when one, drenched in nostalgia, reaches out to people from one's past. Not that I have anything against nostalgia, in fact I am the queen of it. I can slip into the memories of the past and even find things that were never there and sigh romantically. Like the time that I skinned both my knees, foolishly jumping off the six foot high wall surrounding the building complex, onto the hard paved road. I have given up asking why my cohorts and I did such things. It must have been the sense of immortality that kids usually are filled with. However, gone is the pain of the bruises, gone is embarrassment at the foolishness. All I remember is the feeling of achievement at not breaking my teeth (which probably I didn't even feel at that time). Time as usual had erased everything else away. Maybe that's why they call it sands of time. Because it has this habit of sanding away at the jagged corners of all memories, making it nice and smooth.
      Well, I digress. Chalk one more up to my age.
      So as I was saying, I am drenched in the sweetness of nostalgia. Forget Farmville, Frontierville, Yoville and such online games. The main game that Mark Zuckerberg helped propagate is Nostalgiaville. I am thrilled to say that I have connected with fellow residents of The Ville. Folks that I went to kindergarten, high school, and college with. Folks with whom I have never shared a spoken word. Only several written ones lately.
      The blues of the grays set in when I started saying "Those were the days" and hearing the same from my contemporaries.  Sometimes after the words came out, my mind had gone into a frenzied search for the good times the phrase referred to.
      The blues of the grays set in when I realized that it didn't matter that there may not have been many. It was a case of the bruised knees all over again.
      And now that the blues have set in, methinks its time to run over to the cosmetics aisle, and snatch up that metallic green nail paint.
      As some commercial pointed out. Because I'm worth it.

4 comments:

  1. Boy I understand what you're saying as I approach the most dreaded...the BIG 40. I proudly cover the grey. :-)

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  2. SKay, as I learned very early watching my maternal grandfather, age is all in the mind. Grey hair, no grey hair - what does it matter? As long as you can think, write, have fresh ideas, and - oh, yes - poop without help from anyone or anything, it is all good. Rather than being afraid of the 40s, 50s or whatevs, embrace it, wholeheartedly. Do whatever your heart wants, because sure as hell, you're worth it!

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  3. still take solace in the "age is just a number" adage .
    As usual a lovely thought provoking piece
    Anju

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  4. Why wouldn't metallic green colour look good on your nails? :D

    Loved it :D

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