TURNING 60- Age Happens!

My mother said to not tell anyone that I turned 60. So you didn't hear it here. OK?

My thoughts on aging:

Turning 30 was not even noticed. Turning 40 WAS noticed, but easy to ignore. At 50 I paid attention; by then I had to use glasses to read and remove splinters from fingers. I hate losing "close" vision more than anything. I now keep inexpensive reading glasses in most rooms of our house and in the studio I just built. At 50 it didn't take much exertion for my body to protest; simply mowing the grass did the trick. Body parts wear out just like car parts do, I've learned .

I turned 60 on January 2 this year (2009)- and it seems others noticed it more than I did. Ya, my hair is whiter, my vision a bit weaker-though I passed my driver's license vision test with no glasses, and I've developed a compressed nerve root in a neck vertebra, causing some intermittent numbness and cramping in my left (guitar playing) hand. Otherwise, I'm not too bad off. I've been lucky so far, I guess. Real lucky. There are plenty of folks out there with serious medical conditions at my age.

So what am I doing right? Not much, really. I still (usually)enjoy doing chores, especially outside chores, being in the sunshine and the wind. I like setting goals and achiving them, both small and large.

I am a believer in Vitamin C and its ability to help slow the free radicals that race through our bodies and age us after age 25, about the year I started taking Vitamin C. I had read some about Dr. J. Linus Pauling, the inventor of synthesized ascorbic acid, who won the Nobel Prize for its invention. I learned that it didn't matter whether you take the pill version of Vitamin C or got it more naturally through different foods like orange juice, the body absorbs it all the same. It seems orange juice has about 50 milligrams of Vitamin C per "juice" glass, but you can easily get 250 milligrams in a single Vitamin C pill. At the cost of orange juice it was a no-brainer to take one pill per night. I chose bedtime to take my vitamins because many, like Vitamin C, are water soluable and are thus excreted soon after consuming liquids- like morning coffee! If you want a vitamin to be more effective, then my logic says to take it just before you begin a long period of rest with no liquid intake.

My current nightly vitamin regimin:

500 mg Vit. C - for the whole body, especially if you smoke!

1000 mg Omega 3 fish oil - for the heart and brain function

2000 IU Vit. D-3 - for the heart and mood

81 mg baby aspirin - for the heart

That's it. No medicines, so far. Like I said, I've been lucky. The Vitamin C has been a staple of my diet for 35 years, with few lapses. The baby aspirin has been added ever since 10 years ago when I started stressing over my students' passing their end of year tests and started having angina/chest pains. The heart specialist gave me the stress test and full heart imaging with the radioactive dye and concluded I was normal as hell. But the doctor did suggest I start taking the baby aspirin each night, that it wouldn't hurt. I've had no heart problems since retirement from teaching. I cared too much, I guess.

There has been a flood of positive research lately regarding the enormous value of adding Vitamin D to your diet. Sure, you can get all you need by getting in the sun WITH EXPOSED SKIN and no suntan lotion for 15 minutes per day, times 3 days per week. Some weeks I get plenty of sunlight. Other weeks I simply don't, especially in winter. Vitamin D suppliments have been shown to improve mood and heart function. It's hard to overdose on it, but easy to overdose on sunlight. (I've had 15 pre-cancerous "sun-spots" removed so far, some cut, some frozen.)

And, of course, fish oil has long been known to help the heart.

I've only been taking the fish oil and Vitamin D for less than a year. Got to admit my mood had seen some improvement.

I am relatively conservative regarding my belief in the theraputic value of vitamins. I'd love to get all my vitamins through my foods, but I don't believe our "normal" American lifestyles give us that much access to enough natural sources of vitamins. We tend to overcook and overprocess our foods. Suppliments do help some. I think almost EVERYONE should take a little Vitamin C every day, and add a baby aspirin nightly starting around age 50. The next one to consider would be Vitamin D. There's simply too much strong evidence that it helps the heart and mind.

And what am I doing wrong? That's easy: I am still a smoker. Simply put, smoking cigarettes is the biggest mistake of my life. I started smoking after I figured out I was not going to play college football, and I badly needed a way to stay awake all night to study for college tests, midterm exams, and finals. I found cigarettes and lots of coffee did the trick. I've never been the sharpest pencil in the pack, and studying all night enabled me to make the same grades or higher than my brighter roommates who rarely studied. (Of the four of us in one dorm suite, only two graduated, and it took Woody 5 years to finish his degree. But Woody was a very popular man on campus, and partied like one.)

The problem came when I graduated and found just why today's scientists consider nicotine addiction just as strong as heroin addiction- and just as hard to quit. After using cigarettes as a crutch for four years of college, I was and am still an addict.

Every year of teaching high school I told my story above to my students in hopes of deterring even one of them from starting smoking. All the other teachers I knew who smoked NEVER broached the topic with their students. My students told me repeatedly that I was the most honest teacher they ever had.

Ya, sometimes honest to a fault.

Quitting smoking is twice as hard when your wife or husband smokes. The process of quitting has to be timed perfectly to when both spouses want to put the cigarettes down, a hard task. Of course you CAN quit seperately. My mom quit long before my dad. It just takes incredible willpower, the kind I don't have. If I'm around a smoker while trying to quit, I'll bum a smoke. Or steal one- if it's my wife that's smoking. Sure am glad I never fell in love with alcohol, like so many have.

I recently came across the following:

"Someone had to remind me, so I'm reminding you too. Don't laugh.....it is all true...Perks of reaching 50 or being over 60 and heading towards 70!

01. Kidnappers are not very interested in you.

02. In a hostage situation you are likely to be released first.

03. No one expects you to run--anywhere.

04. People call at 9 pm and ask, did I wake you?

05. People no longer view you as a hypochondriac.

06. There is nothing left to learn the hard way.

07. Things you buy now won't wear out.

08. You can eat supper at 4 pm.

09. You can live without sex but not your glasses.

10. You get into heated arguments about pension plans.

11. You no longer think of speed limits as a challenge.

12. You quit trying to hold your stomach in no matter who walks into the room.

13. You sing along with elevator music.

14. Your eyes won't get much worse.

15 . Your investment in health insurance is finally beginning to pay off.

16. Your joints are more accurate meteorologists than the national weather service.

17. Your secrets are safe with your friends because they can't remember them either.

18. Your supply of brain cells is finally down to manageable size.

19. You can't remember who sent you this list.

And Never, under any circumstances, take a sleeping pill and a laxative on the same night."

You got to have a good attitude about life in general and aging in particular. 'Nuf said. Have a good, happy life. Trust me: It goes faster the older you get!