I'm Looking Older

Thoughts on an aging face

I turned 48 yesterday. I found a decently (but not too harshly) lit corner at home and took a selfie. The light in the photo shows my age, but the picture is forgiving. You can see the rings around my neck and my suddenly emerged jowls, but it’s not one of those accidental front camera -situations where my uncontrolled appearance simply shocks me. I always thought that it wouldn’t bother me to start to look older, but it turns out that it does, sometimes.

I quite like my crow’s feet and I don’t mind my forehead wrinkles. I’m a big fan of an expressive face at any age. What I don’t like to look at is my disappearing jaw line and the skin on my neck that looks like a thin, slightly crumpled sheet of paper in a certain light. My hooded eyelids are getting heavier and there are days when I look awfully tired. I’ve been told that my eyelid situation will most likely prevent me from seeing properly when I’m significantly older and it might require surgery, but that’s somewhere far in the future. For now, I just have to live with my aging face. It’s a good face, but I’d be lying if I said that I like what’s happening to it.

I could never afford age-concealing cosmetic procedures, and in very broad and general terms, I am against them. Erasing age is deeply troubling from a societal standpoint, and the language surrounding these procedures normalizes the vilification of old people. When youth-boosting procedures are masked as “healthcare”, “self-care” and “not giving up”, the ones who can’t afford or choose to opt out of the procedures can be labeled as those who have given up on their health and who are no longer taking care of themselves. It boosts the two-tier system of the haves and the have nots. The option to eradicate age from one’s face and body belongs to the wealthy, but the consequences mold all levels of society. It’s never just a personal choice.

Having said all that, starting to look older is most definitely not nothing. When I was in my early 40s, I thought that I was already starting to look a bit older, but the real deal is here now, with menopause. The texture of my skin is noticeably different, thinner, and more fragile. My wrinkles are more prominent. My grey hairs are multiplying. A badly slept night really shows.

The change has been quite sudden for me. I look in the mirror sometimes and I don’t quite recognize myself. I see my mother and my father instead. It’s not easy or simple to just embrace it. On some level I understand why people opt for age-eradicating procedures. You want to preserve yourself in the now, rather than get lost in the complexity of who you came from and where you might be headed. I wonder if choosing to erase one’s age comes less from the fear of aging but more from the impossible urge to be one’s own, free-standing person.

When I feel uneasy about my aging face and body (some days are worse than others), I try to remind myself that today is the youngest I will ever be. I will never look younger than this, and in ten, twenty or thirty years, if I’m privileged enough to have a long life, I will look back and laugh at this moment, when I thought that I looked old at 48. To be honest, I find myself laughing already. When I find that frame of mind, looking older starts to feel like a cool journey to the unknown. Wrinkles, jowls, and all.

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