Age, Aches & Ailments

While catching up with a Prof of mine, I mentioned to him that suddenly I feel like a switch was thrown and I woke up with aches and ailments. He and I are the same age and he said it was the same for him. He could party all night and still be up bright and happy for his classes, but no longer.

Why ? What’s common between Age, Aches & Ailments ?

I went for a trek to Chopta and Tungnath for my 40th birthday. Just four years later in 2013, I couldn’t bend my knees and seven years later in 2016, I couldn’t swing my arms ! What really changed ?

• When I was young, I was open minded and as I grow older, I am rigid in my thinking… my joints freeze up.
• When I was young, I was flexible and as I grow older, I have several non-negotiables…. and my head aches.
• When I was young, I love making friends, now I struggle to keep the friends I do have …. my hair goes grey.
• When I was young, I never knew fear, now am hyper if another human being gets close to me without a mask …. ending up with high BP.
• When I was young, I would eat anything, never count calories, and never sit in one place for a few minutes, now I hyperventilate over every ingredient, check and recheck my weight tilting to one side or the other, and keep staring into a screen for hours ….. obesity strikes.
• When I was young, I waited for Diwali or my birthday to get a few pieces of sweets, now I buy packets off the shelf, order tins over Amazon ….. hello diabetes.
• When I was young, potato chips were made at home by Mom, now I buy them in all formats, ridged, salted, flat, thick, thin, spicy etc …. and we have fireworks without the fire !

You get the drift ? Age has very little to do with aches and ailments, its what we do and think as we age, that brings them on. A baby is flexible and keeps moving but with age, I am becoming rigid, unmoving. The wear and tear of the human body is a small part of ageing but the mental wear and tear amplifies everything.

I saw the news about a baby being born on the Indigo flight, read the pilot’s account – Meet 007 – Baby Boy born in Air. This baby 007 has inspired my blogpost today and he has some important lessons for all of us ..

We are more resilient than what we think. The baby is premature and ideally the Mother would have wanted to give birth in a hospital surrounded by doctors and family, but both Mom and baby are fine. Life is resilient.

We overcomplicate rather than simplifying. A baby is happy with himself, adults worry about height, weight, colour, clothes, food, position, bank balance, nose, eyebrows, chin, lips, nail paint, photographs, eyesight, hearing, music, exercise, cooking, ordering …… Amazon, Bollywood, Hollywood, politics, religion, ideology, veganism, meat, relationships, Earth, Oceans, Sky, stars, planets, Elon Musk, Petrol, Diesel, EMI, Carbon footprint, …… Ice, heat, rains, philosophy, China, India, Japan, UN, Africa, hunger, obesity, pandemic, bacteria, virus, Nano technology, cars, planes, trains, beaches, plastic, aches, ailments …….. DEATH.

We want a particular croissant to be delivered fresh everyday, like Oprah Winfrey. Take bath in Mineral water like Amitabh Bachchan. We would like to have Mukesh Ambani’s bank balance and Milind Soman’s good looks.

Ohhh am tired. Just writing down all the things that we keep track of as an adult :):):). Then we wonder why we have aches and ailments as we age. It would be a surprise if we didn’t have them !

Read an earlier blogpost – Psychosomatic relief ! and be like Baby 007.