Can we talk?

Another Getting Older Sign

    I was thinking about handshakes, and how some people grab with both hands so that you can't make a smooth break and pull back. I thought about who might do that other than a politician traveling the circuit. Then I thought of relatives you haven't seen in decades, or barely knew, or just met for the first time. I realized such relatives are never young ones.

    It must be something about getting older. Some might start after 40, some after 50, and some even later, but we develop that longing for our roots.The really self-involved people never seem to care at any age. Most of us wern't that concerned when we were young, busy building careers and families and enjoying ourselves, though we might have humored our parents once in a while.

    At some point, it seems we begin to recall all the people we've known or heard about from Grandma. We start asking questions, and we show interest in people we didn't give a second thought twenty years ago. We begin to look forward to family reunions instead of dreading them. We stop someone in the mall and ask, "Are you Gloria's son?" or similar things; then we launch into how we know them, and how every body's been, the usual. And we walk away feeling like we won the lottery.

    Even all high school friends or college chums are like a sight for sore eyes. We might not have been close; we might not have liked each other. But suddenly we want to hold on and go back for a minute. I guess age mellows us. We have a different vision of life and relationships now. Ten years out of high school, I might have avoided, but now I give a recieve a cheerful greeting and sincere well wishes.

      Life is funny, isn't it?