The Big One

A significant birthday has come around again and a new decade beckons.  While I discover that I have to wait another six years to obtain a much coveted bus pass, I will soon be able to procure a ‘senior’ railcard (at this point, I’m taking whichever perks are offered).

Apparently (according to online advice), I  should be celebrating this diamond jubilee with white roses, planting a tree and embracing the ‘golden years’. I don’t quite see it myself, but I have spent a few moments pondering the impending milestone and asking others how they reacted to reaching this birthday themselves.  I’ve actually found it considerably less intimidating than the big 4-0 was.

One quote I found told me that the age of sixty represents, ‘a reckoning with the truth of mortality.’ That sounds rather pompous to me but I continue to tell myself, ‘You’ll never be this young again.'

A birthday always provides a clear opportunity to pause and reflect and, in the context of writing, I’ve found that surprisingly pleasing not just in terms of articles and books published even in the last five-ten years, but in terms of honing a craft I’ve always enjoyed and for which time (now I am an empty-nester) is now significantly less pressured.

I’ve enjoyed seeing which news stories, film and songs were popular in the year of my birth but, perhaps more pertinently for writers across the board, a number of classic books were published in 1964 including: The Spy Who Came In From The Cold (John Le Carré), God’s Smuggler (Brother Andrew), and Roald Dahl’s Charlie And The Chocolate Factory.  Perhaps I should celebrate by reading them all again.

I’d be fascinated to know how any of you have celebrated a birthday with a zero at the end and whether you have felt a shift of seasons.  Perhaps I am being whimsical on that point.

I endeavoured to do a bit of a Bible study on the number sixty in the hope that I might gain some pearls of wisdom. Only two books of the Bible have sixty or more chapters.  Psalm 60 isn’t too fun, but Isaiah 60 begins with the words: Arise, shine, for your light has come and the glory of the Lord rises upon you. Now there’s a  great starting point, full of hope for a new decade and a diamond jubilee. I think I’ll stick there.

Happy Birthday to me (in another week), and here’s to many more years of writing for us all!

Jenny Sanders has spent the last eleven years living between the UK and South Africa. She writes faith-inspired non-fiction: Spiritual Feasting (2020) asks how we can ‘feast’ when life serves unpalatable menus; Polished Arrows is explores the allegory of God shaping us to be fired effectively into our culture and contexts.                 
Jenny also has two published collections of humorous short stories for Key Stage 2 children. She is available for author visits in primary schools, taking creative writing sessions.  She loves walking in nature, preferably by a river, and has a visceral loathing for offal, pineapple and incorrect use of car indicators on roundabouts.