In short, women in their 40s, 50s, 60s and beyond no longer associate themselves with a life of lawnmowers and Rotary Clubs, cheese and wine parties, elastic waists, river cruises and walking tours of Madeira. Even the term ‘middle aged’ is fast becoming obsolete.
That quote especially got under the skin of some of my friends. As several said, what the heck do they mean about a life of “lawnmowers and Rotary Clubs”? Whose world is that — certainly not the world of my mother. And some questioned what, exactly, is wrong with “cheese and wine parties, elastic waists, river cruises and walking tours of Madeira”? I could see the point. I don’t care how old you are: you own at least some leisure wear with an elastic waist (yoga pants? leggings?), right? And they’re comfy all as all hell, aren’t they?
But let’s get back to the perennials:
Everywhere we look, highly visible older women are rewriting all the rules. From JK Rowling to Nicole Kidman; Michelle Obama to Anna Wintour, they are at the peak of their power and creativity.
They are engaged, influential and often increasingly political.
There’s even a new term to describe people with this no-age mindset: ‘perennials’. It was coined by US internet entrepreneur Gina Pell, 49, who explains, ‘Perennials are ever-blooming, relevant people of all ages who know what’s happening in the world, stay current with technology and have friends of all ages. We get involved, stay curious, mentor others, and are passionate, compassionate, creative, confident, collaborative, global-minded risk takers.’
Despite this new-found confidence, however, of the women in this age-group who were surveyed, 48% said “they felt less confident in their appearance than they had a decade ago, citing pressure to stay young looking.
Some of my friends chimed in with comments about how they are happy to “look their age.” Sam has written before about not aging gracefully. It’s just another kind of pressure on women to conform. More of the same expectations to look a certain way if we are to remain acceptable.
Like the other day when I was traveling through Heathrow Airport, the thirty-something male customs agent looked at my passport and said, “You look very well for your age.” Literally. That’s exactly what he said. I think it was meant as a compliment.
Sam pointed out that willingness to “look our age” is a collective action problem. If we oppose the demands of normative femininity to keep looking young for as long as possible, we can shift expectations but only if enough women do it. Outliers who go it alone will face a social cost. But if a critical mass of women say “forget it! We’re aging and that’s okay!” then attitudes about what is acceptable will need eventually to shift. As quoted from this NY Times article:
“If [a] woman ignores the process of aging and eases more honestly into her inevitable wrinkles, belly fat and gray hair, she is liable to stand out as an anomaly within her personal and professional circles.”
After witnessing the discussion on my Facebook timeline, a friend sent me a link to Sarah Lesko’s article, “I Believe in Getting Older.”
Lesko says:
Well, I have a new grey stripe right over my forehead, and since I’m almost 50 I think I’m done dyeing my hair. And I love being in the sun (especially at track meets!)… I try to be responsible with sunscreen, but I know it ages my skin a lot. The idea of injecting neurotoxins into my face gives me the willies. And I feel like I’ve earned my wrinkles and saggy skin spots the old-fashioned way: with hard work and worry, lost sleep, excessive smiling and laughing, and carrying 3 babies in my body. Life. So, I look how I look.
The “I look how I look” refrain came loud and strong in response to the perennials article.
I felt torn. To me, the idea of women as “ageless perennials” has more to do with attitude, activity level, and self-perception. How we think about ourselves matters in the face of research that says that in lots of ways “aging” is a choice.” Sam blogged about that way back in the early days of Fit Is a Feminist Issue. I didn’t take offense when I first read it. At the same time, this type of attitude doesn’t set me and my mother apart. She still really active and has been an excellent role model for me in so many things, including how I want to enjoy my later years.
Tracy in Edinburgh last week, age 52 years and 10 months!
And yet I understand the “I look how I look” idea, while still feeling the pressure of wanting to look vibrant and, yes, “ageless,” for some time to come. While I don’t appreciate a random official thinking he has the right to comment on my appearance, even if it’s meant as a compliment (even a compliment of the dreaded “for your age” variety), I do still like hearing people say I don’t “look my age.” Superficial? Maybe. Not that I even know what it means to “look 52” or, for that matter, what it means to “feel 52?”
I am quite familiar with what it means to be 52, since that’s how old I’ve been since September 24th. Not a secret. Not a thing I lament, feel in any way bad about, or need to apologize for. And above all, not a thing I dwell on. If you ask me how old I am I won’t hesitate to tell you I’m 52 (almost 53).
It’s that no-age attitude that resonated with me in the perennials article, even if I have no clue what the Rotary Club is. And the “no-age” attitude isn’t so far off of the “embrace aging” attitude. Both “angles” on what it is to be a woman of a certain age shake off stale stereotypes about aging women.
What’s your attitude about aging in your own life?
The Castle in Edinburgh, as seen from Princes Park. Edinburgh wears its age well.
Tracy and James atop Calton Hill in Edinburgh on the EMF Running Tour.
I stumbled into the most wonderful new-to-me thing on my recent trip to Edinburgh: running tours! A running tour is a guided city tour but instaead of walking between sites of interest or sitting on a bus, you run. I was in Edinburgh for a workshop last week and I spent a lot of time sitting. I wanted to go for a run and as I was searching the internet for routes, I ended up finding the Edinburgh Marathon Festivals Running Tours.
The “souvenir kit” or what I would call a swag bag: orange vest, water bottle, key ring, poncho, t-shirt, and print.
For £27.50 you get quite a bit of EMF swag and a 90 minute tour with James, a personable and well-informed guide. He takes you through old and new Edinburgh at a comfortable pace. The website advertises 6-7 km, but of course it depends completely on the group. I was on a tour with James and a young couple from France. We covered 8.5 km in 90 minutes. There are lots of starts and stops, of course, because it is after all a tour. I learned quite a bit about Edinburgh and I got to go running. What a great combo.
My biggest fear was that it would be hard to keep up. I felt nervous when I saw the young couple because I assume their regular run pace is probably a tad faster than mine. James assured me that he paces to the slowest person in the group. If there are faster runners who want to skip up ahead, he gives them extra loops of things. Still, I didn’t want to be that person who slowed everyone down. But that wasn’t necessary on our tour.
It turns out that running tours are a thing. They have them all over the place. You can find out more about where there are tours at runningtours.net. No doubt they vary. A lot depends on the city and the guide. Edinburgh is an incredible city, steeped in interesting history and packed with sites. James is an experienced tour guide and a lot of fun to be around. So the EMF Running tours in Edinburgh are excellent.
At the end of the tour, with Arthur’s Seat in the background. Happy, with enough fuel left in the tank to go up to the top of Arthur’s Seat and then run-walk all the way back across town to my hotel in the Haymarket area.
I plan to do a lot more run tours now that I’ve discovered them.
Have you ever been on a run tour? If so, please tell us about it in the comments.
Isaac Newton, one of the main developers of modern classical physics and co-creator (along with Gottfried Wilhelm Leibniz, a philosopher) of the calculus, didn’t ride a bike. They didn’t have them then. But Newton did have many things to say about motion. Here’s one of them:
Newton really knew what he was talking about.
As science nerds like to say when they’re having some fun, inertia isn’t just a good idea; it’s the law. Yeah, yeah, I know that people say this about gravity instead of inertia, but it works here too.
After a long period of being a body at rest, I’ve overcome inertial forces and become a body in motion, in particular on two wheels on my bike, and two feet in yoga class (or one foot, or even no feet when I’m hanging out upside down, which is a lot of fun). And it feels good.
Last week I rode more than 100 miles (albeit not all at once, but still), which was more than I had ridden in I don’t know how long. Yay!
Then, last Monday I rode 38 miles with my friend Pata, and did not pay proper attention either to fueling or hydration. Bad me! As a result I started to feel a bonk coming on. Every cyclist has experienced this– sudden drop of energy, vision narrowing, oceans of emotion, and the irresistible need to stop RIGHT NOW for coca cola, a snickers bar, and some hostess cupcakes on the side. That is, you need an infusion of simple carbs. NOW. Not later. NOW.
Maybe this is what Newton meant by being acted upon by an unbalanced force. It certainly felt like a force, and I was definitely unbalanced.
I spied a pizza place and told Pata that we were stopping to get me a coke. Wordlessly she followed, then offered to get it herself, but I was already off the bike and striding at full speed into the restaurant. I got a nice, ice-filled large coca cola, and the person behind the counter told me I could get free refills. I obviously stopped at the right place.
It’s astounding, the transformation that happens after ingesting about 1/2 liter of coke in a short amount of time. We got back on the bikes and all of a sudden life was worth living again, and I felt a surge of energy. Pata, ever the experienced cyclist and good friend to me, made me ride more slowly the rest of the way back. Thanks, Pata!
However, after my great week of cycling, following by a great day of cycling, I succumbed to Newton’s third law:
I fell into a big slump from Tuesday to Friday. Partly I was under the weather (I have GERD, which means I have indigestion and acid reflux, for which I take meds). The GERD had flared up, which wasn’t fun. I was also low energy. That, combined with clouds and rainy weather off and on, kept me off the bike for 4 days.
Of course, now that I was lying around for several days, there was the problem of combating the inertia of my body at rest in order to get back on the bike. Luckily, I have a lot of very nice friends who like to ride bikes with me. Yay friends!
Jessica and I rode on Saturday. The weather was sunny and not too hot. I had packed plenty of energy food in my jersey pockets and had eaten before we left. We did a nice route through leafy green woodsy roads, dotted with very nice houses and the occasional horse farm. This route also had some oh-so-gentle hills.
This was where I encountered Newton’s second law:
It just so happens that my mass is greater than the mass of my cycling friend Jessica, who rode easily up those very gentle rollers. My mass is also greater than it was 3 years ago, and my force is less strong. So, I used all the force I had just to maintain net forward motion going uphill. I knew this would happen, but it’s still discouraging. According to Newton, my situation gives me two options: 1) reduce my mass; or 2) increase my force. For me, I think the best option right now is to keep riding and regain the strength and force that I need to get myself up and over hills. So I’m doing just that.
In two weeks, I’ll be taking on a big challenge: riding 110K for the PWA Friends for Life Bike Rally, with Sam and a bunch of her very nice cyclist friends. I don’t know how it will go. However, because of this upcoming ride I’ve overcome my body-at-rest inertia, increased my force to roll down the road, and bounced back when my reaction to a lot of riding was to do a lot of not-riding. All as Newton had in mind, if he had ridden bikes.
Sir Isaac Newton on a dirt bike, holding an apple (that’s all I could find).
As long as there is a wave of fat phobia and moral panic over body weight out there in the science journalism world, we will never be at a loss for something to write about here at Fit is a Feminist Issue.
Here’s the latest headline:
News headline: Just smelling food can make you fat, UC Berkeley study says
Is this true?
So what’s the deal here? Well…
The news article (found here) summarizes the study below:
…a sense of smell can influence the brain’s decision to burn fat or store it in the body — or a least the bodies of mice.
Researchers Andrew Dillin and Celine Riera studied three groups of mice — normal mice, “super-smellers” and ones without a sense of smell — and saw a direct correlation between their ability to smell and how much weight they gained from a high-fat, “Burger King diet,” Dillin said.
Each mouse ate the same amount of food, but those with a super sense of smell gained the most weight.
The normal mice ballooned, too — up to 100 percent from the weight they were when the research started.
But the mice who couldn’t smell anything gained only 10 percent of their weight. Obese mice who had their sense of smell wiped out slimmed down to the size of normal counterparts without a change in diet.
Riera said the study, which was published this month in the journal Cell Metabolism, reveals that outside influences such as smell can affect the brain’s functions related to appetite and metabolism.
Okay, that’s fairly interesting. Looking at the actual article, we see that what it is really about is:
[discovery of] a new bidirectional function for the olfactory system in controlling energy homeostasis in response to sensory and hormonal signals.
That is, Riera et al. found an intriguing new piece of the puzzle of how olfactory (sense of smell) functions interact with the hypothalamus in metabolism regulation.
But it ends with a bang:
the potential of modulating olfactory signals in the context of the metabolic syndrome or diabetes is attractive. The data presented here show that even relatively short-term loss of smell improves metabolic health and weight loss, despite the negative consequences of being on a [high-fat] diet.
Whoa. Hold on a minute. It sounds like they are suggesting that a plausible treatment for humans (that is, us) in service of weight loss would be to wipe out our sense of smell. Is that what they’re saying? Well, yeah.
Using the study’s methods in humans could be possible.
After eating, a person’s sense of smell decreases. So, if a person was eating with a lessened sense of smell, the brain could be tricked into thinking it’s already been fed and choose to burn the calories instead of store them, Riera said.
People struggling with obesity could have their sense of smell wiped out or temporarily reduced to help them control cravings and burn calories and fat faster.
But the article and researchers acknowledge that this “treatment” comes with risks.
Ya think?
Loss of sense of smell is common in chemotherapy, and occurs in a number of diseases and in the course of aging. This results not only in weight loss but also nutritional deficiencies and other health problems. In short, it’s not good.
And, it turns out, this is also true:
The mice in the study who lost their sense of smell also saw a significant increase in the hormone noradrenaline — a stress response from the nervous system that can lead to a heart attack if levels are too high.
So let me get this straight: loss (even temporary) of someone’s sense of smell is associated with adverse health outcomes, including increased risk of heart attack. And yet this is being considered for humans?
Yes, apparently:
“Maybe once a year you block your sense of smell for a while and then you lose the weight from the year and do it all over again,” Dillin said. “We don’t know yet. There’s a lot we still need to do.”
Yes, there’s a lot you need to do. Like read up on the literature on the adverse health and other effects of yo-yo weight changes. And while you’re at it, maybe read a medical ethics book too. And medical history.
My apologies for the snark, but this extreme approach to medical treatments for body weight change and maintenance is not new. Some of you may recall that in the 70s and 80s, jaw wiring was an approved medical treatment for weight loss.
A picture of a person’s mouth, open and showing upper and lower teeth on the side wired together with orthodontia.
This was not a fringe thing. Here’s an article in the prestigious medical journal The Lancet from 1977, studying the effects of jaw wiring in patients. They note that patients lost weight, although
Two-thirds of the patients, however, regained some weight after the wires were removed.
Of course they did– they were physically unable to eat solid food by the mechanical devices that clamped their jaws together. They were literally starved.
This form of treatment has fallen out of favor (thank goodness), but hasn’t disappeared completely. Here’s a current orthodontist website advertising this treatment, and encouraging other dental professionals to get on the jaw wiring bandwagon.
So, wrapping up: while it is interesting to learn new features of the complicated interactive metabolic processes of mice, and see to what extent those processes are also present in humans, we need to take a big long pause before considering any treatment applications, for a host of reasons, both medical and ethical.
The nose knows a lot; let’s keep smelling.
A picture of a person’s nose, smelling a slice of pink grapefruit.
“Packing for the Future: Instructions” by Lorna Crozier is one of my favourite poems. This is her reading it.
Tuesday night, I was frantically packing for a bike trip in the Baltics. Starting Sunday, I’m riding unsupported, alone, from Riga (the capital of Latvia) to Tallinn (the capital of Estonia). It’s an 8 day ride. I hired a bike from a bike touring company, who also helped me map a route and book accommodation in “the willages” along the way, which are apparently too busy in the summer to risk arriving at sunset without a place to stay. But otherwise, I’m on my own.
Take the thickest socks. Wherever you’re going you’ll have to walk.
I travel solo a lot, and I’ve done a fair bit of riding in Foreign Lands. But this is the first time I’m riding alone, unguided, in a country where English isn’t a strong possibility. I spent a day learning basic bike mechanics, and I did a bit of research, and bought new panniers and some tools, and I’ve been riding a fair bit, as well as spinning all winter. But once the obvious cycling things go into the bag, I get a bit paralysed. I’ll be gone for two and a half weeks, about half of it on the bike. But when I’m NOT on the bike, I’ll be in cities — Riga, Tallinn and St. Petersburg — and have to dress in something other than grimy lycra. And I have to carry it all on two wheels.
There may be water. There may be stones. There may be high places you cannot go without the hope socks bring you, the way they hold you to the earth.
Packing is pragmatic, and it’s about hope, and it’s a proxy for anxiety. I started making lists and tossing things onto the couch in my home office two weeks before I had to put it in the bags. It was all overlaid with a sensation that I was inevitably going to Get it Wrong. (Along with some anticipatory resentment from the cats, who slept on it for a week).
I used to have a Problem with bags. I would keep buying bags — purses, work bags, travel bags. They were never quite right. I think I believed that somewhere, a magic bag existed that would be the perfect container for me to take exactly what I needed, and nothing more.
Take a leather satchel, a velvet bag and an old tin box– a salamander painted on the lid.
This is to carry that small thing you cannot leave.
I finally realized that there was no way I was ever going to get it right. I pack the wrong shoes and end up riding 800 km in keens sandals. I underpack and end up wearing every layer I have. When I’m not in my bike gear, I want to be comfortable, but I also don’t want to dress like Harriet the Spy ALL the time. That means more than one pair of shoes. And maybe a lipstick.
That yearning for the the perfect bag, the perfect packing — it’s really about yearning for equanimity, for perfect flow. About wanting to feel perfectly content, at ease, at peace with what is.
In your bag leave room for sadness, leave room for another language.
When we’re riding, like most athletic pursuits, we can become completely submerged in getting the gear right. The lightest bike, the most effortless shifters, the perfect saddle, the devices that track and record every metric, the wickingest jerseys, the most balanced electrolytes. I do this as much as anyone. I tested three different pedals with my new shoes for this trip, bought two new jerseys and a raincoat (about the 13th one I own, but this one is Just Right), lamented that MEC stopped carrying my favourite shorts.
And yet.
And yet.
I’ve written many times about how seeing a place from the saddle of a bike is my favourite way to learn the pace local people move at, smell the coffee blooms and car exhaust, experience what the air feels like on your face. The space in my bag is for those long hours alone with what’s inside me, the joy and the regrets, the light touching of the yearnings I don’t voice, the effort/not-effort of rolling, the sensation of being in a place I’ve never been before and almost certainly will never be again. To roll through it, simultaneously shaped by what’s happening around me and at ease with whatever unfolds.
Take the dream you’ve been having since you were a child, the one with open fields and the wind sounding.
Really, very little that’s in my bag truly matters. If my bike computer stops working, if I lose my phone, if I don’t have warm enough layers, I will either be just fine without them or I will buy new ones. If I’m lost, I will ask for directions to Ainaži or Tostamaa. People will point. I will get lost. I will get somewhere.
Mistrust no one who offers you water from a well, a songbird’s feather, something that’s been mended twice. Always travel lighter than the heart.
**
Fieldpoppy is Cate Creede, who writes for this blog on the second Friday of every month. When not roaming the world, she lives in Toronto.
I didn’t run far but for me this is a milestone nonetheless. It’s not that I have been entirely inactive. Although I broke my foot (a stress fracture) a year and a half ago, and it did take most of a year to heal, since the break occurred while I was running I figured that even if it healed I wouldn’t run again.
Running hadn’t been my main form of exercise for about 5 years and so I felt I could deal with that. I do CrossFit (see my earlier post on this), bike, and hike and so I thought I could let running go. I mean, I’m 66 and so I figured that there are some things that maybe I have to admit I can’t do any more. But apparently running isn’t one of them (yet).
This is what that means to me.
First, I can still come all the way back from a pretty distressing injury even if not that serious injury. I was in a boot and on crutches for 6 weeks but struggling long after that. Resilience is a good thing and so that’s reassuring.
Second, I discovered that even when injured it is worth continuing to exercise. The trainer I work with (the wonderful Brandy) figured I could still row even with my foot is a clumsy hard boot (the stationary bike and running were clearly out – oh, and no burpies either). I am grateful that she was inventive. I put the booted foot on a skateboard and rowed away. Third, feeling strong is a good way to feel – and I am not saying this just because I saw Wonder Woman yesterday.
Finally, I learned that I shouldn’t prejudge what I can and cannot do based on some idea about how old I am. Yes, I’m getting up there but it isn’t clear what that means about my capabilities and I am finding that it means different things for different people. Finding where you are in that spectrum of experiences is a process and not some pre-determined or static fact. What the limits are is something to be discovered – not told by yourself or others.
I’ve made a note to myself to watch out for mental shadows that prematurely limit my willingness to experiment. I was out riding for the first time in over a month this past weekend and I felt a little shaky. The thought crossed my mind that maybe I shouldn’t be out there giving that I was so old!
I told a friend on the phone and she said, “I know! The paper would say elderly women killed while cycling. How awful!” I laughed even though I was less worried about what the report would say after the fact then the possibility of it becoming a reality (one difference in our personalities). This is not to say that one shouldn’t be careful. I am a very careful cyclist but I am careful precisely because I want to be riding for as long as possible. And while even careful people have accidents and get injured it is not only those over 60 that have that worry.
I may not be running a lot, but that’s okay. At least I know I can run again. Watch out! Elderly runner/biker/hiker coming through!
Picture of three “sheep ladies” hiking from a shop in Sardinia.
Sharon Crasnow is a retired philosophy professor who writes on feminist philosophy of science and lives in San Diego.
Travelling this summer in Europe (Spain actually) I was shocked at the preponderance of bottled water. Plastic bottled water everywhere. I carried a water flask. But that didn’t help at restaurants and it was hard to find places to refill it. By the time I was home I’d had enough.
A memo water bottle, flat shaped, fits nicely in my briefcase
When I got home friends were sharing the campaign for a plastic free July. See here. “Joining the challenge is quite simple…chooseto refuse single-use plastic during July. Plastic Free July aims to raise awareness of the problems with single-use disposable plastic and challenges people to do something about it. You’ll be joining a million+ people world-wide from 130 countries in making a difference.”
“A million plastic bottles are bought around the world every minute and the number will jump another 20% by 2021, creating an environmental crisis some campaigners predict will be as serious as climate change. New figures obtained by the Guardian reveal the surge in usage of plastic bottles, more than half a trillion of which will be sold annually by the end of the decade.”
It’s not that I think individuals taking action is the answer but paying attention to my own actions connects me to the larger cause and keeps the environment in my focus. I also feel less helpless.
I decided to make single use plastic take a way items my focus. No more water bottles, plastic cutlery, and plastic cold beverage containers. I’d already bought washable cutlery and cold beverage washable tumblers and considered myself ready to go. My summer purse (or “hippie side bag” as the kids call it) is starting to feel like a giant picnic hamper around my neck but I am managing.
Straws are an issue and people keep handing them to me. Some people have made the elimination of plastic straws their focus. Sarah bought us each a reusable one and we’ve been carrying them with us. At least they don’t add much weight to the hippie side bag.
So far I’ve faced two challenges, one fitness related and one not.
The non-fitness challenge is ice cream. It’s vaguely calorie and food related. I don’t like ice cream cones and years ago I decided they were empty needless calories. Also, when ice cream is in cones I tend to eat it too quickly because I hate drips. But now I have the plastic cups and spoons to deal with so, for July at least, it’s back to cones. (I’ve been feeding them to my dog.)
The fitness challenge is food and drink during bike rides. I’m not about to start filling my jersey pockets with reusable cutlery and cups. Twice now I’ve landed at a bakery after a long ride and had to use plastic cups. I wasn’t about to not drink iced coffee. After I thought about it having it put in my cycling water bottle but that’s not a good solution either. I wish places used non-plastic cups. It’s not like we were taking the coffee to go.
Here’s our bikes at rest at the Black Walnut Bakery, a favourite place to stop after rides. Here’s hoping they start offering cold beverages in glasses.
