I’ve never been one to fear growing older, but I can’t help but think about what being “50” meant to me when I was a kid. I recall a surprise party for my dad when he turned the Big 5-0, and it felt so momentous and distant to me—I will never be that old, I thought to myself.
Yet… here I am.
I have read that women—especially older women—are better suited to long-space travel than their male counterparts. Traditionally, astronauts are younger, testosterone-churning men, prone to butting heads and impatience. A more mature woman will work well with others to problem solve and has the patience for the roughly 500 days it would take to get to, say, Mars. And then... you need to come back.
Though space travel isn’t on my docket, I have written two novels in two years after the age of fifty—OVERGROWN and CIGARETTE GIRL—a feat the younger me would not have tolerated. I have lived a life, and I have stories to tell. Stories that only could be told through having lived fifty-plus years. Je ne regrette rien!