The Age of E (lasticity)

As I sat, in the foyer of Royal Prince Alfred Hospital, drinking a cappuccino and scoffing a large pink doughnut after having a small film crew exploring my nether regions looking for polyps, or the Labor Party environmental policy, I got to wondering about “Life”.

My current journey began ten years ago in the uncluttered fabulousness of one of those brilliant new restaurants that everyone wants to be at, a place too loud to make conversation pleasant. Six of us sat hunched on the backless hardwood chairs, jammed cheek by saggy jowl, into a room too darkly lit, trying to order food and more importantly wine, from a menu that might as well be written in Sanskrit. Everything on the menu seemed a blur, one dish melting into another. At first I blamed the lighting, then the ridiculously small font, then the colour of the ink against the papyrus. The waiter, a louche young man with impossibly high cheekbones, a child god, who I instantly recognised from the “my favourites” section of Gaydar, stood over me beaming a 'too white' Brittany Spears smile. All eyes were turned on me, feeling pressured I pointed at something I hoped was Chicken with Pasta. As the “vision” sashayed off to attend to a fusion table of AussieBum models and Arq barmen, my dearest friends turned and squealed, “Goat Lung with Witlof Salad!”

I needed specs - I sensed the beginning of a new chapter in my life.

It started with my eyes and moved rather quickly to my butt. What was once pert and high, with the round firmness of a ripe peach, has now taken on the texture and look of a golf ball that’s been around the sand traps once too often.

Herewith a very personal example of the indignity handed out to the aging.
To add insult to sagging injury I met a very attractive boy on line a year ago - perfect hair, perfect skin and a perfect - he was mighty fine - thirty minutes later he was knocking on my front door. Now, my pics; they may have been taken by Cecil Beaton using the Doris Day filter, but I think you still get the idea that this is who I once was and in the right blackout could be again. We raced upstairs to my loft, where he did something so unexpected that I’m still recovering from it; he pinched my arm and said in his angelic voice, “You lose so much elasticity at your age”. I looked down to see folds of skin hanging loosely, like a deflated party balloon, steadfastly refusing to snap back into place. Funnily enough, I think that was the last time I managed an erection - without the help of a little blue pill.

I now look longingly but I stress, not lustfully, at the perfectly unlined, lightly tanned nape of young men’s necks. At the gym I stare off into the distance as well toned, high butted Adonis’s, strut from bench press to bicep curl their eyes bright with enthusiasm for all that life has to offer.

I’m not bitter, resentful or just another “grumpy old queen”. I’m happy that, against all odds, I’m the age that I am. I’m a survivor in so many ways and I’ve absolutely no desire whatsoever to go back and do any of it again. But I do so miss “the age of elasticity”.