Birthdays and Smile Wrinkles

Let us never know what old age is. Let us know the happiness time brings, not count the years. ~Ausonius

I just had a birthday. They have a way of coming around faster than they used to. When I was waiting to finally be a teenager, the year seemed to go on and on. I’m long past the teenager years. Going quickly to ancient years in the eyes of teenagers, for sure.

  “A young boy called his grandmother to wish her Happy Birthday. He asked her how old she was and when she told him ‘67,’ he was quiet for a long moment before he asked, ‘Did you start at 1?’”

We all do start at one, but then we are fortunate to keep adding more numbers on.

Of course, I know how old I am. Well, I know when I was born. I don’t like doing the math, so I usually just ballpark it. (Unknown source)

It would be easier to remember your age if you didn’t change it every year. (Anonymous)

Yesterday I was gifted with another chance to take a trip around the sun.

A birthday is just the first day of another 365-day journey around the sun. Enjoy the trip! (Author Unknown)

The picture is me with my sister when I was too little to even think about my age. I’m not sure how old I might have been in the picture. Maybe two. But I feel certain I wasn’t a bit concerned with counting my years.

Counted or not, years do pile up and increase that age number if you are fortunate enough to keep having them. The best thing to do is enjoy the trip and keep smiling about getting older. If there is one kind of wrinkles you want to have as you add on the years, it’s smile wrinkles.

Wrinkles should merely indicate where smiles have been. – Mark Twain

Here are some more quotes about getting older that I’ve collected through the years. Some of them might increase your smile wrinkles.

~Old age is always 15 years older than I am. – Oliver Wendell Holmes

~Don’t let aging get you down. It’s too hard to get back up. – J Wagner

~Birthdays are good for you. Statistics show that the people who have the most live the longest. –Larry Lorenzoni

~Those who love deeply never grow old; they may die of old age, but they die young. – Dorothy Canfield Fisher

~When I was younger, I could remember anything, whether it had happened or not; but my faculties are decaying now and soon I shall be so I cannot remember any but the things that never happened. It is sad to go to pieces like this but we all have to do it. ~Mark Twain

~Life should not be a journey to the grave with the intention of arriving safely in a pretty and well preserved body, but rather to skid in broadside in a cloud of smoke, thoroughly used up, totally worn out, and loudly proclaiming “Wow! What a Ride!” – Hunter S. Thompson

We all want to run our courses with energy and with joy. I think the Lord is all for that too as we run down the roads He points us toward and slide through the doors of opportunity He opens for us. Rejoice is a word you see often in the Bible.

So it’s fun to rejoice in a birthday and the blessing of a new year to count. Here’s one last quote that seems to sum up the best way to think about your age.

~The other day a man asked me what I thought was the best time of life. “Why,” I answered without a thought, “now.” (David Grayson)

How do you feel about birthdays? Do you enjoy yours as much as you do those of your family or friends?

(In case you’re wondering about the picture not exactly looking like an old picture normally looks –fuzzy and not very clear — I sharpened this one with a photo editing program.)