I’m Okay About My Neck (with Apologies to Nora Ephron)

What I Tell Myself in Front of the Mirror to Combat the Culture of Beauty and Eternal Youth

Ifind it both amazing and embarrassing to say I am okay with my neck. But it’s pretty much true. At least, I’m working on it.

No, that’s not me in the picture. My neck looks much worse, so I’m not taking a selfie to show it off. If you’re a woman, you know what I mean.

Worse is the word most of us use when comparing our own more weathered necks to those less ravaged by age and the elements. And who can blame us?

It’s almost impossible not to worry. How can the average Jane feel good about herself when female models are put out to pasture in their twenties — long before their necks start to “go.” (That happens at 43, according to the late Nora Ephron who heard it from her dermatologist.)

Nora published her book about the vicissitudes of aging in 2006. She was 65. No surprise that I’d always identified with her previous essays and books — I’m a New Yorker, roughly the same age, divorced, and a journalist. But, sister, I Feel Bad About My Neck really hit home.

“We all look good for our age,” Nora wrote of her privileged circle of sixtysomethings. “Except for our necks.”

Oh the necks. There are chicken necks…turkey gobbler necks…elephant necks…necks with wattles and necks with creases that are on the verge of becoming wattles. There are scrawny…fat…loose…banded…wrinkled...stringy…saggy…flabby…mottled necks…necks that are an amazing combination of all of the above.

Nora Ephron would be 81 today. I wonder what she’d say about her neck now when so many of us are aging fiercely and, at times, militantly. We are proud and stylish older women, some loving naturally grey hair, others not embarrassed to be dyeing theirs a color that goes better with their complexion. (I, for one, look washed-out in grey.)

Would Nora now think twice before writing that she and her friends “look young for their age”? Would she be a fan of anti-ageism activist Ashton Applewhite who exhorts us to not mention age at all?

Would Nora, receiving such a compliment herself, do the politically-correct thing: not smile demurely, not bat her eyelashes at the flattery, not say “thank you.” (Applewhite suggests instead: “You look great, too.”)

Shame on me, but I loved it last week when the security guy at Newark Airport asked me to remove my shoes — a requirement only for passengers under 75.

“I’m 78,” I said proudly, reminding myself of my movie-star-beautiful mother who often started conversations by telling her age. I hated that as a kid, but now…well, I have to admit: I enjoyed the look of surprise on that guy’s face.

And yet… Even as I am told repeatedly that I “look young” — whatever that means — even with a battalion of “grey crones” strutting their stuff on Pinterest and Instagram, there’s still the problem of video chats. Last winter, giving a speech in Brazil via Zoom, rather than stare at my own neck for 20 minutes, I wore a scarf to cover what my partner affectionately calls my “guzzler.”

It is a constant and uphill battle to be okay with my neck — a push-me/pull-you with reality. As I’ve written before, wrinkles can be beautiful…if divorced from their cultural meaning or if sported by a man (think Robert Redford). Or, if you work at it.

I sometimes stare at the morphing landscape of my neck and travel upward to my face. I take in the now familiar lines on my upper lip, the assorted and unwelcome blemishes. This is what you look like now.

Then I see something new. Oh, wait, where did that red dot come from? Did it happen on the airplane? Is it dangerous as well as unsightly?

If I’m in a good place — confident, grateful that I’m healthy and, wherever I go, surrounded by good people — my inner sage steps in to interrupt.

Stop! she cries out. You can’t do anything about what’s happening to your neck — or any part of you for that matter. You’re almost 79. Did you really expect to look 30 your whole life? Your neck simply looks different.

Sometimes, I can distance myself and look at my neck through the lens of an artist. I marvel at its architecture. It’s not ugly; it’s interesting. The middle is like an upside-down ski jump, flanked by folds of sagging skin that weren’t there when I danced at Studio 54. And all those ridges — different sizes and widths. It’s a wonder.

Sure, I buy creams and tinctures to moisturize. Other than tanning (less intensely now), I take care of my skin. On my last visit to the dermatologist, I fretted about a tiny wart-like protrusion on my jawline.

“Oh, that?” she said, cheerily explaining, “It’s just age.”

Thanks for that. I asked her to remove it.

But for all the care, I’m under no illusion: Nothing stops the clock.

So, Nora Ephron, I’m okay with my neck. Maybe not 24/7, but most of the time. Let’s face it: it’s the only neck I have.

Some might stare at my neck. Perhaps they will think it’s interesting, too.

Some might say or think I look old because of my neck. To them I say, I am! In no universe is almost-79 young.

But that’s the good news…. As long as my neck is “upright and breathing” — as my friend Marge used to say whenever I asked how she was — I am, too. I’m still here. And if my neck “says” anything about me, it’s that I’ve lived.

Marge, who died a few months past her 104th birthday, often remarked:

I’m amazed at all those people who want to stay young forever. Don’t they realize that they only way to do that is to die young?”

Every time Marge visited the aptly named Dr. Smiles for her quarterly physical, she assured him, “Don’t worry. It’s too late for me to die young.”

If I’m as lucky as Marge, I’ll have another 25 years to become even more okay about my neck!

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