The Relief of Becoming Invisible

Why getting old feels liberating

From a young age, my appearance was a topic of conversation.

“Oh, you’ll make the boys swarm,” my mother began to say when I was eight years old. It was confusing and unwelcomed. I didn’t know why I’d want the boys to swarm. Plus, I was more interested on what was on the inside of my experience than the outside of my body.

I was happiest when I was writing poetry or drawing sketches in my diary. The books of Shel Silverstein were typically within my reach.

However, something changed as I approached my teens. Maybe it was the messages from my family, the magazines I read, or the friends I kept. Like a light switch, I started caring more about what was on my outsides than on my insides.

Looking for external attention

Like so many young women, I fell for the time-wasting activity of trying to reduce my body size — getting smaller so I could feel bigger. I exercised frequently and ate partial salads at lunch and maybe an apple for dinner.

Through my efforts, I got the attention I was seeking. My outsides looked great, but my insides felt hollow and abandoned. Gone were the days of writing and sketching and in were the days of pushing myself to meet an impossible, external ideal that always seemed just out of grasp.

I began to turn a corner when I lived in Chile on a Rotary Scholarship in my late twenties. Whenever I would pass by a construction site, you could hear the heavy clanking of metal as the workers dropped their tools and equipment to whistle and cat call, “Oye, oye!” (“Hey, hey!”).

Machismo was my teacher

It wasn’t just me for whom they’d halt their workday. You could hear the ritual being repeated whenever a young woman passed — the echoes of their yells stretching for blocks. This cat calling was indiscriminate and constant. It happened so frequently that it seemed impossible that they were getting any work done. Needless to say, the city of Santiago always seemed under construction.

Perhaps some women liked it. For me, it felt more like an attack than a compliment. The inability to walk through the streets peacefully was jolting, to say the least.

As I explored the nature of my irritation, I realized that the root cause was my own tendency to treat myself as an object. I was subtly disregarding the importance of what I thought, felt, or desired to express.

This awareness woke me from my slumber. Like Sleeping Beauty’s kiss from the prince, the machismo jostled me awake. I knew that I needed to find my younger, creative self — to reconnect with my insides and focus less on my outsides.

The journey toward self

In my efforts to reconnect with my creative spirit, I purchased a journal and began writing and drawing. My reading choices moved toward spiritual books and topics. It was like an adult learning to roller skate, a slow, steady, cautious movement back toward myself.

It felt good to be reconnecting with the aspects of the young, inquisitive girl that I had forgotten about so long ago.

As I reconnected with my insides, aging took its toll on my outsides. Losing my looks, for me, was like a sudden jolt — a lightning strike. One morning I woke up startled and turned to my husband and said, “I’ve lost my looks.”

I knew instinctively that something had, indeed, changed.

Sure, perhaps there was a bit of sadness that I was in an older, less attractive body (at least by societal standards). However, I mostly felt relief. Ironically, as I grew droopier and wrinklier, I began to care less what other people thought.

Why I’m okay with getting older

Recently I went on a trip with girlfriends, and someone asked, “Who’s had ‘work done’?” She meant plastic surgery and I was surprised to learn that more than half of us “had gone under the knife”.

Although my friends looked great and they enjoyed their “youth-creating” enhancements, I don’t anticipate I’ll ever partake. The truth is, although I’m not in love with all my wrinkles (sometimes my image on Zoom surprises me), they’re a part of me, and I don’t want to erase my age.

For me, it’s okay that no one drops their hammer anymore when I pass, or that people are less inclined to open a door when I approach. I’m glad to be passed that stage of life. I’ve found that the less I focus on my outsides, the more vibrant my insides become. It’s where the richness lies.

Why I welcome my increased invisibility.

I’m now used to being the wrinkled one who needs reading glasses to type or see a text on my phone (I have another story about that topic).

At times, I’ve forgotten my shopping list or where I’ve parked my car. Most likely I’m someone you wouldn’t notice sitting in a coffee shop or walking down on a street.

Yes, I’ve become more invisible.

However, I’m happy to be older and focused on the ideas in my brain instead of the firmness of my buttocks. The more invisible I seem to become on the outside, the more vibrant I seem to grow on the inside.

Now, the only thing I want to swarm are my creative urges. They are ready to unleash.

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