Senioritis

I feel like I owe it to the elderly of Italy to give them a shoutout. For a country that so values physical appearance, "La Bella Figura," it is more than marginally shocking that people age the way they do here. It's as though all of a sudden they reach a threshold, say at 60 or so, and all of their prior careful primping and coiffing and meticulously chosen wardrobes go flying out the window. To put it bluntly, the old people here look, well, OLD. It's like they wake up one morning and acknowledge the passing of time, and resign themselves to spending their twilight years in a world of shapeless, blandly colored outfits and orthopedic shoes. My mother has always believed that age is nothing but a state of mind, and that you are only as old as you feel, and I agree with her. I don't think I would be alone in giving a nod to my parents, who are in their 60s and could run circles around most people in their 50s, and probably some in their 40s (and me, in my 20s, but that's another tale). What, then, has caused the decline of Italy's elderly? Should this even be worth mentioning? Or are Americans conditioned to fear old age? Popular celebrity culture, most rampantly prevalent in the United States, has essentially made aging a cultural faux pas. Botox, collagen injections, and face creams made from placenta are all footsoldiers in the army against Mother Nature. And maybe that's not right, either. There is certainly something to be said for aging gracefully, but what about the sunset of life screams, "MY OUTFITS MUST BE DRAB AND MY SHOES PRACTICAL?" Granted, I understand the need for the shoes, but the kind favored by the Italian grannies is the kind that gives people cankles. For those who don't know, a cankle occurs when there is no distinction between the calf and the ankle- they are one and the same. And orthopedic shoes cause cankles. Alright, there are a few resilient members of the Golden Girls set who simply refuse to don the uniform of seniority, and instead still flaunt their "Golden Girls" in tight sweater sets and short skirts with fishnet stockings, as though they were teenagers on their way to the sock hop. But that's not graceful either. I guess you just have to know when to say when, but I sincerely hope that when I get to the magic age of dressing 'old,' that I have the strength and courage of conviction to throw on a pair of jeans now and again.