THE NUMBER 60 is a good number.  Turning sixty wasn’t so bad.  In fact, any birthday isn’t  devastating, considering the alternative.  Turning sixty isn’t so bad if you have a good friend who was born on the exact same day, same year.  I do have such a friend.  Her name is Jenny.   I remember exactly where we were on that magical evening.  We and our husbands were in Edinburgh, Scotland enjoying the view from the Tower restaurant.  From our table we could see Edinburgh Castle lit up.  It was straight out of a fairy tale book.  All in all, looking back, I guess I’d have to say that my sixties have indeed been good years.  You see, Jenny and I share more than just our age and our friendship.  We have become family.   My son Josh married her daughter Taylor.  They have blessed us with two of the most precious, beautiful grandchildren in the world: Jackson and Avery.

This year we will blaze out of the sixties and enter our seventies.  If you hear a loud boom, it may be Jenny and I as we break the sound barrier.  Life is not slowing down.  We have our bucket lists in hand and are checking off our goals.  As soon as we check one off, we add another one to the bottom of the list.  If we keep it going, then perhaps so will Jenny and I.  We hope to sail on by age ninety-five maybe even a hundred while planning our next adventure.  We’re not old.  My mother always told me that “you are as old as you feel.”  So, with that thought in mind, I wake up each day as a twenty-five year old. That is, until I look in the mirror.  Then I say to the mirror, “Now, just who are you?”

Each morning, I read my devotional, say a prayer of thanks for all my blessings and ask God to bestow His mercy and love on those who are in need of healing or who are lonely or who are lost.  Only then do I turn on my computer to read the blogs my husband Caleb posts on our website calebandlindapirtle.com.

Today, I read an article by Nikhil Sonnad entitled “Mark Zuckerberg is 30. Facebook’s users are aging, too.”  While Facebook was originally developed for young people who wanted to adopt a new technology, the article goes on to say that currently it is the “only social network on which the percentage of users over 65 broke double-digits.”  Last year, according to the Quartz survey mentioned by Sonnad, 45% of respondents over 65 said they used Facebook while the percentage for young people barely moved.

This article made me proud of my generation.  Born at the end of World War II, we have lived through the Korean War, the Vietnam War, the Iraqi War, and now the war in Afghanistan.  We remember the sadness we felt after the Kennedy assassination and the fall of the Twin Towers.  We witnessed the launch of the first manned spaceship and man’s first walk on the moon.

We have mastered the use of technology in our everyday lives.   We have curious minds always trying to learn something new.  We have energy for dancing and sports and playing with grandchildren.  We own enough new hips, knees, and screws and pins holding us together to prove it.  We are indeed the bionic generation.

So, I look forward to my seventies, anxiously searching for new wonders, new adventures.  By the way, Jenny and I haven’t decided exactly where on this orb we will celebrate our seventieth birthday.  But a word to the wise:  listen for that boom.  And when you hear it, know that Jenny and I are at our best.

Please click the book cover to read more about Linda Pirtle’s cozy mystery, The Mah Jongg Murders.