The oldest mom in the kindergarten

It’s kind of funny how we want to live forever, but nobody seems to want to be the oldest person in the room.

By JODY KASNER
GAN: AN unlikely sea of age-related agita for this writer. [Illustrative] (photo credit: YONATAN SINDEL/FLASH90)
GAN: AN unlikely sea of age-related agita for this writer. [Illustrative]
(photo credit: YONATAN SINDEL/FLASH90)
When I turned 30, I transferred all the anxiety I had about my weight to my age – and trust me, I had plenty!
I was suddenly noticing crow’s feet around my eyes, which didn’t exist, and thankfully the consultant at Ronit Raphael was honest enough to send me home assuring me I didn’t need Botox treatment at this stage. But I was only momentarily consoled, knowing there was now the potential for sagging jowls, or slack in general (if you know what that is) and of course my hands (!), so I added them all to my worry list.
Older people – like my mom – thought I was ridiculous. She was right in retrospect, and not just being nice to make me feel better, but I couldn’t see that then. Remember that adage from “The Sunscreen Song?” “You will not understand the power and beauty of your youth, until they’ve faded. But trust me, in 20 years, you’ll look back at photos of yourself and recall in a way you can’t grasp now how much possibility lay before you and how fabulous you really looked.” Couldn’t be more true.
But the fear, it turns out, is fair enough in a youth-obsessed world. And one in which we put a whole lot of stock in whole numbers. I was, after all, meant to get married in June at the age of 24 – like my cousin had when I attended her wedding at the age of seven – and now I’d already (long!) passed that date. So in my mind, I really was that old.
Then there are those lists of the most accomplished folks under 30, listing all their wonderful accolades achieved early in life. And now, clearly, I wasn’t going to be someone who achieved anything noteworthy early in life. It’s not that I’d particularly aspired to. But we all probably have some hidden hope that maybe, against all odds, we will do something meaningful and noteworthy, even inadvertently. But nope. ’Tis was not my fate. And so I celebrated 30 by mostly lamenting it, and asking everyone around me to flatter my ego and insist I didn’t look my age, which actually is the best age to look.
WHEN I did finally get married it was at the ripe old age of 37 – which now looks young to me, too. So if you’re younger than me, keep up with the theme (and also know, there is hope).
 
Getting married at 37 surprised me. I had been living alone in Israel since the age of 21. And if nothing else during that time, I had gone from regular-level drama queen to a full-blown one, and was in the process of cycling back. Mostly I was still out partying, going to spinning classes, making sure my nail polish was NEVER chipped and working to pay the bills. Like many women that age, and my underachieving class, I was wondering how I’d afford retirement, and started considering options like a one-room flat in Ofakim.
But lo and behold, Prince Charming came around, and I was married. The weird thing is, and I’m thinking many of my single friends can attest to this, I didn’t even particularly want to get married. I mean I said I did. And focused tons of energy on dating or meeting people or whatever you call that activity. And I was certainly embarrassed when people asked about my marital status – especially if they knew my age. Or when well-meaning families invited me to spend the holidays with them, God, did I feel old. So I was glad to be rid of that burden. Except, shame as we know, has no end. It just resurfaces in other realms.
Enter the oldest mom in the gan. If you live on New York City’s Upper West Side, for example, it is not all that “odd” to meet a mom in her late 30s or 40s. You can even say the same in certain neighborhoods of Jerusalem or Tel Aviv. But I happen to live in Holon, where on average I am at 10 years older than the standard mom, and that’s a generous calculation. In fact, I am mostly equidistant between the kid’s mom and their grandma’s age, in more than a handful of cases leaning more heavily towards savta.
“SO WHAT?” you might say. And you would be right. Except somehow that is also slightly embarrassing. I don’t know why. Maybe it attests to my previous failure to marry at an acceptable age. Or my own inherent ageism, which I should let go of, too. But for the most part, I don’t want the other moms to know how old I am, which can actually get quite awkward at times.
Once, years ago, I had a friend who didn’t tell anyone her age. I don’t know how she managed to get around it, but no one ever asked. Actually, now that I think about it, I have two friends like that. But when I tried that tactic with a friend, I can tell you, it backfired. That is, I was 34, and when I admitted to this friend I was trying to deceive, she said:, “Oh, I figured you were at least 40 if you were trying to cover your age.”
And as I write this, I think about the feedback I’ll get from acquiescing friends who can relate to those times, when I inevitably post this piece on my Facebook stream. But then I think about some of the gan moms who are my Facebook friends as well, and how this will inevitably blow my much-coveted cover. What do I think will happen? I don’t know.
One mom who I go to coffee with has made disparaging comments about older moms. And instead of calling her out, I just sit and nod, hoping I’m not discovered myself. But why? What on earth do I find embarrassing about that? I guess I kind of worry she won’t want to be my friend, or feel sorry for me, Lord knows why. But on the other hand, I’ve always had much older friends, and it never bothered me. Besides, I’m mostly not looking for friends. Gan, as my husband assures me when I get mired in the strange pettiness of its WhatsApp groups, will soon pass, and those moms will fade into the past with it. If anything, perhaps I should be judging them, for their youth and lack of life experience. But nope. Somehow here it is again, the fear of being old and somehow behind(?), and the awkwardness that accompanies it.
Of course, once you don’t tell the truth, you’re stuck trying to hide it, even if it’s something so utterly mundane. And the truth is, I don’t even know why I didn’t say it at the moment, because now I get trapped in conversations in which I need to cover up clues – like how, I kid you not, I deleted my birthday from Facebook, and not just my graduation date from LinkedIn. Can we say a collective “damn you” to social media for that?
Even if you succeeded, got married, had kids, a great job. It’s this never-ending fear that is supposed to subside as you age, because “they” say when you hit 40, you stop caring so much. But somehow, that isn’t entirely true. The only thing that happens when you turn 40 is you suddenly see how ridiculous you were at 30, when you thought you were old and over the hill. Now you really are on your very last legs of youth and beauty and all the power that entails. Yet you anticipate how you’ll look back at 50 and feel this same way, once again, regretting how you judged your younger self.
It’s kind of funny how we want to live forever, but nobody seems to want to be the oldest person in the room.
Which is why I’m telling you this today. Because I’m sure that just as most women are self-conscious about their weight, they are also secretly stressing about their age and the telling signs as we scan one another’s faces. Just like you might be worried if your jeans are too tight and the person you’re talking to can see your muffin top, they, too, are wondering if you notice the buckling of their blouse, actually more focused on her own blemishes than noticing yours. And similarly, as we reach a certain age and search for smile lines, crow’s feet or the Botox that covers them up, the woman you’re talking to is wondering if she should have dyed her roots.
But more importantly, as these things tend to unfold in life, I found that there are actually a handful of older moms in the gan after all. One is a few months older, another a month less. But I am not alone. In fact, it turns out once again, I am right on pace. And so I will find a new worry to waste my time with.
The author is a freelance writer living in Holon with her husband and two sons. Despite what is written, she thinks she looks pretty good for her age, whatever that may be, and is only marginally as vain as she may sound.


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