However, on the Spanish Costas there are various seaside resorts where, especially during winter months, you might wonder whether you have ended up in an open-air home for the elderly, with plenty of greys strolling along the boulevard or enjoying a coffee or a drink on one of the many pavement cafes. Their brown and sometimes weathered skin being a give-away of their lifestyles, but larded with an overdose of sunshine it all looks rather jolly.
And God is kind when we get older as we start seeing each other in a lovely haze where wrinkles and age spots are non-existent, living in a bit of a blur until the glasses come out to read the menu. Those glasses that suddenly appear in our lives.
So we are living in Spain, and getting older and we all have a story to tell. Me too. I used to have excellent eyesight and I could easily read the small prints on products in supermarkets, but then I started postponing the inevitable till my arms were no longer long enough to hold whatever I was trying to read. Nowadays it is a constant struggle of finding my reading glasses and swapping them for my long-distance glasses so I don’t trip over a lost trolley in the middle of the isle. The realisation that I had been using my husband’s shaving cream instead of fixation foam when styling my hair every morning for quite a few weeks, thinking it was the fixation foam lying next to it in the draw of the bathroom cupboard, made me realise that my eyesight had gone down rapidly… OK still being half a sleep didn’t help. On the bright side, the shaving foam worked equally well.
There is, however, another really positive side about growing older in Spain. There seems to be no age discrimination. I can only speak from my own experience in Holland where, in my hometown of Arnhem, age discrimination does happen, in the sense that the old and the young hardly mix for pleasure. In the town centre there is an area with lots of bars and pubs but every place seems to have its own age group. I remember being in my late forties, feeling like a near-death-experience - as in incredibly old - when I walked into a pub and found myself surrounded by only minus-twenty year olds, giving me the distinct feeling that I did not belong there.
I have never felt like that in Spain and during the recent launch of my La Herradura book this became pleasantly clear to me once again. There was such a nice mix, in the La Cochera music café, of people over sixties, even over seventies, below twenty year olds and every age in between. Everybody happy to accept each other, mingling in conversation, in laughter, dancing and enjoying the live music. It was a great reminder of how much I love growing old(er) in Spain. And let’s be honest, considering the only alternative, the good thing about growing old is growing old.
‘Reflections from La Herradura’, my latest book is a compilation of stories told by people from a great range of ages, all living in Spain or coming over for a large part of the year. You can still get your signed copy for the discount price of 15€ instead of 19.50€ till the end of April. (This is excluding shipment) All you have to do is send me an email via renate@renatevannijen.com The book is available both in Spanish and in English.
For more information about my art or my books feel free to visit my website: www.renatevannijen.com
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