I’m not big on “how-to” books. I find that most are nothing but stories
about how individuals managed to do whatever the book is about how to do. Authors interview a bunch of people, and write a book that is a
compilation of their stories. Period.

However, I am always up for self-improvement. This week, in my latest foray into how-to, I read (OK, I only skimmed) a
book by Sonja Lyubomirsky, a professor at U.C. Riverside, called “The How of
Happiness,” and I
think I actually learned a thing or two. For example, there are some scientific
studies that back the author’s finding that the same circumstances can affect people’s
happiness level very differently.

Take my friend Christa, for example. She is upbeat about 99% of the time. She’s
upset like the rest of us when something bad happens, but she gets back to her
happy self in record time. Whereas, when
something is bothering me, it’s always been hard for me to let it go. When I was a teenager moping around the house, my mother was likely to encourage
me to get over it, proclaiming “Nobody loves a sourpuss!” Easy for her to say.

So here’s the lesson I took from the book. We are born with a pre-set level of happiness.
It’s in our genes. That accounts for
about 50% of our happiness response. Another 10% is based on our circumstances, meaning that some of us are just plain
luckier than others. But the final 40%
is in our hands and the author offers many strategies to make
that a happier 40%. My favorite two are “make
gratitude lists regularly”, and “don’t ruminate”. The former is easier for me than the latter.

My friend Christa probably doesn’t need this book. As for me, although I’m usually happy,
there’s always room for improvement.

Today is my husband Peter’s birthday. This is not a birthday that is divisible by five or ten. Yet it seems to be very important, and I am asking myself why. At 78, he is still handsome and smart and my best friend and more.

I think this birthday is important because in spite of his good health and our good luck, we only have so many years left together, and we are both becoming more aware of that. When I married an “older” man (although only by eight years), I never considered that eventually, our age difference might become important. And even if I had considered that, I would have reminded myself that I would be grateful for any years that we might have together.

Or maybe it has something to do with my being 70 now. Because even though Peter thinks I am beautiful, smart and his best friend, I’m not the woman I used to be. However, in some ways, I think I’m better. And in some ways, together we are better than ever.

So happy birthday Honey, and here’s to many more.

Several bars from Haydn’s 88^th Symphony are engraved on the inside of my wedding band. There’s no “to my darling on our wedding day,” no set of our initials, no date of our marriage. Just the first several bars of the last movement of Haydn’s 88^th symphony.

When we were dating, Peter had found it amusing that I learned to identify pieces of music for exams in music classes by putting words to the tunes. “Eat pretzels, drink beer cause Haydn is here” comes to mind as does “Mozart’s in the closet—let him out, let him out, let him out”.

So when we were contemplating getting engaged, (actually I was contemplating it more than he was) we put some words to the theme of the last movement of Haydn’s 88^th symphony. “I am going to Mr. Gusil’s, I am going to Mr. Gusil’s,” Mr. Gusil being a jewelry designer whose shop we frequently passed and who I hoped would be the supplier of an engagement ring, sooner or later.

We did, of course, get engaged and the engagement ring which was a complete surprise came from Mr. Gusil’s. But it was only on our wedding day that I found out about the engraved music inside the wedding ring.

Last night, almost 40 years later, we attended a concert of the Handel and Haydn Society. The program included Haydn’s 88^th Symphony. I don’t think we had ever heard it live before. When the theme of the fourth movement filled the hall, I grabbed Peter’s hand, and my eyes filled with tears.

They were playing our song.

In 1989, my friend Valerie and her family moved away after 13 years as our across-the-street-neighbor. I was on vacation on the day they left, so I didn’t have to watch their departure. I do remember their arrival on our street, with their tiny infant twins fitting into a baby carriage normally meant for one, and the twins’ older sister, about four, with a ton of bouncy blonde curls. Who knew then that 19 years after they moved away, Valerie and I would still be talking on the phone every Sunday at 10:00 a.m.?

Val and I spent a lot of time together during those 13 years. We exercised in her basement twice a week to a Jane Fonda tape. Husbands and children swore we exercised only our mouths, but that wasn’t true, although I did learn whom our son was taking to a prom during a Jane Fonda session long before he told me. We always had dessert at Val’s at Christmas. At one Christmas, we decided that since they had only girls and we had only boys, we should exchange a child for a week. (I think this stemmed from a conversation about which father was funnier.) I loved having another female in the house, and they welcomed our son as one of theirs.

Just last week, we learned that the bouncy-curls daughter may be joining the faculty of a college near one of our children. And might even live in his town. I don’t know who was more excited, the children or the parents, as we envisioned another generation of neighbors.

Val and I plan to visit a spa together on the 20^th anniversary of our Sunday morning phone calls. By then we would have talked on Sunday 1,040 times, give or take a few. Is that a record, or what?

Forty years ago today, on a chairlift in
Cortina, Italy, I asked my husband to marry me, and he said “no”. Back then, February 29th was the only day women
were “permitted” to ask men to dance (or marry). But then women didn’t go skiing in Europe
with their boyfriends either. I remember finding a letter addressed to me from my mother on the hall
table in the chalet where we stayed. She
would not have been happy to hear that I was registered with my "married" name. Of course the owner had no idea that I was
the intended recipient of the letter since there was no one with my name staying there.

Peter didn’t actually say “no” that day. He said, “When it’s time to ask, I’ll do the
asking.” Since we were high on a chair
lift in Italy, I couldn’t exactly get up and storm out of the
relationship. Which was lucky because
four months later he did ask, and forty years later, I can say it was worth
waiting.

I thought of my father when I woke up this
morning.

Dad
was a mystery in many ways. I have a
picture of him before I was born, probably taken in the early 1930’s. There he is, the epitome of debonair in his knickers, leaning
against his Hupmobile, his
Lucky Strike cigarette in his very long cigarette holder clenched between his
teeth. Mother always said he was a
ladies’ man, but I’m not exactly sure what she meant.

Dad
left home to earn his living at age thirteen. His resume is very, shall we say, eclectic? There were tales of his starting the first
indoor miniature golf course (a disaster) and many other undertakings before he settled down on a path
that led him to be a successful state-wide manager of a life insurance
company. As a salesman early in his insurance career, he was on the road a lot, but my
mother could always open the front door at 5:00p.m. on Fridays, and he would be pulling into
the driveway. If it was the right
season, she would have the pot boiling on the stove for the fresh corn he would
have bought from a farm stand on his route home.

Dad
never got used to retirement. He had
only known work—no golf, no hobbies—and I think that may have contributed to
his much-too-early-into retirement death. 

Even
before his terminal cancer struck though, I remember him frequently remarking,
“I ache all over.”

This
morning when I woke up, I ached all over, and thought of my father whom I still
miss very much.

I hadn’t talked about my age much, except
maybe among friends and family. But I’ve
decided that at 70, I’m ready to flaunt it. 

I started with Kelly, who has been cutting my hair for more than 15
years. She’s about 40 now. “NO,” she
exclaimed. “It can’t be true!” Next my
personal trainer (if you call someone you see four times a year a personal
trainer). She sent me a birthday card
after I told her my secret. At the
bottom she wrote, “No one would believe you are turning 70.” Finally, I told a few people at work. Twenty-five year old Erin’s eyes
widened. “You can’t be 70, she
said.” Paulina, a 50-something colleague
responded by “demanding” my exercise program.  Her thought: If it works for her it’s worth trying. Even my kids’ friends reportedly were
genuinely surprised to hear that I was in my eighth decade (just barely).

So I ask this question? Who looks 70 and what makes anyone “look”
that age? I have friends in their 70’s,
but I can’t describe any shared characteristic like X-number of wrinkles or
gray hair or shuffling feet. I guess how
one looks is more a reflection of attitude or behavior. Does my riding my bike to work or studying
beginning Spanish make me look “not 70”?

A birthday card that I received several years
ago sits on the bulletin board above my desk at work. Its message: “It’s not the years in your life, but the life in your years.” So there was my answer—just waiting for me to
notice it.

A lot of life is
about family, that circle of people who have known you forever, those folks who
share your triumphs and failures and who put up with you at your worst moments,
because that’s what families do.

Friends are another
story. Friends are not about obligations;
friends are about love. 

I turned 70 at a
beautiful party with 22 friends two nights ago. No one there had known me less than 20 years, and I have known many who were
there for more than 50 years. Remarkably, all are still married to their original spouses.

I could talk about
the fabulous food in a beautiful flower-filled setting with fireplaces ablaze.
(I had nothing to do with the planning.) But instead, I want to talk about being loved. When you think about it, how often are you at
an event with only people you chose because you can’t imagine celebrating
without them? And how great it is to
have all those people meeting each other?

The evening
flew. I moved from table to table; I
couldn’t get enough of everyone. We
gathered in couches surrounding the fireplace for dessert, a sinful flourless
chocolate birthday cake (no singing).  People
spoke about their relationships with me, and why they were happy to be there. They brought back distant memories about how
we met or what experiences we’ve shared. It was a magical evening.

And now, I’m 70.

It’s
a crystal clear Saturday, this last day of my sixties. I woke early with a butterfly-y feeling in my stomach, reminiscent of many other milestone occasions in my life.  However, it does feel different because I am going to be 70 tomorrow.

Tonight,
friends who have been so important to my life will gather at a party planned by
Peter with the help of our friend Tina.  I know nothing about what will happen.  What I do know is that these are all people who have enriched my life by being my friends.  We have shared (mostly) triumphs together,
as well as some sadness. Peter often
says “life isn’t fair”. He adds, “Thank
God”.  

More when I am 70. 

About
five years ago, a friend in her 50’s, I in my 60’s and another friend in her 70’s shared our thoughts about our respective decades.  Here is the introduction I wrote to my part at that time.

"I celebrated turning sixty.  And I mean celebrated!  Whereas, on my fiftieth, I fled the country to avoid my birthday, I celebrated my sixtieth by running up a hefty tab at one of New York’s très
chic and très cher restaurants with my husband, a son, and close friends.  I had loved my fifties,
and believed that there would be more ahead worth celebrating. Yet who would guess that during the first two years of my sixties I would meet an 82-year old half-sister that I hadn’t known existed, I would make my first visit to South America and fall in love with Chile, and I would have an op-ed piece published in The New York Times that inspired a public television documentary."

Many other wonderful and memorable things happened in my sixties.  There was a trip to Africa with our grown children, a son’s wedding, a first (and second) grandchild, continuing success in my career, and more. 

So, I am positive about my 70’s (now five days away).  there are different issues that have moved to center stage as I face this decade.  I feel our country is less safe.  I feel our planet is less safe.  I am anticipating my own losses.  I remind myself that it is important to prepare for the inevitable, but just as important not to become obsessed by it.

So bring on the 70’s!  I’ll be grateful for every day.