When you get to 60 and people start to call you “elderly”, this is when your “real” life begins

A 60-year-old me with Susanna (my lovely wife and friend) in Canterbury in September 2025

 
During the summer I reached the age of 60. But, since I haven’t ever paid much attention to my birthdays, the day came and went . . . well sort of. The reason that my birthday this year was noticed by me was simply that on it, I had to have four of my front lower teeth taken out as a result of chronic over-crowding, and replaced with a set of partial dentures. At the very least, this served as a reminder, as the cliché has it, that I wasn’t getting any younger. Anyway, the (painful) day came and went, and by now I’ve got used to not getting used to my false teeth . . . 

As the last few months have passed by, I’ve come to realise that one of the things I’ve valued about reaching 60 is that no one can any longer dismiss my own winding philosophical or free-religious direction of travel by saying things like, “Oh, he’s just naive”, “it’s just a phase he’s going through” or “he’ll grow out of it when he’s had some real-life experience.” As a minister of religion, I have lost count of the number of times the things I’ve been saying have been dismissed out of hand by blaming them on my youth or naivety. Well, HA! No more! Free at last! Naturally, none of this means my direction of travel is (or should be) now, somehow, beyond challenge and criticism, but I can be assured that, from now on, “youth” can no longer figure . . . and that, I confess, is a relief! 

So why am I posting this short piece this morning? Well, it’s because as I was reviewing some of my notes about my great free-religious hero, Imaoka Shin’ichirō (1881-1988) — who lived to the astonishing age of 106 — I came across the following (unpublished) note made by his friend (and now mine), George M. Williams. It recounts an answer given by Imaoka-sensei to a question about when life begins. George tells us he replied:

“I think until 60 it’s a life for being ready to continue the real life which starts when you get to 61. In Japan, until 60 you spend your life as most people do. A very ordinary life. But when you get to 60 you retire from your job, and you are supposed to be in the world of the elderly. But in my opinion, when you get 60 and people start to call you “elderly”, this is when your “real” life begins. You enter the university of life.  Being old itself is just like being a student in the University of Life.  And then your second life, no, rather your true life, starts.”

So, this post is a celebratory one. I wish to celebrate the start of my true life, along with my enrolment as a student in the University of Life, from which, as Imaoka-sensei loved to remind us, there is no graduation.