Age Spots and Other Badges of Life and Experience by Carolyn J. Rose

Carolyn J. Rose grew up in New York's Catskill Mountains, graduated from the University of Arizona, logged two years in Arkansas with Volunteers in Service to America, and spent 25 years as a television news researcher, writer, producer, and assignment editor in Arkansas, New Mexico, Oregon, and Washington.  She teaches novel-writing in Vancouver, Washington, and founded the Vancouver Writers' Mixers. Her hobbies are reading, gardening, and not cooking.

 

Age Spots and Other Badges of Life and Experience

by Carolyn J. Rose

“Out, damned spot!”
Lady Macbeth

The age spots on my hands are multiplying, spreading into as-yet-undeveloped territory on my arms. Most are just freckle-sized, but some are larger blotches.  There’s one in the shape of Illinois and one that resembles Iowa. As my skin gets thinner, more transparent, papery, and less plumped up with youth, small veins become visible. Like highways, they connect Illinois and Iowa.

(An aside here—I’ve done a little research and learned these are actually spots caused by exposure to the sun. But, as I age, they’ve increased in number and size. So, for the purposes of this blog/rant, I’m sticking with “age spots.”)
 

I won’t mention my exact age—no point in scaring the youngsters—but if you listen to Jackson Browne’s “Running On Empty” and do the math, you’ll be able to figure it out. As time goes by, I expect more “states” will appear on my skin. I can already see a string of blotches resembling the Hawaiian Islands curving out from between two knuckles. And there are many tiny spots that could be Delaware or Connecticut.
 

At the age of four, I spotted the first blotch—a miniscule brown mark on my palm in the pad of flesh at the base of my left index finger. I felt this mark made me somehow more unique, more recognizable. I remember telling my mother that, even if there were a dozen girls who looked just like me, she would always know by that mark.
 

My mother seemed less than excited by my pronouncement and hardly glanced at the mark. For years, I considered and reconsidered her response in the light of other incidents and interactions. As children do, I asked myself a hundred questions. Was she absolutely certain she would always recognize me? Did she not want to think about the many events or people that could separate mother and child and prompt a frantic search? Was she not worried about losing me? Or would she care little if that happened? Would she simply replace me with another child?
 

I doubt I ever asked her those questions.  I suspect I was afraid that my deepest fears about myself and my position in the family (a collection of anxieties including: I’m adopted, I’ll be given up for adoption, no one really loves me, no one cares about me/listens to me, etc.) would be confirmed. And now it’s well beyond “too late.” My mother has been gone for 17 years. I know from her diaries that she loved me and even admired me. So I tell myself that she worried about losing me, but believed she would always know me, could find me even in a crowd of a million children without resorting to peering at palms to spot a speck of brown.

Over the years, I acquired a host of other marks—scars, wrinkles, bumps, dents, calcium deposits, and skin tags. As for that tiny mark, it faded away many years ago. But long before it disappeared, I recognized that it was only a tiny part of what makes me unique—experiences, people met and connected with, friendships sustained, books written.

Still, when those brown blotches started spreading, they got my attention.  During my yearly physical, I asked my doctor—a courtly and charming man—if they were a sign of something serious or just age spots.

“Nothing serious.” He smiled. “But calling them age spots sounds so harsh.”
 

“Well, they’re hardly youth spots,” I retorted. “Should I bleach them? Use some special cream?”
 

“Not at all” He bent and placed a kiss on my knuckles. “A woman such as yourself should leave them just as they are. Wear them proudly as badges of your life and experiences.”

Yeah. What he said!

Call them mementos. Souvenirs. Even spots.

Just leave off that part about age.