The Age of Invisibility

I think I realized I was turning invisible a few years ago. At first, it was awesome. As a woman, reaching the age where you’re finally exempt from the male gaze is liberating. You can cruise through life unnoticed and get away with things you couldn’t before. Being invisible is one of aging’s perks. That, and being freed from the physical and emotional shackles of menstruation, feels like the reward for years of pain and unwanted advances. At 50+, you can plow through with a steady hand and get shit done without hassle. As great as it sounds and is, I am turning 54 this month, and I am beginning to feel the full ramifications of female invisibility. Not just as an object of lust but as a human being capable of anything.

As for the physicality of age, I’ve always been an avid gym-goer, dabbling in running, spin, swimming, yoga, Tai-Chi, all the things. Even if I wasn’t always my ideal weight, my exercise level has been pretty consistent. After Covid, I let that part of my life slide. Then I started school full-time, transferred to grad school, and stopped going to the gym, exercise classes, even my daily 45-minute walk. My bike gathered dust. My online workouts went untouched. I spent so much energy on my brain that I had nothing left for my body. I imagine most neurodivergent people know exactly what I mean—that feeling of being overwhelmed and unable to do the one thing you know will make you feel better.

Sometime after Christmas, I made a pact to get active again. I started swimming, and by March was waylaid by what they first diagnosed as a hamstring issue then later told me was a Baker’s cyst. I put off dealing with it for months, and the pain and the dragging and sitting on my ass got so bad, I looked like a zillion year old lady hobbling around. A few weeks ago, I finally started PT and swimming again, but I still have a long way to go. While I’ve never been super focused on how I look, how I feel is another matter.

Beyond the physicality, recently I’ve been passed over for a handful of opportunities, and I’m beginning to think this age of invisibility isn’t so much fun anymore.

My husband is 16 years older than me and recently retired. He is having the relaxation of his life, and there is this tremendous urge to lean into that. To think of myself as the same age as him and not worry about being passed over. To accept being older and cede the jobs and fun and life to the younger generation. But it’s not my time yet, right? I still have so much I want to do.

Why at almost-54 do I feel like I have to work to validate myself when I’ve done so much and built a life for myself? Why all of a sudden should opportunities be starting to dry up, just like other unnamed parts of my anatomy?

Which leads me back to the pool. The university pool is off-limits over the summer, so I've taken to going to the activity center in town. Last week, I was enjoying a swim, basking in the fact that my knee was finally feeling better. I love the pool because I can sort of blend in with the geriatrics. I shuffle around in my ratty old swimsuit with great swaths of rotted elastic showing through. Fearless. No one can see me there, right? Especially if I take off my glasses. If I can't see you, you can't see me. In the water, everything aches a little, but I'm joyful. Buoyant. Weightless. Moving in ways I can't on land.

Suddenly, I get stopped mid-lap by a small voice swimming in the next lane.

“Excuse me. I need help,” the man said.

Earlier, I had blurrily watched this man enter the pool. He was late 30s or early to late 40s and struggled with a marked limp, the kind I associate with MS or polio. From that, I made all sorts of incorrect assumptions about what sort of “help” he might need.

I must have given him a quizzical look, because he repeated and expanded, “I need help understanding women.’

I laughed, “I don’t think that’s something I can help you with here.” In my naivete, I pictured us on a bench somewhere, me holding his hand and explaining the intricacies of the female psyche, how to treat women well, what they are looking for emotionally, and all the other wonderful secrets to what women want.

Then he said, “I’ll pay you.”

All of a sudden the pool got really dark and close and sad as what he was really asking came into focus. I wasn’t scared. I did the Gen-X thing and immediately started making excuses for him. He obviously had physical limitations. Maybe cognitive ones, too. He seemed harmless, I told myself. I laughed nervously and swam away, only slightly offended when he ducked underwater with his goggles every time I passed.

When I was 19 or 20, I was propositioned by an older co-worker for sex. He offered me $5,000 to sleep with him and prefaced it by saying I could drink as much as I wanted beforehand. At the time, when he handed me a check—already filled out and signed—I laughed it off. Maybe even briefly flirted with the idea of cashing it and getting black out drunk to stomach the thing. Taking him for a ride, literally and physically. $5,000 was a ton of money to a young adult in 1990-whatever. Sadly, it didn’t seem creepy or lecherous to me at the time. It was kinda sad. He was sort of a friend, and I felt sorry for him. Pity sex with a price didn’t feel like prostitution. Until it did. Once the dollar signs stopped flashing before my eyes, I saw the situation for what it was. A so-called “friend” trying to take advantage of a person sustainably younger and dumber and more broke than them. Needless to say, I did not fuck the guy, and as recently as a few years ago, I did not accept his friend request on Facebook. I mean really, WTF!?!

When I think about the audacity of these two men—juxtaposed in my life experience—it shocks and shames me. As a young woman, especially one born before the 1980s, you put up with these sorts of advances because, well, you were taught they were a compliment. The male gaze meant you were wanted, and attention—no matter how inappropriate or grotesque—was attention none-the-less. Age and the changing times have disabused me of this notion.

My mother’s best friend was raped and murdered in her own home by a stranger when she was 63. That after a lifetime of hassles from her ex-husband and legions of men who wanted to take a smart, beautiful woman down a peg or two. Another close friend of mine was raped in her own home in her 60s. She let her guard down because she assumed she was safe.

I mean really, who would want an old maid right? Kind of makes us easy prey. Maybe being older doesn’t make us invisible. Maybe it just makes us vulnerable.

When the school gym opens up in August, I’m going to hire a personal trainer. Not because I give a shit what I look like, but because I don’t want to be passed over for things because people think I’m too old or used up or tired. I don’t want people to assume I’m vulnerable. Over-ripe for the picking. I want to be ready for anything. I want to be able to kick the ass of the next guy who asks me to help him “understand” women. Because really buddy, if you haven’t figured us out by now, then leave us the hell alone.