Agatha Christie called it the “Second Blooming,” she found in her 80s that she was writing her mysteries better than ever before.

She said a whole new life had opened up for her as she got older…she called it a “fresh sap of thoughts and ideas rising in you.”

In America, we see old age as a sclerotic and grim period, a slow march to incontinence, helplessness, and death.

I see the change in how people treat me, as if I am too fragile to go shopping and get the bags into the car.

For many, Christie was an icon, a link between education and experience.

She learned what I am learning and trying to preach, that learning is not only a lifelong task that ripens with age but also a summons to a  renewal of the soul.

I am not dying, I am born again.

When I left college to become a reporter, I thought I had as much education as I wanted or needed. In a sense, that was true. I was a good reporter and loved every day of it.

But I wasn’t educated for any holistic or long-term reason, had no spiritual life, suffered from anxiety, and anger followed me everywhere. I was unprepared for true life and its twists, turns, and challenges. No one had ever taught me how to live in school.

Life is the best teacher for me, and the longer I live, the more I get a chance to learn.  I love it and am grateful for it. I shed ambition, envy, resentment, and fear as I age.

The education I received in my early life prepared me for minor areas of life.

I never imagined that when I got to be 75 – I never expected to get that far – that my education was only beginning. My memory is not as good as it was, but I don’t joke and do “old talk” about myself – as in “Im losing it” and “at our age. ”

I don’t laugh about it or join in when other people laugh at me.

I couldn’t remember a friend’s name the other day, and I thought, “is this it?” is it finally happening to me? I’m Dyslexic and older now and make more mistakes than I used to make. But I also write better than I ever did – fearlessly and continuously.

Many people laugh at me or get angry when that happens; social media loves to pounce on mistakes as if they were deliberate; one longtime blog reader said recently that my typos made her uncomfortable and suggested I have Maria proofread my work.

The doctors say old brains are smaller, but that old minds are not. I’ve never been more comfortable with myself.

I can hardly believe the things I am learning now – how to live, be honest, have a spiritual life, read good books,  incorporate doing good into my life, and make friends.

I have never written better or felt better about myself, not in any of those books I wrote.  I’m free at last to write what I want. I’ve learned to seek out healthy relationships without drama and boundary problems – my blog comments have taught me much about that.

I’ve learned to cope with the raucous nature of writing in public. I can get into trouble turning on the computer, I have learned so much about my own anger, resentment, and fear. I have learned to love myself and speak up for me

As I’ve grown,  I have “bloomed,” as Agatha Christie described. I am calmer; I have new abilities, empathy, insights, and a new and more straightforward way of seeing the world. I am mentoring people, and helping them.

But this only happens, writes author Joan Chittister, “if we continue to develop, to learn, to cultivate our mental security as we age.” When I stop learning and being open to new ideas, that will be the first death, perhaps even the real one.

Maria and I are exploring the very new world of alternate heating – in our case, heat pumps. I don’t know if we will get one, but I am eager to earn everything I can about them. This is a new way of living for us, an important one.

Chittister’s call to learning is good advice; I take it to heart. I read, write, and take photographs every day, and I am busy every day and productive. Each of those things keeps my mind active and open, searching for new things to learn. I don’t need to surrender to the unnecessary, and I won’t.

I believe poorly considered retirement kills more people than heart disease. I want to have meaning and purpose in my resting and relaxing life.

I know the day will come when my body and mind will fail me; our society dismisses the elderly as a tremendous and untenable expense, and I know people look right through me now as if I was a ghost as I move around.

My job is to not listen to that, to refuse to accept that stereotype. Ageism is the last acceptable bigotry; I feel it almost every day. No one gets to define me, but me, as unhappy as that makes the people who try.

But I have learned this: aging can be active or passive. I can see the passage of life as a time for a slow death, or I can see it as an opportunity to live differently and fearlessly and authentically.

Learning becomes more critical every day that I live. I couldn’t learn when I was young. I can learn now.

It makes the difference between aging in an unhealthy way or a healthy one.

I’m in my second or third “blooming,” with more to come.

I am beginning to learn how to learn.