I am here. I am healthy. I am strong.

The first third of my life started out as a 4.5 lb baby with life threatening congenital problems that in other countries would have resulted in my demise. The second third of my life started out with my world in complete collapse due to a set of events that made me an uneducated, broke, single parent of two children who were five and two. Now I start the third part of my life.

At the start of this part I am married twenty-seven years. I have a master’s degree with a six figure income and career. I have two accomplished daughters who teach me every day. Most importantly I find that I’m first coming into my full potential. I am a late bloomer and all is well.

Turning sixty makes me acknowledge what I learned the first two-thirds of my life and that is how fragile life is. Not only from the point of view that there have been many losses among family and friends as well as the fact that I am now on the latter part of my life span. But also how easy everything can go away. Current events remind us everyday.

I have come to understand that the real value in this life is how much we love and how we get up with every knock down and every knock out. For me, it is why and how I landed here.

My common mantra has always been “one foot in front of the other.” I control that every day. Every step leads to a door. Every door has the potential to lead to something better.

My mother told me at 5 years old, “never say you can’t, try.” My mentors taught me that what we tell ourselves can always be reframed to something more positive thus influencing how we respond to the adversities before us.

I learned that what we do influences others in a way that only actions can say. It shifts mindset to realize that they too can think differently, reach higher, be better, and achieve more than they could ever image. It creates legacies that can influence even generations yet to come. I know no greater gift. It also changes mindsets about you for the better. That’s the definition of luck.

So today I am 60. I am here. I am healthy. I am strong. What is means is that I am blessed to be in a position at the start of this third leg to continue to build good things with others, for others, and for myself as part of what hopefully will be a full last 1/3 or more of my life. My mantra now includes “age is a privilege.” A privilege to be spent helping to lift others as we continue to lift ourselves.

Ester Horowitz

(Happy Birthday T-bro.)