Many readers will be familiar with the poem that says, 'when I am old I wil wear purple with a red hat that doesn't go.'  Well, on Sunday I wore purple tights with a red duffle coat and headed off for a lovely autumn walk kicking up leaves and, if not running a stick along the park railings, at least using them to prop up my phone so I could get a selfie!

The red duffle coat is now a decade old - buying it was an act of defiance and decadence in the face of my cancer diagnosis, so that it is now ten years old is symbolic in its own right.

To grow old is a previlege denied to far too many, and this year as a pandemic cruelly steals lives of above and beyond the five-year average (globally) perhaps that is especially and acutely apparent.

My red duffle coat is very shabby - stains that won't come out, pills from use, and cat hairs that no amount of brushing, rollering or sellotape will remove.

When I am old... is 57 old?  Technically, yes, as 'young old age starts' at 50-55, depending whose definition you choose.  Purple tights, red coat, knees visible below the hemline (!)... if that's old, then I'll gladly embrace it!