This  article was written whilst I was in Portugal right at the very beginning of my travel adventures and it was an occasional reoccurring theme over the next few years – thanks in part to the emotional baggage that I was dragging along with me.

Are all of your friends just like you?  Are they of a similar age?  Do they all work in the same occupation or come from the same social background?  Can you ever be too old for them?

When I was studying for my degree in my forties I was repeatedly told that I was wasting both my time and my money and that there was no point in continuing to study as I was too old to change things.

Once I holidayed with a friend who just happened to be twenty years younger than me and I was informed that this was classic behaviour for somebody having a mid-life crisis!!

Whilst I was married I was often told by my husband that I should act my age – however I couldn’t actually win as I would either be castigated for acting too childishly (e.g. having fun) or if I were being too serious I was acting too old. Part of my nomadic journey was to discover my own identity which had been manipulated for too many years.

So here were were in Portugal and we were chatting to an elderly gentleman whom we had met in the bar which we had adopted as our local in the Algarve during our work exchange. This man explained that he would be going out for dinner that evening to a small bar/restaurant in the next village.  Nothing fancy but the food was usually very good, and then he said that if we would like to join him he would pick  us up in his car about seven’ish.

We said that would love to accompany our new friend to dinner, despite only meeting him a couple of hours ago; we were after all already sat in his kitchen at this point, drinking wine and sharing an amazing sheep’s cheese with him. As one of the parameters of my trip was to have fun and to just bounce and go with the flow it didn’t seem an odd request at all and I certainly didn´t have to think twice before accepting his invitation.

Prior to this moment in his kitchen we had seen Keith in our local bar in Bensafrim a couple of times.  A smart gentleman, obviously well liked among the locals, he would come and sat at a table on the terrace in the afternoon to read his kindle whilst he drank a coffee and one of those ubiquitous tumblers of red wine.  We already knew that he was English and then earlier that afternoon he opened up a bit more to us.

It turned out that he was an ex-policeman who had moved out to Portugal with his wife some years previously, but sadly she had since passed away.  Despite suggestions from his children to return home to the UK, he had declined and he chose to remain in the village where they had made some good friends.  Keith has a good social life which included both Portuguese and British friends and he was one of those people that you just ‘click’ with; so earlier when he had asked if we would like to leave the bar and go and see his home and join him for some more wine it didn’t seem strange at all.  We settled our respective bar bills and we wandered over to his beautiful home with him which was a blend of English and Portuguese styles.

What was surprising was that it turned out that Keith knew the family of one of my friends who lived back in the UK.  Who needs further proof of the Six Degrees of Separation theory?   It is a very small world indeed. My travels were always full of coincidences and connections like this one.

Anyway, later that evening we wandered down to the junction at the bottom of the hill to meet Keith  who rolled up in his smart cabriolet sports car and with the top down we cruised to the next village.  At the Caramba restaurant and bar I had a lovely grilled swordfish and my friend had beef stew. After being plied with complimentary drinks by Marco the waiter we decided that the night was still young so Keith drove us to the home of a couple of his friends where more wine was quaffed.  Following that, Keith drove us home the long way, stopping off on the cliff road to show us the views of Lagos and the coastline by night before leaving us in the lane close to our farm.

It had been a lovely, impromptu, fun night out but something that Keith had said was bothering me.  He had asked us a couple of times during the evening whether it was cool to be seen out with him.  I had been very quick to reassure him that we loved his company; he was full of fun and very interesting.  I worried on his behalf that he was worried about us wanting to spend time with him (are you keeping up with this?)  My friend Chris, who is always very insightful, pointed out to me that I was the same and that I often worried about whether my younger friends really did like my company, due to the head-worms that had been planted in my brain over the years.  Chris asked was Keith’s age was ever something that I had considered before agreeing to go out with him that evening.  I replied of course not, it had never even crossed my mind.  So, Chris continued, you should stop tormenting yourself with self-doubt when you go out with your friends who are quite a few years younger than you.  They don’t see an older woman; they see someone whose company they enjoy.

If you enjoy somebody’s company and get on well then it doesn’t matter how old or young they are.  One lady who I really admire is in her seventies.  She has led the kind of life that I would like to have led, but what is amazing is that she is still doing it.  She taught English as a foreign language in Kuwait after the first Gulf War, visited deepest, darkest Africa by herself and she still travels to some amazing places and refuses to slow down.  She is a professional house-sitter moving to new places for weeks at a time, is interesting, funny and well-informed.  If I achieve half of what she has achieved in her life I would be very happy.

Keith – you asked us if it was cool to be out with you.  It was VERY cool to be out with somebody who is eighty one years young and hats off to you and to everybody who refuses to let life slow them down.  I hope that I can be as friendly, outgoing, interesting and just as nice as you are for a very long time yet.

If you enjoy someone’s company and get on well, it doesn’t matter what age they are. Life is far too short.  We owe it to ourselves to enjoy every minute.

Rewriting this article has made me smile! Over the following decade I met and travelled with people of all ages. I was dragged out partying in Rio de Janeiro with a group of twenty year olds, and many times during the fiestas in Spain I am amongst the last ones standing as the party and the music winds down and the sun rises over the mountains. I am convinced that my attitude has kept me young both in body and soul; to the extent that my partner is quite a few years younger than me!

If you sign up to my account on the Buy Me a Coffee platform you can keep up with my travel stories and discover where I headed off to after Portugal and you will also be able to read in a later article about some of the (thankfully) very rare cases where I experienced ageism.  I hate all types of discrimination and whilst the world currently seems to be entering a new era and one where certain politicians are doing their best to divide and conquer, I will continue to advocate kindness, tolerance and acceptance.

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