50shadesofbrave

Firstly, let me confess that I have never actually met Maxine face to face! A few years back, a mutual friend connected us, with it in mind that Maxine might be a good person for me to talk to about my relocation plans… which actually have yet to materialise. Our conversation about turning 60 revealed that we have a lot more in common…

Maxine describes herself as passionate and loyal, with a memory like an elephant. She told me she has lots of energy and is always busy, with a tendency to ‘over schedule’ her time – friends sometimes tell her she needs to slow down, and some might describe her as a bit ‘full on’, but I got the impression that for Maxine, that was a ‘them problem’ 😂. She has a ‘glass half full’ outlook on life, and when I asked her how she felt about turning 60, her reply was that it’s just a number… albeit one that is getting bigger! Unlike 40 and 50, at 60 she does feel slightly as if there is limited time left to do the things she still wants to do before, as she put it, the time for hip replacements is upon her. She admitted to feeling that life is both too short and too long… but at 60, Maxine is grateful to still have a zest for life, as well as her health, and sees this period of her life as the time to use those gifts to do what she still wants to do. In January 2026, she celebrated her 60^th with a romantic weekend away with her partner, a dinner for 10 close friends and family, and a party, which 86 people came to. She told me how humbling it felt to have that many people come to celebrate with her – such a number of different people from so many different stages of her life all in one place was something she expressed much gratitude for.

About 6 years ago, Maxine moved to Whitstable from London and has made a fabulous new life there – proof that a leap into the unknown can pay dividends. It wasn’t in her plans… she told me she thought that at 60 she would still be married, and probably living in the countryside with a dog. But as I can testify, not all marriages are destined to last, and I could empathise with Maxine’s sentiment that post-divorce, her wedding anniversary can still give rise to feelings of sadness and nostalgia, or to a sense of having ‘failed’ at marriage… but I also agree that those feelings do evaporate and it becomes easier to accept that we are where we are. Now she has a new partner, and is navigating the peaks and troughs of ‘coupledom’ in later life. She expressed how she feels that a part of the ‘real’ Maxine got lost somewhere in marriage, but that some of the sassiness that got her places earlier in life has now re-emerged. It means that she won’t put up with ‘bullshit’ in her relationship or in her working life – at 60, she sees less of a need to compromise on the things that she knows she wants in life. It’s not necessarily perfection, but feeling she can be herself in the relationship and each person having their own separate life as well as their couple life suits her.

We talked for a while about work, which Maxine sees at least in part as a means of ensuring that she can continue to enjoy the things she wants to enjoy in life. I’m sure many people feel that way… I know I do! After school, she went to secretarial college and had a successful career as a PA, which took her to Paris to live and work (where she met her ex-husband). As many women do (or did), she stopped working to bring up her children, but soon got bored by being a stay-at-home-mum. With an entrepreneurial spirit she set up a playgroup in her house with a friend which she ran successfully for 4 years, before becoming the Office Manager in a private school. It’s only now, though, that Maxine is doing what she has always wanted to do. When she was 18, her ambition was to do an art history degree and work in an art gallery. But the degree wasn’t an option at the time, and the line of work wasn’t accessible without a certain kind of background and education, plus the right connections. Fast forward to 2020, and during the pandemic Maxine enrolled at the Open University and is currently finishing Module 5 of 6 on the art history degree she wanted to do. Succeeding at the degree is a personal goal she’s determined to achieve, even though she admits that the material she’s studying isn’t perhaps quite as riveting as it could be…! She’s also working on an art project, which involves her organising exhibitions in Whitstable, for which she has negotiated commercial sponsorship. The project is gaining in stature and Maxine told me she still has plans to make it bigger and better – she is definitely achieving things at 60 that she didn’t feel she’d have been able to before and it feels good!

I asked Maxine how she felt about the world today, compared to how it was when she was growing up. We agreed that life without social media and the ‘immediacy’ of news reporting was easier, and we both had good memories of the freedom we enjoyed to just be kids when we were kids. She admitted to finding current world events quite terrifying and to seeing the unfettered rise of AI as potentially catastrophic for future jobs and relationships. We did, however, agree that we had some confidence in the next generation to take the world in a better direction.

So, what advice would the 60 year old Maxine give her younger self? Don’t be too fixed in your ideas of what life should be, she told me. If you don’t like it, change it, and make the best of that change. Hold on to your energy – physical, emotional and spiritual – and don’t be afraid to be your authentic self. Women so often feel they have to give up parts of themselves to be what society expects, but we owe it to ourselves to stay in touch with ourselves and to take our own journey though life.

Oh, and don’t write us off just because we have grey hair!