Americans have always had a complicated relationship with aging: embrace it, deny it, defer it—and women have been on the front lines of the battle, willingly or not. Here New York Times columnist Gail Collins illustrates the ways in which age is an arbitrary concept that has swung back and forth over the centuries. Giving women reason to expect the best of their golden years, Collins looks back on four centuries of change, from Plymouth Rock (when a woman was considered marriageable if "civil and under fifty years of age"), to recent decades when freedom from striving in the workplace and caretaking at home is often celebrated, to the first female nominee for president.