This past April, I had the privilege of having my 50th birthday. It makes me giddy sometimes thinking about it. It scares me at other times. The prospect of actual old age is a lot closer feeling now. You start getting those AARP ads in the mail. The part of me that is not skin and bones – and least we forget the FAT, does not feel like fifty years has happened to me. It is not a matter of where did the time go. I am not even sure it is explainable, because just what does it feel like to be any age.
At 45 years of age, I went to bed one night, knowing everything about my body and how I felt and woke up to a whole new set of rules. I hit menopause overnight. I think it happened during the night. It was that horrid cold sweat that wakes you up, leaving you breathless for no fun reason what so ever, that was the tip-off. While I did not recognize my skin, the majority of my beauty products did and they refused to work together.
My best friend stayed with me all the time after that. Terry Cloth Towel is her name. While I took long hot Epsom salted steamy baths to scrub off the sweat and dry skin that had forced their kinship with me. She would be taking her own soak in the washer downstairs. Happy in the fact that she was wet from clean hot water and not my slick sweat. I still find after almost 5 years the need to have her around. They still pop up for no pleasing reason and she helps a great deal. My best friend Terry.
This is also the time in my life that I am suppose to get a life. My husband and I married at 19. Six months later I am pregnant with our first. The plan was that I pretty much stay home with the kids and the house until they were older. Life gets a little more complicated than we anticipate most times and older keeps going. Even though I held night time part time jobs over the years, these were not the dreams of a career or any part of a dream at all. They were the means to Christmas presents, and birthday parties, new clothes and shoes for 3 kids. Night work for me saved on babysitting, but left me little time for far-fetched dreams. During all these years I’ve sewed costumes and clothes. I painted pictures. I made things left and right. Sold some gave a lot away. I found pleasure in working with my hands in one form of creation or another. I still do.
Even though the face I see in the mirror is slowly looking familiar again in an unfamiliar way, the step into a new time in life is not familiar at all. The decision of what to be when I grow up has come around again for me. It is scary and exciting all in one. My children are 23,28,and 29 years old and all know how to dress themselves and flush the toilet. I feel free to do as I please with my life once again. I tried to think back to when this had first concerned me, in high school before my life’s path began. What did I plan for myself and how do I begin to get it back. Things are different now, my thoughts have changed, I want to be something else, not that other thing. I will indulge myself with writing and art and my garden. This being where my passions reside. I feel ageless within them, each equal in their potential for success if only for the satisfaction each activity brings.
I might look 50 or more… but I sure do not feel it in my heart… my soul. What this boils down to is… 50 is a great age that I am happy with, it feels good and I hope I wear it well… but I do get a little scared none the less, because 50 only lasted a nanosecond.
