Time keeps ticking away. It's official. I have reached middle age. I even looked up a definition of middle age: "the time between 40 and 60 is middle age." Yep that's me, middle aged. I kind of like it. I have been known to say, "I love my 40's!" In fact I just did it today. . ."I love my forties!" I exclaimed to my younger friend who was antiquing with me today. No response.
"No really," I say trying to feel like I have to convice her. She is looking at me through the corner of her eye, skeptically, "Yea, My forties are great!" still no response. I continue, "You know when you reach your forties," she obviously hasn't reached her forties, "you have learned that you can't please everyone, it is just impossible, and so you don't feel the need to try any more."
"That's freeing."says my younger, wrinkle free friend with a smile, attempting to validate me,
"It is really! my forties are great, I love my forties." I say with enthusiasm like some type of missionary of the aged spreading the good news.
I call them "My Forties." They have their own title and they are mine. Not like when I was in my twenties or thirties. During those decades it was strictly year by year. You were either twenty-one or twenty-two. Then, you wanted to be older. Each year meant more maturity, more experience and at the time, that was good.
Then when I reached thirty, all of a sudden, I felt an ache and a pain in my back--Like over night--at twenty-nine I fall asleep feeling fine and dandy and then the morning I wake up thirty, and I am stiff and achey, but still it is year by year: thirty-two or thirty-three.
However, when forty comes, you claim the whole decade at once. It didn't matter that I was 40 or 41, I was in my forties. I claim the whole decade as my own and I take them all in and I love them. I love them because I realize all that I have been through to get me here. I cherish every lesson and every joyful experience. I try to celebrate every moment, and realize that it is perfect just as it is, the joys and the pains, the victories and the losses, the hurdles that have been crossed safely and those that weren't, causing me to fall on my face, and cry hot, steamy tears that sting my eyes. I'm not ashamed of being forty, I am proud of it. I feel that I have finally grown up, except that I haven't. I still love to play way to much, and I am still on an eternal vacation as a friend once said back when I was 25. I have aged, yes, but like a fine wine, or a great cheese. The years have refined me, taught me, made me more appreciative of life. So I celebrate "My Forties!" and look forward to embellishing them with great memories and experiences.
Sorry folks, since I am planning on being mobile til I am forced to move on. I decided to not give any energy to me needing the aqua chair. But I do plan on having a great decade in my 50s. For sure.
