Balance - Aging

I was thinking the other day about all the ways I have not grown up. I want to see Footloose (the new, hot one). My last meal on earth would include oreos because every time I eat one I still think, "yum", I mean every time. I still eat them by licking off the cream and dunking them in milk. I have a huge crush on Keith Urban and share this crush with one of my 15 year old students;  (relatable or immature? hmmmm)   I know all words to Taylor Swift songs (saw her in concert) I like to make fun of people with my kids. I love barrettes. I love makeup.

Okay, maybe this just makes me a girl. I don't know. But as a grown up lady I know I have matured.  I feel like I take more time for everything; I drive slower, I look around more, I take pictures of trees as the leaves fall. Ironically, being older, I feel like I have more time. I am more cautious, I am more patient. I feel like I've been there before and I can predict an outcome, probably because I have. I guess they call that experience.  I couldn't be happier. Being my age - late 40's if you must know, is so much better than I ever would have thought. I literally do not care how I appear to others as I used to.  I still care very much about my appearance, just not my behavior.

I took a Latin Dance exercise class over the summer and as I focused on the beautiful, sexy, tiny teacher sensuously moving her body, I tried to match her. I truly felt like I was dancing in the same rhythmic Latin way that our young teacher was, until I caught a glimpse of myself in the mirror. HORRIFIED. Frankenstein with no hip motion (because we all know Frankenstein can move), but my moment of realization came when instead of cowering or leaving (someone did) I just chose to ignore Frank and chose young, pretty Latin girl. That is how I felt, and I was going to be her.  Who cares what I look like? I truly did not, although I had a smile on my face because I knew how I looked. So funny.

Have I become one of those crazy middle aged women who wears hats and dances with her girlfriends? Someone who wears her glasses around her neck or worse always loses them and holds the menu an arms length away? YES to all of it. It is true. Not all of it literally okay, but you get the idea.  As much as I enjoy my relaxed outlook on life, I still struggle with it. Of course there is a struggle, because with every shift, there is a counter shift in the balance. So I may not care as much about what others think, I may make more thought out decisions, maybe be even a little more rational, but every time a young person (you are getting the idea) compares me to his/her mom, I cringe. Every time an older woman uses the pronoun "we" when talking to me ("we can still wear that length) it startles me. I look in the mirror at that point, because inevitably I am in a dressing room when this happens, and I realize, "people know how old I am" I am not  28 or 34 or even 40. I am the older woman who can still wear that length or those jeans. Still trying. Painful.

Even when you say you feel young on the inside, that means you're old. You are. That's okay. I feel so much better on the inside and for that I feel lucky.  Youth is wasted on the young anyway.

That's Keith

that's heaven