SOMETHING IS ME

This isn't an entertainment post and it probly won't interest my Readers anyway. But it is the weekend and nobody reads here so it's not a big deal. This is more therapy for me but I will try to make it a little bit interesting just in case you are reading.

I may or may not have alluded to the fact that I am turning 50 in a few months. Chances are I have mentioned it, it's not something anyone-especially if it is Me- can just disregard. It's kind of like having the Hindenberg hanging over your head. You can't just pretend it's not there. I don't think any of my Readers are anywhere near even conceiving of the idea what it might feel like to be looking down the barrel of a big Five-Oh. It actually is the number that is bothering me more than the physical state of being alive for fifty years. The first one of you who says "That's half of a century" is going straight to hell, no questions, so shut your unlined little mouth.

There's no way I'm this old. Sure my body and my face may look it but my mind has never matured past late puberty. It's really funny though, I often feel like I've already started the "full circle" thing you've heard old people refer to. I often catch myself talking and acting like a fourteen-year-old. I drive worse (ok, faster) than I did at sixteen. And I certainly play music as loud as, if not louder than I did then. My music collection rivals the one I owned then. I wore bell-bottom jeans at 13. I'm wearing them again except they're called "flares" now. Now they're called low-rise, then they were hip huggers. I have shoes in my closet that aren't any more sensible than the ones I wore in high school. Some are just as dangerous. I pay about the same amount of attention to the rules as I did then too. Now though, it's not as much about rebellion as it is experience. The similarity though is that I thought the rules were dumb then and I think they're dumb now. I didn't give myself credit for being ahead of my time.

My face still breaks out, I still get cramps. I still hate shaving. I still run up and down the steps. I still spend my extra cash on music and books and make-up. Some things never change. Some do. I no longer drop what I'm doing and run to answer the phone. I don't usually blush when I'm talking to guys. If I'm home on a Saturday night, it's by choice. I don't write in my diary and lock it up and bury it under my mattress. Now I put it on the Internet for the whole freakin' world to see. Go figure.

There are good things about being my age. Very good things. It's only been very recently that I've become aware of many of them. I believe around this age you develop a kind of uber-awareness of yourself and how you relate to the immediate world around you. I'm just speaking for me, but I hope it's a universal woman-thing because it's really cool. If you're my age and reading this and aren't identifying, maybe there is something wrong with you ;-).

I'm positive that my hormones are behind whatever this transformation is. And they bloody-well owe me something after the hell and havoc thy have been wreaking on me for the last few years. Like to make you think you're a lunatic. The sooner you can part with the dam things I think the better off you are. They're complicated little bastards that just lurk in your insides and play games. Back to what I started to say...

The good things... I am feeling more comfortable with me. As an adult, I never thought that I wasn't but I am aware of "fitting into me" better. I accept my faults for what they are and they no longer feel like things that need fixed. They're just there and part of me. My limitations, I can accept. I no longer feel the need to overcome, to find ways to compensate. They are now just things I can't do. So what. I never really needed to do a cartwheel. I am not as compelled to please people who have no special significance in my life. I appreciate the people who are special to me more than I ever did. I have become more stingy with my time and fill it more with things I enjoy. I am more relaxed. I'm learning exactly what I can change about my life and what I can't. A lot of things just aren't important and it's not so hard to differentiate between what is and what isn't. I used to worry what other people thought about me. I still care but I don't worry. Some days I care more, some days I say "what the hell". It's good to have choices. Very soon I want to start a good exercise program. Of all the things I'm giving up worrying about, the way I look is not going to be one of them. And I'd like to be around when I'm sixty. That should be a lot of fun. By then I won't give a rat's ass about any thing at all!

STHTTMML: I watched Wedding Crashers. Not a normal choice for me but I laughed my butt off more than once. I love Owen Wilson. I want him to be my brother.

GSL: "How do you numb your skin after the warmest touch? How do you slow your blood after the body rush? How do you free your soul after you've found a friend? How do you teach your heart it's a crime to fall in love again?" from Insensitive by Jann Arden 1994