Is this how it goes?
For Christmas I got a packet of Golden Girls mints. My beautiful and deeply loved friend gave me the Blanche tin of mints in recognition of my ferocity.
I’ve also been watching the latest “Sex and the City” series and loving and hating it all at once. It’s like aging is hitting me in the face.
For a long time I didn’t believe it when women would tell me that things change when you get into your 50s. To be clear, I mean not when you turn 50, but when you are well and truly into your 50s. “Psssh. Not me,” I declared with a dismissiveness that rivaled a teenage girl. I didn’t believe that I would feel invisible to some, that I would feel an affront to anyone who referred to me as a senior citizen, that I would indeed get creaky knees, or that my hair, gasp, would definitely thin out. My ethos was that my age meant nothing and that I would always be forever young, even with premature graying of my curly locks.
Cut to the mid-50s. 55, to be exact; where I now have those odd moments of sympatico with that women that came before me. Standing in line at the local pharmacy and hearing the cashier say to me, “Are you a senior citizen?” My reply comes out as a curt “not yet” with a “fuck you” edge to it.
I wonder what it is that I am so fearing about my age now. Is it that I am running out of time? That I indeed will become invisible; no longer hot, sexy, fierce, or desirable? Some days I feel greater than I ever have before. Strong. In command. Amazing. Gorgeous. Like I’ve got all these years behind me now that tell me everything will be okay. Other days I seem to be gasping for air; running on the fumes of feeling spent, haggard, worn out, and just damn tired. On those days I can spin out of control with a worry that no one will ever want me again or that I will just have to settle for the guy on Match who has spaghetti stains on his t-shirt. My mind runs amuck that I will never be relevant in my work and that I should just give up and sit on my porch watching the world go by.
These aren’t just silly ruminations. I know that. There is a reality to being a woman my age. Society can give you the old heave-ho with a pat on the hand and dismissive “have a nice day, ma’am” with no thought at all. But I don’t want to have that be it, the end and goodbye. I don’t want my footnote to be that I had a good run and that I had a nice ass at one time. I want to be real and vital and vibrant in all areas of my life.
So, I’m going to work on the narrative in my head and heart. Work on being my age and being extraordinary for my age. Because, in the end, it is our present vibrancy that will keep us from sinking into an abyss of has-beens and and too-lates. It is our vibrancy that will keep us relevant to ourselves and able to master the art of feeling the pains of aging while also enjoying whoever it is that we want to be.
I may be a bit Blanche and a bit Carrie, but I am mostly Valerie. Glowing, vibrant, if only little more gray and creaky.
