| The life-altering event I had been dreading finally | | | | children and twenty more years of life. And there, to |
| occurred. I went to bed one night able to say I was | | | | my horror, is yet another gray hair poking through |
| thirty something and woke up with the realization I | | | | the brunette strands. I mentally make a note to the |
| was forty something. Somehow, I had thought I | | | | long list of to do's for the day to call the salon. |
| would be able to escape the inevitable, that | | | | When the kids returned home, throwing their bags |
| somehow the rules of nature would not apply to me. | | | | on the table, papers inevitably splay everywhere. |
| I made the conscious decision that regardless of | | | | Going through them there was an essay from my |
| what any calendar might say, a single date would | | | | middle child's English class. Something caught my eye, |
| have no profound impact upon my mental state. | | | | so I sat down with a cup of coffee to read, "The |
| Scores of people had reassured me that nothing truly | | | | greatest teacher in my life is my mom." Setting my |
| earth shattering would happen the day I reached the | | | | coffee aside, knowing this will be a revelation, I |
| age of forty. They could not have been more wrong. | | | | assure myself that the wonderful child of mine will |
| Actually, the ground trembled and the skies opened | | | | say how I have taught her proper manners and to |
| up. | | | | pick up her dirty laundry. |
| By the way, these scores of people were all forty | | | | To my astonishment, she wrote of a person I did |
| and reassured me that forty is merely the beginning | | | | not know myself, of a woman who had taught her |
| of life. Age is a state of mind. A time for | | | | that home is a place in the heart, and no matter the |
| introspection and re-evaluation of life. A time to | | | | scarifies any one makes if one has the love of family, |
| re-prioritize what is truly important. All I can say to | | | | they can overcome anything and be happy in spite |
| that is, bull crap, when I rose this morning, my bones | | | | of the sacrifice. She wrote of a woman who gave of |
| ached and creaked. I took the handful of multi-source | | | | herself more than anyone else she ever known, who |
| vitamins that are a special formula for women of | | | | taught her what love, compassion, understanding and |
| middle age. I mixed my Mega Green so things will | | | | hope were. |
| continue to flow properly. | | | | I turned the paper over a few times wondering if I |
| Re-prioritize? Now when am I supposed to do that? | | | | was reading another child's essay rather than my |
| After I pick up a child from drama club, drop one off | | | | own child's. I realized that the person I saw in the |
| at baton practice, swing through the pizza joint for | | | | mirror was vastly different from the one my children |
| supper, rush across town to pick up another child, | | | | saw. In that one moment, every priority and every |
| drop them off at the soccer field, taxi back to baton, | | | | petty worry over my wrinkle lines and gray hairs |
| back to soccer, then off to boy scouts? On the | | | | shifted. |
| other hand, is it when I get home and have to | | | | I looked out the window realizing I would not wish to |
| placate the husband who now feels abandoned, run | | | | be any other age than I was at this very moment. I |
| the dishwasher, throw in a load of laundry, and make | | | | would take every gray hair, every wrinkle line formed |
| lunches for tomorrow, feed the dogs, pick up the | | | | from laughter, and every creaky bone given from |
| bathroom from the toothpaste fight and walk the | | | | chasing them, over being twenty again. Wiping a tear |
| dogs? Too tired to re-evaluate anything now, | | | | from my eye, I went outside and piled everyone, |
| perhaps it will be next Tuesday after the PTA | | | | including the two dogs, into the middle-aged soccer |
| meeting, while I bake cookies for the bake sale at | | | | mom's minivan and headed off to the soccer fields. |
| school the following day. Then it might be quiet | | | | The ground did tremble; the skies did open up, just in |
| enough to re-evaluate. | | | | an unexpected way. The old adage that, "when |
| I am tired before I even make it to the bathroom | | | | everything else physical and mental seem to diminish, |
| mirror, just thinking about thinking about re-evaluating | | | | the appreciation of beauty is on the increase," took |
| life. The youthful glow that used to be there stares | | | | on a whole new meaning. I had thought that beauty |
| back as wrinkle lines and creases. I need my bifocals | | | | was to be found in the mirror. Now I realize it looks |
| to put the contacts in to see what I used to call the | | | | up at me every night when I tuck the beauties of |
| sparkling eyes full of life. What in my twenties was a | | | | my life into bed. Being forty is not so bad today. |
| size two body now sags and bulges from three | | | | However, do not ask me about fifty. |