This was an actual question on Family Feud the other night (Yes, it’s a guilty pleasure to watch and is part of the home after work ritual TV watching). Of course the top answers were 40 and 50 years old. That is so messed up on so many levels! First off, its insulting and sexist but mostly because it is true. It prompted me to Google the question and I don’t know why I was surprised at the quantity of articles came up. An excellent one was written by Tira Harpas for salon.com.
Last month I turned 50. Surprisingly, this didn’t bother me nearly as much as I expected it to. As I get older, I realize the pageantry of celebrating birthdays is overrated. Three days prior to turning 50, my husband and I celebrated our 17th wedding anniversary. Maybe the anniversary of our wedding of seventeen years takes the sting out of moving into a different decade and starting the slow (or fast, depending on your perspective, as time is speeding up and marching on) descent into the autumn of my life. I don’t feel 50…. I feel more like 38.
My wedding/birthday anniversary was marked by a peculiar and quirky bunch of gifts, that upon reflection, I wonder, if looked at as a whole, says something about who I am. For starters, my husband gave me a .12 gauge shotgun for our anniversary. Am I a gun enthusiast you might ask? No, not a bit, never have I shot a gun in my life! However, the first week after my birthday, we went target practicing, and it wasn’t so bad. I also received a 10 yr bottle of Laphroaig (mmm, that lovely peaty liquid smoke, love it), a rope hammock, a cook book titled “365 Ways To Cook Hamburger” (Ugh, hamburger! So not a fan), a used grass cutting garden tool, and an “astrological chart reading” (from my friend Jennifer, who is walking proof that you can take the girl out of LA but you can’t take the LA-LA out of the girl. Love you Jen!).
My friend Sharron also gave me a small box of chewing gum contained in a tin that read “I need more money and power and less shit from you people.” It was such a small funny gift, but this is how my friends perceive me. Is this a good thing or a bad thing? Hmmmm, don’t really give a damn, so I guess that in itself makes it true, whether good or bad.
Time marches on and the world is a crazy place. I am defined on my 50th year, in this world, at this time, as a menopausal, gun-toting, scotch drinking bitch, swinging on my hammock, contemplating the fact that my astrological chart indicates that I’m going to be operating out of my comfort zone…until September 17, 2012.
okey dokey.
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