I want to talk about being in my early fifties. I want to talk about how it feels to look in the mirror and see your mother looking back at you. I want to talk about finding extra laughter wrinkles around your eyes and stress lines around your pursed mouth; the weird little brown spots that appear on hands and arms; the thickening toe nails. I want to talk about catching sight of yourself in shop windows and wondering when you started to slouch. I want to talk about muffin tops, bulging bellies and grey pubes. I want to talk about how you get to a time in your life where you are not only financially and emotionally supporting teenagers, but you feel you have to start parenting your parents as well, in that well- rehearsed emotional rollercoaster of life.
Now, as a woman in my fabulous fifties, I am supposed to have blossomed with wisdom and confidence by now; satisfied with my lot. No longer desperate to please others or impress work colleagues; not giving a hoot about thickening thighs; I should be sitting back on my contented cushion reaping rewards from all the hard work put in during my productive years. I beg to differ. I am still trying to work out who I am, so find it impossible for any kind of smug reflection; waiting instead for it all still to happen to me. I look around and have friends the same age who have semi-retired; or whose children have already left home and are talking of downsizing, perhaps moving to the coast. I am still working my way up life’s ladder with no intention yet of stepping off, desperate to keep on climbing, frustrated by the lack of time I seem to have left.
Glamorous and amorous no more, my body is beginning to feel old. I know hormones are contributing to the scatty memory I have at the moment, but I see my sons exchange knowing glances with each other when I repeat a story yet again over supper, as they impatiently finish the ending for me. I have always had perfect eyesight, but now I can’t even tidy up my own eyebrows as I need my reading glasses to see myself close up, and it is not an easy task wrestling with tweezers, holding a torch and squinting through the reflection off my glasses at the same time. I still think I am invincible, and believe I am as fit as I was at 25, but often get caught out when I try and do something I always used to do easily, but probably haven’t for a while. Performing handstands, bouncing on trampolines, arm wrestling and other innocent acrobatic activities have caught me off guard, as I still think I have it and take on bets and dares to keep up with my sons, but find I put my shoulder or neck out yet again, and require the osteopath to patch me up. That or the sudden urge to pee.
For me, one of the by-products of this transformation from spring chicken to an old bird; is the inability to drink a normal amount of wine without either blubbing like a baby, crashing out on the sofa splendidly after two glasses, or more dangerously, getting a second wind and end up dancing to 80s music at 2am in my own living room. The stark reality is, wine, worry and waning years don’t mix; no matter how hard I practice. I think I’m 18 again. My liver disagrees, and even just after a few glasses I know I am going to suffer… hangovers are now just cruel, especially when you have to deal with the 4am Fear that normally accompanies even the teeniest tipple.
Don’t get me wrong. I have no desire to be emotionally back in my teens or terrible twenties. I have no desire to date new people, I wouldn’t know what to do with a Tinder and I am crap at small talk. Any case, I am perfectly at ease knowing I don’t have to shave my legs or armpits before bedtime in case I get lucky; happier and more comfortable with an unfinished book, cosy PJs and a snoring husband. It’s the fact that this has all happened a bit too quick, as I have blogged about before – it is like time has sped on, but someone forgot to tell me the race had started. I see my eldest son now at an age where I had my first boyfriend and all that entailed, yet I still feel as if I am trying to get my own post baby body back. I still haven’t sorted his baby photos out – most taken pre-digital camera, so these all sit in a dusty box in my study waiting to be put in albums, the faded post-it note reminder on it adding to yet another guilty ‘to do’ I haven’t done. And I meant to have started a new fitness regime once the youngest had started full time school - and he is now 13.
I know I am my own worst enemy and I should be proud of the podgy belly which housed my sons, and regard my wrinkles as badges of honour, each one telling its own story. But I don’t. I see a middle-aged woman who gets adverts for retirement homes, Tena pants and funeral plans in her mailbox, who now has an arthritic toe. I am sure when I hit my mid 60s and the free travel and pensionable perks kick in, I may be ready for maturity… who knows, but at the moment let me wallow in self-pity as I try and pluck that stray hair from my chin.
© The Real Tilly Fairfax
You nailed it with this post. I relate to every word.