Turning 40
I turn 40 years old on February 11th. I was talking with some colleagues the other day and they asked me how I feel about my upcoming birthday. Truthfully, BIBLE, I am not worried about turning the big 4-0, or feel as though my youth is slipping away. I'm happy where I am in life. I have made horrible decisions and hurt people in my life and boy, do I regret it, but I've also made fantastic decisions and helped others. I'd like to think I have evened myself out, and that as I've grown I've made less bad decisions.
I'm pretty darn content in my life. I wonder if the same people who go on and on about turning certain ages aren't? Or maybe they just have more regrets? Maybe they just think that's how they should sound - woefully missing their golden youth. Then again, maybe they just have so many more dreams than I do and I'm actually shockingly apathetic about the whole thing.
*BIBLE - I'm wondering if I'll feel completely differently when I awake on my birthday; maybe you'll find me kneeling on the bathroom floor praying for my lost twenties, and I'll come to see this post as pretentious, ableist and elitist.*
Without any airs, I can say (right now - and maybe we should all knock on wood three times) that I really like my life. I have a husband whom I adore and who if not adores me, at least likes me a lot. I have a son that's funny and smart and prickly and who gives me multiple cheek kisses and half hugs on his way into school. I'm very good at my job, they trust me and respect me, and my boss is a mentor. I have a few best friends, a lot of really, really good friends, and heaps of people I call my friends (though it may not be reciprocal). I volunteer in my community: I help lead Cub Scouts, I work as a Sunday School teacher, singer and secretary of the board at my church, and I have a personal relationship with God, where I really try to listen to Him and follow His teachings.
I like my body right now. This year I ran a half-marathon and even though I haven't run since December, my body hasn't completely gone to pot. I also recently learned that I have a gene mutation called MSH6, which is part of the Lynch Syndrome. It means that I have an increased risk of getting cancer in a few parts of my body like the colon, rectum and uterus. With my new oncologist, I'm taking the next year to get tests so that I can see what I'm working with in my body, and I'm having my uterus removed in March. This is my baseline year and then we can be proactive and aggressive if big C comes calling.
I would be lying if I said I didn't miss my youth from time to time. I miss the relative ease of it, other people making my decisions when I was very young, and then making my own decisions knowing the safety net was being held up by my parents and sisters. I miss my heady twenties where I was losing myself and finding myself and picking myself up, creating a family of friends and beginning the rest of my life. I miss my sensitive and artful thirties, where I was a new bride and new mama and new blogger and new Minnesotan and new home-owner.
Last year when I turned 39, I realized that I didn't want to hit my 40s with more regrets. I started a #40before40 bucket list because I wanted to celebrate my upcoming milestone. More about the bucket list to come, but I've finished it. I can tell you, I really didn't expect to have so many feels about it.
Do you remember the movie, Slumdog Millionaire? In the movie, the main character is on Who Wants To Be A Millionaire? and as he's answering these game show questions, we watch flashbacks to the random times in his life when he learned the answers to each particular question. Whether he was escaping a man trying to blind him, answering phones at a call center or riding around on top of trains, he had gained all this seemingly random knowledge which led him to this spot, this game show and he, ultimately, wins the game.
This is an apt description of life, I think. Life isn't a straight road - it's full of twists and turns. Sometimes it spits you out right-side up, and sometimes you emerge upside down, hair covering half your face, mascara trails down your cheek and your calf bruised for absolutely no reason that you can recall. But each time that you can stop to breathe, you learn something and you pick yourself back up. All those learnings, all those life teachings may not seem like much when you look at them individually, but together - TOGETHER - they make up the whole of your life.
I learned that quinine treats malaria and you can get it from the bark of a cinchona tree when I was 14 taking Biology with Mr. Myers.
I learned that Gotthold Ephraim Lessing wrote Nathan the Wise, a play about religious tolerance, when I was in the play at Hope College.
I learned that McSorley's is one of the oldest bars in New York when I was designing, producing and acting in my first play with Alacrity Players, a theatre company that I began with two friends from college.
I learned that AIDS is most prevalent in Africa, though still lurking in USA (#AIDSisnotover) while working at the International AIDS Vaccine Initiative (IAVI) from 2003 to 2012.
I learned that Minnesota actually has 11,842 lakes from becoming a resident.
Before doing my #40before40 bucket list, I imagined just being happy to finish the list. I am, but I am so much more than just happy. I feel freer because I have opened up so many new options to myself. I feel stronger, because I tried new things and I was successful at many of them. I feel so blessed and lucky because I was able to do all of these wonderful new things - with some resources and my family and friends urging me on. I feel smarter, because I've put myself in situations where I learned - truly learned. I feel happy because I didn't let my brain trick me into thinking that I "couldn't or shouldn't" try something due to preconceptions. I tried 40 new things, I expanded my horizons, and I didn't get hurt, die, or lose anything! What a celebration!
I'm REALLY looking forward to turning 40. No, I don't think I'll win any game show. But with all that I've learned and all that I'm hoping to, I already feel like (pardon the Pollyanna-esque ending here) I'm winning at life!
I'm pretty darn content in my life. I wonder if the same people who go on and on about turning certain ages aren't? Or maybe they just have more regrets? Maybe they just think that's how they should sound - woefully missing their golden youth. Then again, maybe they just have so many more dreams than I do and I'm actually shockingly apathetic about the whole thing.
*BIBLE - I'm wondering if I'll feel completely differently when I awake on my birthday; maybe you'll find me kneeling on the bathroom floor praying for my lost twenties, and I'll come to see this post as pretentious, ableist and elitist.*
Without any airs, I can say (right now - and maybe we should all knock on wood three times) that I really like my life. I have a husband whom I adore and who if not adores me, at least likes me a lot. I have a son that's funny and smart and prickly and who gives me multiple cheek kisses and half hugs on his way into school. I'm very good at my job, they trust me and respect me, and my boss is a mentor. I have a few best friends, a lot of really, really good friends, and heaps of people I call my friends (though it may not be reciprocal). I volunteer in my community: I help lead Cub Scouts, I work as a Sunday School teacher, singer and secretary of the board at my church, and I have a personal relationship with God, where I really try to listen to Him and follow His teachings.
I like my body right now. This year I ran a half-marathon and even though I haven't run since December, my body hasn't completely gone to pot. I also recently learned that I have a gene mutation called MSH6, which is part of the Lynch Syndrome. It means that I have an increased risk of getting cancer in a few parts of my body like the colon, rectum and uterus. With my new oncologist, I'm taking the next year to get tests so that I can see what I'm working with in my body, and I'm having my uterus removed in March. This is my baseline year and then we can be proactive and aggressive if big C comes calling.
I would be lying if I said I didn't miss my youth from time to time. I miss the relative ease of it, other people making my decisions when I was very young, and then making my own decisions knowing the safety net was being held up by my parents and sisters. I miss my heady twenties where I was losing myself and finding myself and picking myself up, creating a family of friends and beginning the rest of my life. I miss my sensitive and artful thirties, where I was a new bride and new mama and new blogger and new Minnesotan and new home-owner.
Last year when I turned 39, I realized that I didn't want to hit my 40s with more regrets. I started a #40before40 bucket list because I wanted to celebrate my upcoming milestone. More about the bucket list to come, but I've finished it. I can tell you, I really didn't expect to have so many feels about it.
Do you remember the movie, Slumdog Millionaire? In the movie, the main character is on Who Wants To Be A Millionaire? and as he's answering these game show questions, we watch flashbacks to the random times in his life when he learned the answers to each particular question. Whether he was escaping a man trying to blind him, answering phones at a call center or riding around on top of trains, he had gained all this seemingly random knowledge which led him to this spot, this game show and he, ultimately, wins the game.
This is an apt description of life, I think. Life isn't a straight road - it's full of twists and turns. Sometimes it spits you out right-side up, and sometimes you emerge upside down, hair covering half your face, mascara trails down your cheek and your calf bruised for absolutely no reason that you can recall. But each time that you can stop to breathe, you learn something and you pick yourself back up. All those learnings, all those life teachings may not seem like much when you look at them individually, but together - TOGETHER - they make up the whole of your life.
I learned that quinine treats malaria and you can get it from the bark of a cinchona tree when I was 14 taking Biology with Mr. Myers.
I learned that Gotthold Ephraim Lessing wrote Nathan the Wise, a play about religious tolerance, when I was in the play at Hope College.
I learned that McSorley's is one of the oldest bars in New York when I was designing, producing and acting in my first play with Alacrity Players, a theatre company that I began with two friends from college.
I learned that AIDS is most prevalent in Africa, though still lurking in USA (#AIDSisnotover) while working at the International AIDS Vaccine Initiative (IAVI) from 2003 to 2012.
I learned that Minnesota actually has 11,842 lakes from becoming a resident.
Before doing my #40before40 bucket list, I imagined just being happy to finish the list. I am, but I am so much more than just happy. I feel freer because I have opened up so many new options to myself. I feel stronger, because I tried new things and I was successful at many of them. I feel so blessed and lucky because I was able to do all of these wonderful new things - with some resources and my family and friends urging me on. I feel smarter, because I've put myself in situations where I learned - truly learned. I feel happy because I didn't let my brain trick me into thinking that I "couldn't or shouldn't" try something due to preconceptions. I tried 40 new things, I expanded my horizons, and I didn't get hurt, die, or lose anything! What a celebration!
I'm REALLY looking forward to turning 40. No, I don't think I'll win any game show. But with all that I've learned and all that I'm hoping to, I already feel like (pardon the Pollyanna-esque ending here) I'm winning at life!
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