COMING FULL CIRCLE

 

Another year has come and gone.  Am I supposed to mourn its passing or celebrate?  The usual protocol doesn’t apply anymore.

How should I behave now that I’ve officially arrived at this milemarker?  Like a giddy teenager?  Like a cranky old woman?  I don’t have any reference points… or at least none that I really care to use.

I could pretend that old age and death are not a factor for me.  Wouldn’t be lovely to parade around in ‘tweenie clothes and shut my eyes to the inevitable?  Lots of wealthy and deluded matrons do just that.  Think of the host of 40 and 50-something celebrity women who are suddenly flooding the media with revealing photoshoots, fading stars flaunting their bikini-ready bodies in a last-ditch effort to prove that they still have it. 

It’s curious, don’t you think, that when we are young we go to extreme lengths to appear older and more sophisticated and when we are old, we’ll do just about anything -no matter how ridiculous- to appear young.   It seems we are never satisfied with just being. 

Not that I haven’t occasionally fallen prey to it as well, but I’ve long since dropped grown-up affectations.  There’s nothing glamorous or awe-inspiring in the smug and greedy attitudes of the common adult.  And what’s with all the anger?  So what if the world isn’t what you expected!  At least you have the good fortune to be alive. 

So, is it disappointment that drives us back to youth, or desperation?  I’m not particularly enchanted with the world either, but ignoring the reality doesn’t make it easier to bear.  No amount of Botox, plastic surgery or Pilates lessons will stop the wheel from turning.  It will eventually roll over your well-honed body and crush you back into dust.

And is that really such a bad thing?  Why live forever if you don’t really like living?