Hello, reader. How are you doing? Now that I’m 50, I feel deeper into middle age. Truly, I do not like 50. It was a bumpier transition than anticipated.
Not that I want to stay “young and beautiful.” I was never a conventional beauty. Or when I was very little, maybe I was, but didn’t even have the concept yet. It’s not that kind of vanity.
Not that I’m afraid of being closer to death, though I am. Death is a big deal. I would prefer more time on earth to feel pleasure and explore the world with Ming, doing my life’s work as it slightly changes.
synesthesia
More that 50 is all new colors, and I had fallen in love with the number 4. Leaving the land of stable blue 4, to enter the land of rounded red 5 feels like abject tragedy. Yes, I have strong feelings about numbers.
Do numbers have colors for you? Do you remember learning about numbers as a kid, and feeling their shapes and personalities? Now that I’m 50, I’m still that kid with a pencil. Numbers thrill me and shake me. This I would never choose. I don’t make up the rules.
Yeah, I get that age is just an idea, and theoretically I could live in a culture where we don’t track age, or we count in different ways, like base 9 or something obscene like that. I understand that I could make my own calendar, my own numbers, or erase numbers from my mind. Maybe I will do that later.
Meanwhile, in this reality, now that I’m 50, I want a mature, ripe, juicy decade of
- saying no
- choosing myself
- no longer over-giving
- art
- writing
- Ming
- true love
- being more of who I am
- swords
- glaciers
- roses
- uruz– Shakti or the energy-force throughput of massive extinct oxen charging
I’m an extinct ox, 3000 pounds, fat and glorious; I feel good about that.
That’s the necklace I made myself for my birthday, to help me feel strong.
60
I have ten years to plan what to do when I turn 60. Probably run away, hide out, and accept I am going to cry all day. If I forget, please remind me.
Six is pink, and zero is that nasty clear-white color. I love me a circle, but zeros are all Wrong.
Oh yeah, like graduating to the next ballet class, too painful.
art
Luckily love is here to help me get through the hard parts. My best friend Ellen used art-love to add a lot of newness to a picture of me that I shared some months ago.
This was part of my birthday present. I was enchanted, and I asked if I could show you. Ellen said yes.
I adore both.
