over the hill

So it's official................This weeks marks the official "over the hill" mark for me. My son turns 30! Thirty! THIRTY!!!....(no matter how I write it, it still looks ominous).

I've been thinking about this milestone for a while now...What does this mean to me? What will "it" look like from the other side of the hill? How did I get here?, and more importantly, how did I get here so quickly? What happened to the days and nights of my youth?......

I can only surmise that I have been sleeping....It seems like just yesterday that I was changing his diaper, spooning strained carrots into his mouth....like yesterday that I was nagging him to do his homework while he used every trick in the book to divert my attention away from schoolwork and onto the Power Rangers.............like yesterday that I was telling him about Santa Claus, and the Easter Bunny and mean people who stole toys from children, called republicans....

Where did the time go?

This only proves a point that I have believed all along. We all stop growing mentally at about 25.. We may continue to grow emotionally, (and I hope I have), and we continue to grow physically, (alas, my girth will attest to that), but CLEARLY we hit 25 and stop. While I have been continuing to look around me and wonder where all the big hair went....where REO Speedwagon has been, and trying, (in vain) to find myself a pair of harache sandals, my child has become a man.

I am trying to wrap my head around this and what it means for me....(Let alone what it means for him).............So, I am guessing, if he is 30, that makes me, well,........................old....

There, I said it.

Okay, so not old, like ancient old, but old like teenagers call old, old....,

Not so old that I qualify for a senior citizens discount, but old enough to where handsome young men on motorcycles no longer turn for a second look..(and if I am being honest, that probably stopped happening long before this)................Old enough to begin that transition into invisibility.

And I refuse......................I refuse to go quietly............I will NOT be one of those women that walk through life as though they are ghosts......getting quieter and meeker and more easily manipulated as they grow older.

See,..society has told us, taught us to believe lies. We are useful as little girls,.....smiling and curtseying and holding hands, and warming the hearts of all. We are important as teenagers because of our budding bodies and burgeoning spirits. As we grow older, we become lovers, and wives and mothers, (and cooks and nurses and laundresses and housekeepers), and we are valuable. But is our value in who we are or in what we do?

At any rate, children grow older...............our outer beauty fades.............

So it's decided...I am going to step into old age, as I stepped into young adulthood. With beads around my neck, and a bottle in my hand. I am going to laugh like I have never laughed before, I am going to dance with everything I have..............I am going to taste every single moment of every single day and savor it. I am going to eat when I want, sleep when I want, and play in the dirt if that's what I want. I am going to paint with bright colors, and wear ribbons in my hair. I am going to love with abandon, and never worry about what people think. I am going to speak my mind and listen to loud music, and maybe even find myself a corncob pipe. See........

that's the beauty in being invisible....no one will see a thing..........

Except the people that really matter. They will see. They will see the beauty radiating out of me................the beauty of a wife and mother who has more waist, but less hang-ups, the beauty of a woman who cares more about clothing herself with kindness than expensive clothing. I will be that woman,.......for me,....................and for them....

So Happy Birthday, Dear John. You, my firstborn, taught me almost everything I know about unconditional love and sacrifice......and about the beauty in this old woman's life, and about caring for the world around me. (and also about making play-doh out of salt and flour and the names of all of the He-man characters) You were the beginning of all my perspective, and the notion that "it takes a village".................

And from this side of the hill, I see it.......and you never know, now that I am getting old, I might just become the mayor.