Micro Rage
I think school pickup is its own ring of hell. Sitting in traffic, finding parking, standing outside while sweat drips down my thighs and pools in my bra. Then there are afternoons like today, where my littlest one is crying because she has to go to the bathroom (but she won’t admit that is the reason and refuses to go back inside the school to go before we load up in the car to head home), and we have to stop shortly after leaving to use the restroom, and my oldest takes “stand outside” literally and goes to wait outside creating a panic when I come out of the restroom and she is nowhere in sight.
Macro Rage
“‘I think that everybody has a completion to this sentence: 'I'm afraid if people think I look old then therefore ____,' and for different people it's different things…Some are afraid they'll lose their job or never get a job or not get a mate or no one's going to listen to them or whatever. My position is, that fear existed before your face started changing…So it's an opportunity to take care of that fear so it's not leading you around by the nose and making you make other decisions that are not you, taking you off track." (Justine Bateman)
I’m now in my second year in a new decade, and as someone who has always been perfectly content getting older, I was surprised to feel a little unsettled. I am not worried about how the world perceives me, though I found the backlash on this Twitter thread about Hillary Duff “still” looking great at 35 delightful.
And adored this piece by Julia Williamson on Huffington Post. Especially this quote.
“People who love you think you’re beautiful. They care about your feelings. They’re interested in what you have to say. Those who ignore me, don’t matter to me. Their opinions don’t count. I decide if I’m relevant or interesting or valuable, not them.” (Julia Williamson)
I still laugh watching this classic sketch by Amy Schumer.
Yes, it’s frustrating that nobody seems to understand what an aging female face or body should look like. There is a constant need to comment on how well/poorly you look compared to one’s objective perceptions. Mainly it’s the lifelong implications of having female reproductive organs in a world where there seems no shortage of disinterest in our health. You know you’re screwed when even Oprah Winfrey attests that “a female doctor had given me, first of all, an angiogram and put me on heart medication and never once mentioned that this could be menopause or perimenopause.” That in 2023, the New York Times can report (gift link) on a Mayo Clinic study that “menopause costs American women an estimated $1.8 billion in lost working time per year.”
I found out through a comments section on the Instagram account of a lifestyle blog (shoutout CupOfJo) that early waking could be a sign of perimenopause and to start taking magnesium.
It pisses me off, and then it doesn’t. Because I have a community of women, and honestly, they existed well before modern medicine and will certainly outlast it.
A Small Thing
A comedian doing impressions of celebrities ordering coffee. (The world of IG comedians is my happy place.)
A Big(ger) Thing
There is a lot going on these days. Pick your poison. I don’t have a specific action to direct you towards - just find your thing and do it. Educate yourself and show up consistently. It doesn’t need to be big, but it does need to be steady. Focus on your actions, not your outcomes.
Brava!! 👏🏻👏🏻👏🏻❤️❤️❤️🌟
Mare Kell (among others) got me through those twelve years of lockdown! The only answer to how to age properly is the one you've clearly already found - not giving a f*ck. :)