Oh Say, Can YOU See?

I can't see shit.  


My vision, while never 20/20, was always pretty good. I only needed cute glasses for watching movies or television - far sighted not near. (Is that right? whatever). I could read the fine print on a menu at three hundred paces away. And just like a Lifetime teevee movie of the week...*blink*. I am holding the menu directly in front of my face, over a candle, underneath a thirty bulb one hundred watt chandelier and can't see shit.  Squinting to make out the regular print forget the fine. 'Yes, I'll have the item highlighted in red, medium well. Oh, that's the restaurants name?".


I can't hear shit. 


In the 'before' days, you could whisper my name from miles away in a crowded school yard on a crowded subway in a crowded nightclub while standing on a loudspeaker the size of a small car and I would respond ('whaaaat'). Now you could be standing on top of me, shouting my name while using sign language and I would blankly stare at you,'whhhaaaaadidyousay'. To accommodate this unfortunate circumstance, I have developed the sexy (ha) side tilt. I laughingly lean in, tilt my head ever so slightly to the left/right and whisper back 'hmmmm?' at least twice before I can understand the words that are coming out of your mouth. And if I still don't understand, I simply laugh and change the topic. 


I can't speak for shit. 


In my minds eye I can see the words I want to say I can formulate them in my brain while exchanging witty adult banter. But what happens in my head and what comes out of my mouth are vastly, laughingly different: '"Oh yes, his performance had me totally stuck in my place" (mesmerized). "The color palette is so congruous with the wood stain." (consistent). Funny. While conversing with children under the age of five I don't seem to have this problem. 


Yep, this is the definite area where it all goes to hell in a round woven object (handbasket). And there is absolutely nothing you can do. Nope. Frustrating. Yep. But it is simply the body beautiful aging the hell out of you. Unless you can 'jump' bodies (did anyone determine that yet?), you are stuck in your own. 


And for once, I am not fighting it. I actually find it works in my favor: 
A ten percent tip for an asshole waiter instead of the fifteen. "Oh, so sorry...didn't see that notation on the bottom of my check". The contractor who informs me that he will show up at the end of the week to collect his final payment even though he took two additional weeks to complete my already late project."Ohhh...did you mean THIS Friday? So sorrreee! I heard you incorrectly." Reviewing an artist friend newest contemporary piece using their hair and plastic string. "Oooohhh...I totally get why this is a sham that it sells at this price....oops, I meant 'shame'....".


And sometimes it happens all at once. While peering at my neighbors hideously ugly baby that everyone was cooing over, I lost all of my senses and simply smiled lovingly when asked 'isn't she precious'. I apologized to my neighbors later saying that I simply lost my senses while staring at the wonderous new life. 


See? Jumping out of your body does work. 


xo,
Fabulously Fourty(ish)

Am I Becoming (gulp) Conservative?

I used to be 'that' girl with 'those friends'. 


You know, the young lady you would see in the super high heels with the super v neck top exposing almost everything with the super illegal short skirt that you can't bend down in or sit down in or breathe in. Trampi-I mean, traipsing around all sex before the city doing everything short of illegal and if it was, So. What. 


My friends were all artists and automatically cool. We partied in old churches converted into night clubs. Partied in lofts that were taken over by other artists with questionable electrical and sometimey water. Sexuality? Free to be you and me and possibly he. Fueled by liquor cigarettes and drugs we would laugh at our parents, the old folks, 'cause they missed the train on being young and fun forever and ever aaaaamen. 


Now I can't figure out if I am old or just jealous. 


I still consider myself kinda...hip. *cringe* I dress current enough to accommodate certain things (yeah, the old 'do I look fat in this?'). I still have the cool artist musician writer design photog friends except we all have super high rent or mortgages to consider. Gave up the drugs, still do part time cigs and the liquor continues to flow into my body - albeit on a very slow pre-determined schedule, And my party places? Well that old church is now a mall. And the party has moved to my couch. 


Even my politics seem to have taken a small turn right of 'let everyone be what they wanna be': So...you have many kids with many non-participating fathers. Suing because you spilled the hot coffee you ordered on yourself. Don't like the direction the country is taking but don't vote.  Watching your pant size increase but won't get off of the couch or really change your diet. I am not heartless but it isn't bleeding too much for anyone anymore. 

When packing my purse I make sure to carry a pashima an umbrella mints tissues lotion extra pair of shoes ibuprofen lip balm SPF face lotion ...Maybe it's just me and this is what people (women) carry all the time. No one could ever count on me having any of this stuff. Took my chances with weather, with heels, with the possibility of a mess. Now I pack for the Apocalypse. 


Ordering in restaurants is depressing. I consider my red meat intake my sugar intake my diary my carbs and settle for the freshly washed green leaf salad instead of the bacon garlic crouton encrusted buttermilk dressing salad. Settle for the steamed not the fried exotic. Settle for pseudo milk instead of the fourteen liqueur infused cocktail. 


During my 'me time' days, I make sure to tell the manicurist to paint them Ballet Slipper throw up muted pinkish grey instead of the Aiee Ya Ya vivid lime green that catches my eye. What would my clients think? A responsible adult makes responsible choices. 


Right? 

As with everything, as long as you can identify the problem, you can solve it. The problem: I was becoming an old judgmental asshole before my time. I could foresee it happening while kissing the sidewalk at the age of nine hundred (mumbling toothless at the feet of the young whippersnappers) but not now . The solution: just stop it. And it's not easy. You toe the line between being seen as the adult who can't let go of the past to the adult who can't let go and enjoy the future. 


So everyday I have to make a concentrated effort to play with my food. To remember to live and let live. Paint them nails in teenage shades. Carry a smaller purse (impossible). To listen for those thoughts those words of pure naked cranky adultness before they come out of my mouth. Stop paying attention to right sided people. Go back to the ways of the glass is half full. 

And maybe, just maybe, I can truly be cool again. 


xo,
Fabulously Fourty(ish)

The Only Exercise I Wanna Do Is Hand to Mouth

I have avoided them all day.

They silently lay in the other room but I can feel their presence. Every since I brought them home, they have been waiting for their cellophane to be ripped off, their hardcovers forced open, to be gently lifted from their center and slid, on their backs, into the waiting gap.


They have familiar names: Rodney Yee A.M Yoga workout. Billy Banks Fitness Boot camp. GAIAM P.M. Cardio Walking. Richard Simmons Dancing to ...whatever.


In my youth, I was not an exercise aficionado, but I always had a gym membership. It was a waste of time for I was able to maintain my weight by bobbing and weaving through people walking the sidewalks during the day and furiously club dancing almost every night. If I was hungry, I had a cigarette (yes, they are good for something). If I couldn't fit into those tight jeans comfortably, I simply drank liquids for a week. Easy.


During my twenties that is.


It's pretty amusing that at the time of your life when you need to exercise, keep it oiled and lubed so that your joints will continue to get you from a to b without incident - I simply have no desire to 'just do it'. At all. But your doctor and your health dictates it differently.


Most of my women friends experiencing this decade are totally committed per their posts on my social media site: "Ran another buh-jillion miles today!"..... "Just signed up for the NYC marathon (holding up their number)".... "Here is the latest photo from my morning walk!". Really? Whatever. *raised middle finger*


Due to guilt and the slight wheezing from climbing the subway steps, I rejoined the gym. The first couple of weeks went extremely well. They always do. Visions of Rocky Balboa jugging up those infamous steps in that horrific sweatsuit - that's me in way better clothing. Of the moment reusable water bottle. Hip scientific sneakers - I mean athletic footwear. Five pound hand weights so I can enter the 'gun' show.


Then I get bored with the repetition of being indoors. Would be more inspired to be inspired by Mother Nature. Aaaahhh. As usual, the first couple of weeks go well. Fast walking boot camp classes free to be me yoga classes in the park. Seeing all of the other women in their exercise gear, fancy water bottles. We give slight nods to each other. High five sisters, we are doing it for ourselves.


Like the bloom on any rose, this glow also wears off. Alarm goes off, hit the snooze button remain in bed. Repeat daily. Heeeyyy....since I love my bed, exercise would be made easier by simply rolling out of it directly into my exercise gear. Enter the Internet. I can get thin by using my computer. And combined with the food diary from the weight loss conglomerate it will be so easy that it's stupid.


Stupid is as stupid does. I pull a calf muscle doing downward dog. Inflamed my knee (think swollen oversized knob) doing cardio kick boxing. While using my five pound weights, dropped one on the top of my left foot. Dropped the other one in the garbage. After a couple of  (finally) injury free weeks, I started using the computer to catch up on "Basketball Wives" before work. Surprise. 


The bitch of it is that I do feel better when I do work out. Lighter on my feet. Can stay focused during meditation without daydreaming about the 'what ifs'. Don't have to lay down to zip up my jeans. (score). And that pigeon crap on my shoulder? Bluebird love.


The problem is there is no everlasting joy in it. And you're allowing your endorphins to rule if you think otherwise.  Exercise is a necessary evil - period. Whether it's done in a gym, outside or on a yoga mat in your home, it still sucks. Basically, I only do it to look good in my clothes, to be able to eat food that is 'bad' for me and to drink fruity cocktails with wild abandon. 


 So until I am inspired to try something new (Zumba here I come), I will continue to practice the best exercise I know: Lift fork to lips. Lift glass to mouth. But... I will be using my butt muscles to clutch my backless bar stool so I can stay erect. 


That counts for something, right? 


XO,
Fabulously Fourty(ish)

Crossing the Burning Sands

I have a number of friends who are experiencing birthdays this month. Some within this decade, some just before it, some who are celebrating what we call a 'baby birthday'. Meaning you can still say the number out loud instead giving people the year of your birth and letting them do the math.

Birthdays always remind me of when I turned forty. Not any other birth year for they were just fodder compared to The Big One. Forty was the milestone, the immovable object, the rock which permanently closes the entrance to the cave. Unlike that story, there will be no resurrection of your youth beyond this point.

Remember the birthdays of yore? Cake, presents, balloons, the nervous happy anticipation, your friends and family wishing you 'Happy Birthday'! all day long, cards from Grandma with five dollars enclosed. As you got older,.. play hooky from work, surprise parties, dancing wildly all night with your girlfriends, intimate dinners with boyfriends/husbands/lovers, trips abroad to mark the occasion (the standard photo of naked feet with painted toes on the sand). Now? A non-fast food meal, a bottle of wine, maybe sex, lights off by 10. Exhausted.

I don't know how you spent the big one, but I spent mine in bed re-enacting a Bette Davis movie: peignoir, 4oo thread count sheets, cold martini glass, large martini shaker. Drinking and crying. Dripping non waterproof black mascara (for I got made up for the occasion). Drinking and crying. Flinging my arm across my face, sobbing loudly. Loud enough so that my neighbor proceeded to bag her broom handle on her floor (my ceiling). A drag queen didn't have nothing on me with all the drama I was bringing.

And then my head cleared. I got up off my ass and realized the world didn't stop rotating on its axis. The sun was still shining (horribly bright). I still had to get up, feed the cat and take my ass to work (that would be my home office down the hall). I made a vow then to never give up my real age readily or easily. I would make others work for it.

"Hey! You just had a birthday didn't you?"
Me: "Yes".
"If you don't mind my asking, is it the big one?"
Me: "What do you consider big?".
Dead stare.
Silence.
Dead Silence.
"Okaaayyy. Well, happy birthday anyway!". Nervous smile.

I had let everyone else's thoughts regarding that day turn me into a hot mess. That it was all over now...I was officially 'old'...that if I haven't done it by now...that it's vitamins, doctors and weather telling joints from here on out. It is only truly now (that I have sobered up) that I have stepped back and realize it is, it was the greatest day ever.

It means that I made it through my wild, wild youth and still live to tell the tales. Some of my dear friends did not. It means that I am 99% me. Instead of walking on clouds, I walk on solid ground with purpose to my step not uncertainty. It means that I may not have achieved all of my dreams personally and professionally, but I have new ones that excite me.  And there is still time to realize those.

So yes, the big 4-0 is a big deal. And you should treat it as such whether you do it out loud or do it quietly. Celebrate it for all of the right and positive reasons. You will never cross this way again. And that's not a bad thing.

Cheers baby.

xo,
Fabulously Forty(ish)

I Get So Emotional Baby....

I fancy myself a tough bitch. 


A born and bred New York City woman who can step over a drunk body or a dead body with the same indifference. A woman who can command a sidewalk elbowing folks out of my way like bowling pins while making my way from point A to point B.  A woman who would seriously like a mink / crocodile farm in order to have her coat, purse and shoes made at the same time. I am not emotional on the inside or the outside. 


Talk is cheap. 


During this special oh so very special decade I have taken to crying unexpectedly, instantly and at great shock to me and everyone around me. It's freaky weird and embarrassing. I never know when the water works will start. It could be something as normally horrifying as the loss of a love one or as outright stupid as not being able to find the right birthday card. For a kid. Who is 1.  


I have always prided myself on facing life realistically. To me, there was/ is no crying in real life; at least not in front of others. Crying was for the weak. That was something you did behind closed doors, preferably in a bathroom while berating yourself for it. You take a moment, shake it off, re-apply your face powder, return to the situation to the life at hand. Chop chop and all that. 


Ah, the good old days. 


Those stupid Hallmark commercials, any commercial involving family/sentiment/feelings receives a watery salute. The video where the momma dog adopts a slew of mewling kittens receives a ghostly tear track. Any video where a serviceman returns home and surprises his young children at school...you have to pry the kleenex decorative box out of my shaking hands. The moment when I return home and realize the cashier mistakenly forgot to pack my jar of mayonnaise for my tunafish pasta salad...well, I think hysterical weeping leading into hand wringing leading into 'why God, why?' might be a bit much. 


Yes, I realize that each incident preceding the tears touches me in some way. Reminds me of life in some way. The loss of youth. The loss of innocence. The loss of love. Subconsciously crying over spilled milk and all of that. But crying over actual spilled milk is kind of freaking me out. 


I actively work against it. When I realize that for whatever ridiculously insane reason I am starting to blink rapidly to prevent another damn burst, I pinch myself. To draw blood. Or step on my own foot. Or bite my tongue. Or think of something really nasty disgusting (having sex with my Ex) or really hysterically funny (having sex with my Ex). Either way it works like a charm. Sure. 


Actually, there are annoying positive aspects. The massive amounts of water have proven to be a plus for my skin. The tears have proven to work for me in certain public situations ("Oh my goodness lady, it's okay, it's okay...here, I'll just include this cookie with your coffee since we don't have any more organic napkins"). The salt is amazing at removing waterproof mascara. Really.


Cry me a river? *shrug* My damn pleasure. 


xo,
Fabulously Fourty(ish)

I Am Too Old To Worry About That S**t.

What is refreshing about this time is that your concerns have become practically non-existent. 


People, places and things that used to effect you emotionally, that would make or break your day are still there. They just no longer have that power. Outside of any pressing medical issues, you really could give a crap. 


'Eh' with a shoulder shrug should be printed on tee shirts for this decade. 

Let me give you a few examples:


- Getting ready to go out to dinner. Hair, makeup, nails done. Outfit on. Rocking shoes. Grab bag. Overall slow check in full length mirror one more time. Bend head down to scope errant hair from breast of shirt. Lips brush fully against front collar. Red lipstick. White shirt. Loud curse. Quick stare down in the mirror. Shrug shoulders. Exit. 


- Having folks over for dinner. Vacuum, dust, polish days beforehand. Day of the dinner sweet furry felines decide that their hair should be the party gift. Review party landscape right before guests arrive. Take a pointed look at thin, slivery hairs softly floating in the air. Landing on the furniture. Everywhere. Oh well. Break out big rolls of masking tape for guests.  


 - Standing on quick process line in supermarket. Behind woman with shopping cart of more than ten items. Who has no understanding of the scanner. Repeated blips. Moving like molasses. Time ages me. Finally I state loudly "For God's sake lady!". Everyone looks at me ugly, horrified. What an asshole I am. Did I mention she was about eighty? Lady says to me pointedly, "you'll be blessed to reach my age". Yeah. But it won't be at the inconvenience of every one else. 


Sex with the lights off? For god's sake. Glad to be having sex period. Flared pimple in the middle of my nose on the big date/presentation/ first day of vacation? *shrug*. Pop it. Wear red pulsating dot all day. Grey silver roots appearing faster, openly, brighter? Eh. Wear it like I don't see it. And you don't either. Pizza garlic breath and no gum? *eh combo shrug*. Breathe normally. Talk directly to people face to face. And not behind my hand. 


It's not that you won't have a flicker of 'Oh God, should I.....?". It's just that you won't back step. One foot in front of the other. Keeping it moving. You have become strongly aware that, shit, this decade IS the halfway point. Life is shorter than you thought. All of this 'stuff', this toxic cloudy mess of uncertainty mixed with superficiality...do my colors match, what do my friends, my boss think of me, does my mustache show (too lazy to wax today), choosing your actions so very carefully before a reaction, speaking from scripted thought instead of from your real mind...... *you know the routine*. 


This is the time of your swagger. Let your 'I could give a shit' flag fly (pretty visual that one). Peel off the decorative plastic wrapping and show the gooey goodness inside. Whether it's to everyones liking or not.


xoxo,


Fabulously Fourty(ish) 

Sex. Sex. And Mo' Sex.

They say men think about sex about a million times a day. So what. You will think about sex about a million times a minute.

And not love making, not soft core porn, not 'caress my face before deflowering me' women made for women movies of the week. Just hard core straight up doggy style reverse cowgirl rough and ready ride 'em make me yell your name hard and loud sex. You will become that prepubescent pimpled boy. Without the bathroom time or the Playboy magazine.

The sense of urgency is palpable. Almost controls you instead of you controlling it. Foreplay? A thing of the past. Not required to ride this ride. By the time you say "Hello", I am standing there naked. Liberating? Hell yeah. Embarrassing? Only when it happens in public.

As a major sex supporter, my desires went from comfortable to ridiculous pretty instantly. I could not look any man in his face without itching to survey his crotch first. Is that zipper straining? How big were his lips? The size of his hands, his feet - and yes nine times out of ten it's true. Shoulder width? (Good for climbing). Oh God. What was happening to me?

At first, red faced, stuttering shame. I was mature on the outside but a raging hormonal booty call on the inside. Later, no shame. When I was caught, I coolly met their eyes. Dead on. Yeah, big boy. Bring it.

Every little thing will set you off. Every little thing sets me off. A breeze. A purring car engine at a stoplight. The smell of a musky cologne. A shoe sale. Handing the male bus driver my metro card. Whatever. Whenever. I exist in a perpetual state of 'blush' all the time.

Mother Nature, in all of her infinite wisdom, made women over fourty possess the libido of a zippy college boy. Made men over fourty have the libido of a eighty five year old man. With a broken hip. And a cane. Sucks. Especially since we have 'arrived'. Are 'seasoned'. Know exactly where, how to position our lips. Our hips. When to 'inhale' and not 'inhale'. Wink.

Forget sex toys. Pocket rabbit vibrating weird color penis clitoris massager...nothing will help. Or slow you down. All of that cold plastic. All of those required batteries. A little nerve wracking to say the least. Ain't nothing like the real thing baby. In reality no one has a tiny sex rabbit. No one has a penis that vibrates. That feels, smells and tastes like plastic. Not that I've come across.

I do get concerned - sometimes. How much can my sugar box take? Have I really lost my freaking mind? Am I a sex addict?  My boyfriend, who is  eight years younger than me, wonders out loud what the hell he has gotten himself into. Ever seen a grown man really cry? Most of the time he stares at me in stunned disbelief. Damn woman, AGAIN? Ah...yes. Please.

So what. This is the best highlight of this decade ladies. We are so sexually healthy it is every mans wet dream. Or it could be. Hold your head up. Put your embarrassment on ice. Experience this gift to its fullest whether that is in or out of bed.

Who are we kidding. Preferably in.


xo,
Fabulously Fourty(ish)