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The Perennial

Turning 40 is hitting me like a ton of bricks.

I’m talking somebody standing at the top of the Empire State building with a wheelbarrow of bricks that they throw on top of me as I stand on the street. Every brick that catapults toward me has a different message:

Your hair is getting gray.

Your eyebrows are thinning.

The skin on your neck and elbows is getting soft.

Your hands are wrinkly.

Your midsection is getting softer and rounder.

You wear progressive glasses.

You wake up and go to bed really early.

You talk about things like vitamins and retirement.

Your back hurts when you get out of bed and when you stand too long or when you sit too long.

You think about taking Metamucil or Fiber One to keep you regular.

You have one glass of wine and feel hung over the next day.

Your kids talk about buying bras and getting their period.

You should have stood up straight as a kid because now your neck and back are stuck in this awkward, turtle-like position, and it's painful.

You talk about time passed in decades.

All of these bricks are crushing reminders that force me to ask myself, How did I get here? It feels like just last week I was in high school. Wasn't it over the weekend when I got married? Wasn’t it just yesterday that I had kids? All of the Old people in my life laugh when I say these things because they tell me you only feel older as each year passes. I'm still so young, they tell me. I have no idea what old is, they say.

What the hell? That’s bullshit.

Modern technology and chemicals and air brushing are our fountain of youth and we have this idea that we won't ever get old because of that fountain. Popular culture tells us that forty is the new twenty but who in their right mind wants to be twenty again? I'll take periodically peeing in my pants, a forty-something FUPA, and some neck pain over the pain of trying to figure out who I am, who I want to be, who I love, who I DON'T love (that was worse) and how to pay bills and how to survive in the universe. Any of us who have set the twenties decade behind us know better than to wish that upon ourselves again.

A few years ago, I started to come across articles about a term that sounds much less sad and depressing than middle-aged. It sounds like a happy medium between the terrible twenties and...um...death. It's called a perennial. I just got into gardening a few years back and it took me a summer planting season to distinguish between annuals and perennials. (What do you mean, annuals don't come up annually? I'm confused.) If you haven't seen this term before in reference to people, check out this article: https://www.mamamia.com.au/what-is-a-perennial/. According to the article, "Perennials are "ever-blooming, relevant people of all ages who live in the present time, know what’s happening in the world, stay current with technology, and have friends of all ages," according to US tech entrepreneur Gina Pell." Apparently, perennials may not actually be young, but they feel youthful and sometimes they even look the part, too. Sounds good to me. Don't we all,as the article explains, want to be Silver Foxes like Steve Carell?

The imagery of an actual perennial is just beautiful. Perennials endure, they are perpetual, ever lasting and unfailing. They are about survival and revival and reinvention. With the pressure to work into later ages to pay off our school debt and our other debts and the debts of our children, we middle-agers have to be survivalists. We have to reinvent ourselves. We can't go dead during the winter and never come back. We still have 100k in loans due to the government! We have organizations that need us to lead them, we have citizens who need us to advocate for them, we have children who need us to coach and love them and still do their laundry and make their dinners. Long gone are the days of Wheel of Fortune and stretch waist pants at fifty five. Long gone are the days of going, "gently into that good night" as the article's author chides. Middle age doesn't have to be gentle or quiet. We can get old boldly and loudly. We don't have to hide it.

It's about time.

I'm going to take all of those bricks and use them to line a new garden bed- filled with perennials.

Comments

Emily said…
Happy birthday my dear friend! You are most definitely a perenial - stronger every year! I'm so glad to have you in my garden of friends! 🏵️
June 26, 2018 at 4:23 AM
Barb said…
Love reading your thoughts on turning the big 40. Embrace it, my friend! I heard an NPR interview the other day talking about women crossing the great divide into middle-age as an exciting time of knowing who you are (and what you’re not), being comfortable in your own skin (even the softer flappy parts) and caring little about what others think. Rather than calling it middle-age, she referred to it as “mid-century modern.” Not bad, but I couldn’t get over the inage of a piece of antique furniture. I think “perennial” may be our best description for the wildly succulent lives we lead.
July 8, 2018 at 5:32 PM
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