Time marches on....

So I’m careening toward my 43rd birthday next month, and that got me thinking. About where I am in my career, about how quickly my daughters are growing up, about how hallmarks of the aging process are hitting me in strange and unexpected ways.

Like for instance this summer I noticed that my toes – my toes! – are getting, well, wrinkled. Not many telltale aging signs have appeared yet on my face, but apparently my toes are getting ready for the shuffleboard court.

Laugh if you will, but it gave me pause. I remember so clearly being 14 years old and feeling so overweight (at a whopping 110 pounds) and imperfect and just not good enough. If only I were thinner, richer, with straight lustrous hair instead of the mass of curls God gave me, then and only then, would I feel OK. And now I look back at pictures of myself then and see such a beautiful young girl, brimming with promise and youth.

Today I weigh considerably more than 110, and still engage in a daily battle with my hair, yet in most respects, I’m pretty content with the way my life has turned out. I even changed careers two years ago and feel incredibly invigorated by the work I do. And of course, I’m madly in love with my 5-year-old daughters.

Nonethleless, I feel a midlife crisis coming on. I no longer get the sidelong glances and comments from construction workers that I got even five years ago, and I miss it – I really do. I watch my niece blossom into a 20-year-old woman with her whole life stretching out in any direction that she wants to take, and I feel a twinge of envy, wishing I had had the confidence she has at such a young age to explore and travel and make her way in the world.

And wondering what I might have done differently with my life if I knew then what I do now.

Already I see my daughters’ lithe young bodies changing and curving more into the young women they’ll become in less than 10 years and I mourn the loss of their babyhood, but it’s more than that. Are all mothers deep down just a little jealous that their daughters will supplant and one day surpass them with their youth and vigor and freshness and feminine charm?

I like to tell myself that I had my time in the sun and I’m more than happy now to let them shine, but suddenly I’m not so sure I’ll fade into the background as easily and naturally as I had hoped.

So I’ve embarked on a mini self-help campaign, trying to eat more nutritiously and in smaller portions, actually exercising for a few minutes every day, and taking more care in my appearance.

I may not get the stares on the street anymore, but it sure feels good when your kindergartener looks at you in your crisp business suit on a Monday morning and says, “Mommy – you look beautiful.”