What an Inheritance, The Salt & The Kleenex...

I spent half an hour in the shower this morning like it was Saturday and I had nowhere to be.  I layered my lipstick with a Something Corporate song in my head like I was 23 and it was Friday night, not Friday morning.  I thought about one day last week when I had Boo-berry cereal for breakfast and listened to pre- 20/20 Experience J.T.

I watched the leaves fall to the highway on my morning commute and thought about where I could drive to if I should happen to miss my exit.  I judged a Sara Bareilles song harshly.  And then realized it was written for a Broadway musical, so I took it back.

I thought about the kid in the mailroom who doesn’t call me ma’am and winks at me in the hallway.  And all the people in denial about 40 being the beginning of midlife.  And how both of my grandmothers were dead in their sixties before I’d gotten through high school.  Both grandfathers dead before I was even born.   Given that genetic math, I’m actually running about five years behind.  I am literally in the middle of my life.

I realized I’ve always surrounded myself with older people, and never thought about age—young or old—until it started thinking about me.  I tried to put my finger on the exact moment a girl becomes a woman.  And what makes a woman a lady.  And how I never call men, men.  Always guys.

I thought about how much time I have left.  How Elton John pulled Leon Russell out of nowhere 30 years after becoming an almost.

And then I stepped out of the car with my scarf and my Starbucks.  I walked into the office and winked back.  Shopped for nauseatingly expensive sunglasses.  Made an appointment for bangs.  And decided to pull the trigger on my midlife crisis.