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click here for flickr!
2004-01-07
by anne lamott
somebody posted this in craigslist.. i like.
BY ANNE LAMOTT
I was at a wedding Saturday with a lot of women in their 20s and 30s in
sexy dresses, their youthful skin aglow. And even though I was 20 or 30
years older, a little worse for wear, a little tired and overwhelmed by
the loud music, I was smiling.
I smiled with a secret Cheshire-cat smile of pleasure and relief in
being older-49 and change, which even I would have to admit is no longer
extremely late youth. But I would not give you back a year of life
lived.
Age has given me what I was looking for my entire life-it gave me me. It
provided the time and experience and failures and triumphs and friends
who helped me step into the shape that had been waiting for me all my
life. I fit into me now-mostly. I have an organic life finally, not the
one people imagined for me or tried to get me to have or the life
someone else might celebrate as a successful one-I have the life I
dreamed of. I have become the woman I hardly dared imagine I could be.
There are parts I don't love-until a few years ago, I had no idea that
you could get cellulite on your stomach- but I not only get along with
me most of the time now, I am militantly and maternally on my own side.
Left to my own devices, would I trade this for firm thighs, fewer
wrinkles, a better memory?
On some days. That's why it's such a blessing I'm not left to my own
devices. Because the truth is I have amazing friends and a deep faith in
God, to whom I can turn. I have a cool kid, a sweet boyfriend, darling
pets. I've learned to pay attention to life, and to listen. I'd give up
all this for a flatter belly? Are you crazy?
I still have terrible moments when I despair about my body. But they are
just moments- I used to have years when I believed I would be more
beautiful if I jiggled less; if all parts of my body stopped moving when
I did. But I believe two things now that I didn't at 30. When we get to
heaven, we will discover that the appearance of our butts and skin was
127th on the list of what mattered on this earth. And I know the truth
that lam not going to live forever, and this has set me free. Eleven
years ago, when my friend Pammy was dying at the age of 37 we went
shopping at Macy's. She was in a wheelchair, with a wig and three weeks
to live. I tried on a short dress and came out to model it for Pammy. I
asked if she thought it made me look big in the thighs, and she said, so
kindly, "Annie? You just don't have that kind of time."
I live by this story.
I am thrilled-thrilled-ish-for every gray hair and achy muscle, because
of all the friends who didn't make it, who died too young of AIDS and
breast cancer. And much of the stuff I used to worry about has
subsided-what other people think of me and of how l am living my life. I
give these things the big shrug. Mostly. Or at least, eventually. It's a
huge relief.
I became more successful in my mid-40s, but this pales compared to the
other gifts of this decade-how kind to myself I have become, what a
wonderful, tender wife I am to myself, what a loving companion. I get
myself tubs of hot salty water at the end of the day in which to soak my
tired feet. I run interference for myself when I am working, like the
wife of a great artist would: "No, I'm sorry, she can't come. She's
working hard these days and needs a lot of downtime." I live by the
truth that No is a complete sentence. I rest as a spiritual act.
I have grown up enough to develop radical acceptance. I insist on the
right to swim in warm water at every opportunity, no matter how cold, no
matter how young and gorgeous the other people on the beach are. I don't
think that if I live to be 80 I'll wish I'd spent more hours in the gym
or kept my house a lot cleaner. I think I'm going to wish I had swum
more unashamedly, made more mistakes, spaced out more, rested. On the
day I die, I want to have had dessert. So this informs howl live now.
I have survived so much loss, as all of us have by our 40th-my parents,
dear friends. my pets. Rubble is the ground on which our deepest
friendships are built. If you haven't already, you will lose someone you
can't live without, and your heart will be badly broken, and the bad
news is that you never completely get over the loss of a beloved person.
But this is also the good news. They live forever, in your broken heart
that doesn't seal back up. And you come through. It's like having a leg
that never heals perfectly-that still hurts when the weather is cold-but
you learn to dance with the limp. You dance to the absurdities of life;
you dance to the minuet of old friendships.
I danced alone for a couple of years, and came to believe I might not
ever have a passionate romantic relationship-might end up alone! I'd
been so terrified of this my whole life. But I'd rather never be in a
couple or never get laid again than to be in a toxic relationship. I
spent a few years celibate. It was lovely, and it was sometimes lonely.
I had surrendered;
I'd run out of bullets. But I learned to be the person I wished I'd
meet-at which point I found a kind, artistic, handsome man. we have been
together 20 months now, when we get out of bed, we hold our lower backs,
like Walter Brennan, and we smile.
Younger women worry that their memories will begin to go. And you know
what? They will. Menopause has not increased my focus and retention as
much as I'd been hoping. But a lot is better off missed. A lot is better
not gotten around to.
I know many of the women at the wedding fear getting older, and I wish I
could gather them together again and give them my word of honor that
every one of my friends loves being older, loves being in her 40s, 50s,
60s, 70s. My Aunt Gertrud is 85 and leaves us behind in the dust when we
hike. Look, my feet hurt some mornings, and my body is less forgiving
when I exercise more than I'm used to. But I love my life more, and me
more. I'm so much juicier. And, like that old saying goes, it's not that
I think less of myself, but that I think of myself less often. And that
feels like heaven to me
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