So this is 44

I blow out the candles before properly committing to a wish. Maybe that’s where I’ve been going wrong all these years.

The cake, baked by my 11 year old daughter, is blanketed in thick folds of buttercream, liberally dusted with gold glitter.

“It was supposed to have mascarpone but we didn’t have any, so I used some Laughing Cows I found at the back of the fridge”.

Despite the innovative-yet-slightly-unsettling dairy switch, it tastes amazing. I eat a forkful and detect no Laughing Cow.

“How do you feel about turning 44?”, my husband asks, his tone congenial.

I never know how to answer this type of question. You know the sort. In the same filing cabinet as ‘where do you see yourself in five years’ time?’ and ‘what makes you happy?’

Questions that I should have asked myself, but inevitably, have not.

They’re nebulous, the answers too multifarious, too yucky. It’s like looking into a deep dark well with no bottom. It’s all just too thought-provoking, too probing, for my liking.

How do you feel about turning 44? No good will come of this. Especially when the asker is younger than I am.

The truth is, I don’t know how I feel about my age. Does it matter? I can’t do anything about it. I suppose I feel the same way I felt yesterday. I feel old and young. I feel powerful and weak. I feel amazing and shit.

I see 25 year olds with glassy skin and shiny eyes and think: ‘we’re basically the same age, aren’t we bruh?’ I’m delusional, hopeful, and quite peri-menopausal. I give fewer fucks than I ever thought possible, but there’s still room for improvement. It’s fine being 44, it was fine being 43. It’s all just fine.

“Yeah, good.”

I could have done better than that, but I’m eating cake, and I’d like to enjoy my lemon sponge with Laughing Cow without this side serving of self-reflection.

“Anything you want to do this year?”

I’m in the danger zone now. We’re talking pure Kryptonite.

I know how much my husband loves an open-ended, conversation-starter. His questions are rolling meadows, they’re broad panoramic landscapes; a quality that speaks to his gentle, non-confrontational nature. “Any big plans?” “Anything you want to explore?” “How would you feel about…?”

But sometimes they’re too boundless for me, their scope too vast. They feel like an ocean, and I’m much more at home in a puddle. I need immediacy, I need to see the edges. Ask me what I want to do today, right now, and I’ll tell you, but what I want to do this year?

I know he’s trying to be nice, he’s trying to chat in a birthday-esque way, but to me it feels like scrutiny, like subterfuge, like… criticism.

I don’t think in years. I don’t think in goals and destinations — I didn’t even know where I was going when I started writing this post. So when someone asks me what I want to do this year, I feel pressure. And guilt. And the teenage impulse to shout ‘leave me alooone!’, before running to my room and slamming the door.

“Maybe I’ll have a mid-life crisis.”

“Yeah? What you gonna go for?”

“Not sure yet.”

“I think I’m gonna have mine when I’m 50.”

“You’ve scheduled your mid-life crisis?”

“Yeah. I’m gonna get a motorbike.”

Of course he’s already planned it. Even an event with the word ‘crisis’ in it needs to be meticulously thought through, carefully choreographed, years in advance.

“It’s so weird that you’re older than daddy”. My son, this time.

“Only two years older, Chicken. But much, much wiser.”

I cut myself another slice of cake as I make my announcement:

“I think I’m going to start making more to-do lists this year. And unsubscribe from some mailing lists. And I’m definitely going to clear out my sock drawer.”

“Woah, steady there. You don’t want to burnout — you’re not 43 anymore.”

He’s right — all the big plans and go-getting can wait. Right now it’s time to sit back, relax, and let myself eat cake.

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