I am 40!

I have never lied about my age (well I obviously have, but to be older and go clubbing), my mother raised me to understand that it was pathetic to pretend to be younger because it’s nicer to look younger than your age or indeed look your age, than lie and have people thinking how you look much older.

Like all the women that have gone before me, I just don’t feel forty. I remain confused that I have come to a point in my life where I am unquestionably a grown-up, have children that rely on me, a husband, a home, a car, bills to pay… but I could still happily live off a diet of ice cream and repeats of Friends.

I am a hoarder and so, when recently attempting to clear out some remaining boxes of my stuff still stored at my parents’ old house (to be sold this year I hope), I found a fabulous piece of writing by my 11 year old self, describing my life at 40, complete with a drawing!

 

Now, part of this was definitely written with the teachers in mind (I never wanted to be Prime Minister) and clearly most of it is a child’s idea of successes (houses, yachts), but I’m pleased that I know now that my achievements in life are not “things”, it’s not even that I managed to get married and have kids. What I’ve achieved amounts to something very simple: happiness. Of course I don’t mean I’m happy all the time, living a perfect life… and god knows I’d still love a house in America with dogs and a swimming pool (and yes, recycling bins!), but I found the love of my life and we made two amazing children. That’s not too shabby.

And… I’m going  to say it even though it makes me feel sick; I didn’t get cancer. You see, if my mother was here, she’d be able to recount giving birth forty years ago. She was 35. She could tell you the names of the nurses that made her laugh. She could tell you what it was like to be induced so that the baby was out and her cancer treatment could begin. She would survive a further 38 years.

She could also recount how at forty, she had a divorce long behind her, a second husband and four children and (I’m pretty sure) that we all moved from London to Littlehampton on her 40th birthday, arriving in the evening to find the previous owner had taken all the light bulbs. We had to get supplies from the corner shop and we had corned beef sandwiches.

So I guess what I am saying is that I don’t care that I am older. I don’t really feel funny about the significant birthday at all. But I do feel strange that my parents aren’t here with me. It’s absolutely mind-blowing to have reached an age where I remember my mother so clearly – she was always 40 something to me as a kid and she was always old. And I’d like to laugh with her about that.