7ToF: crone-y

1. Everyone knows about dry, chapped lips in the winter, but a few years ago my lips were so unusually dry and cracked that it was painful. After a bit of thought, it occurred to me that a couple of weeks before I had started taking a daily cranberry supplement on the advice of Somebody On The Internet. "UTIs are the cause of all kinds of trouble for older women, take a cranberry supplement to keep them at bay!" 

I stopped taking the cranberry, and my lips were back to normal in a few days. It is actually true that UTIs can be the cause of all kinds of trouble, but apparently a daily cranberry supplement is too much for me. Now I only take cranberry (or drink some cranberry juice) if I feel something coming on.

2. This winter, it happened again, but my painful lips were so painful that it was keeping me awake at night. Believe it or not, it was a couple of weeks before I thought about what supplements I was taking, and realized that the culprit might be an anti-migraine supplement I had spotted at the health food store a month before. 

The supplement had several different herbs/minerals that I had heard were helpful for migraines (ginger, feverfew, etc), so I thought I would try it. I have no idea which ingredient was causing the problem, but once again when I stopped taking the supplement, my lips were better within a couple of days, although it was about ten days before they got back to normal. 

3. Moral of the story: not sure, because I'm not going to stop taking all supplements. A couple of them seem to be helpful. How about this: if I'm going to try something new, be on the lookout for unusual symptoms for a few weeks so it doesn't take so long to figure it out.

4. Switching gears: thirty years ago, I believed that for the most part you were done changing and growing by the time you hit 30. At that age, I had a child, my spouse and I were both working and keeping ourselves afloat, we had even bought our first house--a shabby rancher in a 1970s subdivision. We were fully grown adults, right? But by my 40s I knew that wasn't true-- I was learning new stuff all the time. And now I'm surprised to find out how much I'm still learning in my 60s. It's not a small amount. I'm learning a lot these days. 

5. One of the many new-age teachers I knew back in the 90s when New Age was still a thing (I posted a bunch about this many years ago, here is the most interesting of them) said something that still comes to mind. If you open yourself to growth, you will grow. I hate to use the phrase "setting an intention," but she probably said, if you set an intention to pursue spiritual growth, the resources you need will find you. 

6. I get less and less woo-woo as the years go by, but I have to admit this has been true every time I've tried it. As long as I stay open to growth, the tools and information I need come to hand--in the form of books or newspaper articles or podcasts or even conversations overhead at the post office-- anything. To try it for yourself, just say, maybe even out loud, I'm ready to grow whenever you think of it. I was feeling kind of stuck a few weeks ago and tried it. It's such a relief to find out that I can still grow and change at age 61. 

Make of that what you will. Of course, it could be things that would have happened anyway, and the only change is my level of awareness. Be skeptical if you want, you have my blessing.

7. A few days ago, I was looking for a post I wrote years ago. Instead of finding that one, I ran across a half dozen other posts that said pretty much exactly the same kinds of things I've been thinking about in 2023. Apparently, I can grow and change, but yup-- also I'm still exactly the same. I think it was Karen Armstrong who wrote about growth being a spiral: you keep circling back around to the same issues, but you're in a different place each time you visit them. 

Wow, I wasn't intending to go that direction when I started this. We're headed south for a couple of weeks in search of (we hope) some sun, so I'm not sure if I'll post again until we get back. Have a great weekend and enjoy the rest of January, wherever you are.

7ToF: what a drag it isn't getting old

1. I like being 60. My fifties were transitional, and I'm not someone who deals well with change. 60 feels like I have arrived at something, although my friends who are already in their 60s seem a little mystified by this. I've written quite a bit about coming to terms with being a senior citizen and of course I'm not entirely there yet-- but once I made some semblance of a shift to thinking of myself as an elder, a crone, an old person, I really like it.

2. Which is why I've twice recently gotten myself into (briefly) tense situations. A couple of months ago, I was watching a movie with friends and when we paused for intermission (ie, snacks), one of them said, I refuse to say that I'm old. I don't feel old. and of course I couldn't keep my mouth shut about that, and I said I am embracing being old. That's one of the reasons our society has such a fixation with youth, I went on, because those of us who are old continue to chase after youth. If even those of us who are old are saying, ewwww, being old stinks! why should younger people think any different? Unsurprisingly, she was not convinced.

3. The next time was a few weeks ago when we were at a dinner party where everyone was about the same age (early sixties), but technically, I was the youngest one at the table. It was the week of Doug's 61st birthday, so I teased him that turning 60 is cool, but turning 61 is just old. There was this frozen half-second of silence (during which we can pause and recognize that I am sometimes a complete bonehead), and then one of the other women said with a fair amount of heat, why do you always have to remind us that you're the youngest one here? 

Which honestly kind of stunned me. First of all, I think of us as being the same age, because I'm 60 and the oldest person at the table is 63. Who the hell is worried about a two-and-a-half year age difference? I am as old as they are. And secondly, it's not insulting (in my opinion) to be old, although I reserve the right to tease and complain about it. I am continually surprised that people are so touchy about this. Why are we so brittle and sensitive around something that is a) inevitable, and b) not so bad?

4. My conclusion (besides the one about me being an insensitive idiot) is that our culture is just flat-out weird about aging, which we all already knew, so why am I even telling you these stories. I don't know. I guess I have to write about something.

5. Another thing people can be so touchy about: when someone asks me if I've seen whatever the latest TV sensation is, and I say I don't watch much TV because I'd rather read, a perfectly appropriate response would be: oh, that's too bad, you're missing some really great shows. Because that is true, and I know it. I'd still rather read, but I don't say it to be a snob, it's just my preference. The immediate assumption is that I'm bragging because somehow reading has a reputation for being intellectual and grandiose, while watching TV is supposedly pedestrian and dumb. 

6. Anyone who follows along here knows that I hardly have high-brow taste in reading. Among other things, I read cozy mysteries and romance novels and sci-fi (I'm in the middle of a Star Wars novel right now) and all sorts of genre fiction, some of which is fairly literary and some of which is really, uh, lightweight. But it's impossible to say, "I'd rather read than watch TV," without people assuming you're being a snob. So mostly I avoid  talking about it. A friend: Have you seen Killing Eve? (which I understand is seriously well-written and -acted), me: No, tell me about it!

7. This week's worthwhile listens:
- "How to Lose a War" on the SmartyPants podcast- an interview with Elizabeth D. Samet, who teaches English at West Point and has a unique window into the minds of people in the military. I was fascinated. (SmartyPants is the podcast of The American Scholar magazine.)
- "From Evangelical Pastor to Buddhist Nun" on the Ten Percent Happier podcast- if you're interested in either Evangelicalism or Buddhism, this one is also interesting. Probably you need to have a little basic knowledge about Buddhism to follow the conversation, but the general outline of her movement from Evangelicalism to Buddhism is pretty clear.
- I'm hit or miss on Gretchen Rubin's podcast Happier, but their episode on Burnout was thought-provoking. There's a difference between burnout and exhaustion, and the solutions to each are different, too.
- And of course I always plug the only podcast that I've continually listened to since I discovered podcasts: What Should I Read Next? hosted by Anne Bogel, which is usually just Anne interviewing some normal person about what they read and why, and then she recommends three books she thinks they might like. It's so much a part of my Tuesday morning routine that when she skips a week (as she did this week for spring break), my whole day feels off. Darn it, Anne.

I just realized that this will post on April Fool's Day and I spent about 30 seconds trying to think of a way to prank you, but that's never been my thing. Be careful out there.

anger, part one

I've been sick this week-- not deathly ill, just viral yuckiness. I did finally get a covid test yesterday, which came back negative today, so at least it isn't that. But I spent an outsize amount of time sleeping and sitting on the couch, and not enough time thinking about what I wanted to write this week. So I'm pulling this one out of the drafts folder at 11pm on Thursday night, even though I'm not sure exactly where it's going. If I ever get around to writing part 2, we can both find out.

I've been thinking about anger, lots. Both thinking about it and also feeling lots of anger. I'm angry about so many things right now-- social injustices, lack of change, anti-vaxxers, corporations who are making millions off lies and "misinformation," things in my personal life, and of course there's always the hulking, looming shadow of the pandemic in the background. 

How can you be angry about a pandemic? It's completely out of my individual control, although of course I'm doing my part to stop the spread, and it's no one's fault. What a waste of energy, to be mad about a virus. It's just out there, doing what viruses do. And yet, I am mad about it. I'm mad that I haven't been able to travel freely in two years, I'm mad about events that have been canceled and plans that have had to be changed, social occasions that didn't happen, community groups that have acrimoniously split over covid arguments-- it just goes on and on. 

What to do with all this anger? Where to direct it? I don't know. I'm working on it. Maybe I'll have answers in part 2, but probably not. The thing I've been thinking about this week, though, is the frequent disconnect between anger and having a spiritual life.

Having a spiritual life is an integral part of feeling healthy for me, but it's hard to find a spiritual "path" (sorry, I know it's a cliché) that makes room for anger. Being "spiritual" is supposed to be the same thing as being calm and serene, right? It's supposed to be about floating through life on a fluffy cloud of unwavering trust that God is in charge (if you're theist), or peacefully (smugly) observing the crazy swirl of emotions and over-reactions of the less spiritual (if you're not). 

And that's just not going to work for me right now. Maybe it is because I'm immature and unevolved. But a spiritual life that's founded on dishonesty is hardly worth the effort, not to mention that it's pretty much the definition of hypocrisy. And if I pretend I'm not mad, or frustrated, or even sometimes despairing, I'm lying. I want to believe spirituality is about being real, being grounded in myself, in authenticity (hmmm, lots of buzzwords there). 

Maybe it's because traditionally, spirituality has been connected with various religious paths, and institutionalized religion has a vested interest in keeping its people wrapped in cotton wool, not asking questions, and not thinking about the ways you're being coached into supporting the status quo. 

No. I want a spiritual path that can deal with my anger. I want to be set free to feel what I feel rather than herded into following along. And that's complicated to figure out, because of course acting blindly out of uncontrolled rage isn't a great idea, either. I'm having a hard time right now untangling the beauty of a fully-present life, a life that includes anger and fear and jealousy and pain as well as joy and peace, from my own preconception of what a spiritual person should be like. And a spiritual person doesn't get angry??? That can't be right. 

Huh. That's where the draft post ended. No wonder I hadn't published it yet, because it's like half a thought. It may not even have made much sense. But maybe you will grant me a little leeway since I'm still feeling a bit sickly and I will try to explain better in part 2. 

In other news, one of the things that made me angry this week was watching women my age chase after youth. Give it up. Good grief. Why the hell do we care if a 16-year-old thinks skinny jeans have gone out of style? Why do we want to look like we're 35 again? (well, OK, you got me there.) but since it's not possible, why are we wasting time and money chasing after something we can't have?

Which is one of the reasons I post the nostalgia listens. It's a way of celebrating the things we know, the things we've experienced, that those teenagers haven't and never will. They do not know what it was like to hear "Sweet Baby James" when it was brand new, or "I Just Called to Say I Love You," or "I'll Take You There." And we do. So there. (We're also super mature. ha.) I'm adding links to those songs and they can be this week's nostalgia listens.

the morning sun when it's in your face really shows your age, which is terribly unfair.

I told you last fall that I suddenly realized I was a senior citizen, but I don't think I ever told you how that happened.

There were a bunch of small things leading up to it--a nick on my finger that would have been gone in a few days when I was 30 but now lingers for a couple of weeks. The sudden appearance of a muffin top with no changes to my eating habits. My total ignorance of 90% of the people who appear on the cover of People.

But what really made me wake up to my senior status was listening to younger women talk. In the middle of a pandemic, it wasn't my usual habit of eavesdropping in a coffee shop. I was listening to podcasts.

I somehow got into a circle of smart, interesting, thoughtful podcasts by women who were talking online about their reading, their houses, their kids, their skin-- really, they were just talking about their lives. They all seem to know each other. They appear on each other's podcasts, they @ each other on Instagram, they blurb each other's books.

Some of them are enormously appealing, and I found myself listening avidly, as if they were truly friends of mine. But the things they were talking about were... well, they weren't quite right.

You'll remember my frustration with their obsession about skincare. And then their endless discussion of home organizing techniques and "life hacks" -- everything from how to organize your spices to menu planning to how to work more reading into your day.

It wasn't that I don't care about those things, but I would see the topic of the podcast and think it was something I would learn from, and then I'd listen, and their advice would be so basic that I'd end up thinking, wait, you don't know that? You haven't figured out how to organize your kitchen drawers? 

But you know, if I'd heard this when I was in my late twenties or early thirties, I would have thought it was great. Because back then, I was figuring out the same things. But now, I'm not. Our house is never as organized as it could be, but it's organized the way I like it. I might pick up a tip or two, but for the most part, it is clear that I'm not their target audience.

I need to declutter (as always), but it's on an entirely different level than what they're talking about when they describe taking last year's fashions to Goodwill, or clearing out toys that their kids have outgrown. 

We married in 1984. I'll save you the math and tell you our 37th anniversary is coming up in May. If I had only accumulated one box of stuff per year, that would still be more boxes than would fit in any closet not owned by one of those people on the cover of People. The easy stuff-- the clothes I no longer wear, the books I've lost interest in, the DVDs we'll never watch again-- I know how to declutter those, and I do it regularly.

My problem is the boxes of stuff that are pushed to the top shelf of a closet and I'm not really sure what's in them, and when I open them, there's so much miscellaneous crap that I just close the lid back up again. There's a two foot high stack of flute music. There's Doug's old coin collection (which has not been added to in 40+ years, but probably has some valuable coins in it). There's a set of four silver wine goblets from my grandmother, and a shelf of cranberry glass, some from Doug's grandmother and some from my great grandmother. 

There's an entire double-sized crate full of travel books and maps. Who wants old travel books? How do you get rid of them? And my beloved literature textbooks, which are so horribly out of date that they have no value to anyone but me. I've even thought about burning them, because the thought of sending them in a box of scrap paper to the recycling center just breaks my heart. At least I could imagine it as a ritual funeral pyre or something. 

It's an entirely different level of decluttering than the kind you need when you're 38. Compounded by living in a town where nothing sells at a yard sale if it's priced over a dollar, and the only estate sale/auction company specializes in farm equipment and auto parts. We've used them for some big ticket items-- large pieces of furniture, our old pickup camper-- but would they know what to do with cranberry glass? I haven't even tried to find out. The whole thing exhausts me before I've even started.

This is not the series I mentioned a couple of weeks ago, but I can already tell it's going to be two or three parts. Have a great day, and apologies for posting late. This was supposed to go up yesterday, but even though we're no longer locked down, I'm having trouble remembering the day of the week. (just me?)

Fashion for Seniors

When I was in high school back in the 70s, there were all kinds of fashion trends that were way out of my financial reach--especially designer jeans, which were newly in fashion, even though it was a bit before Brooke Shields famously declared that nothing comes between her and her Calvins in 1980. 

But there were two fashion faux pas that were to be avoided at all costs: your bra strap showing, and highwater pants (pants that were too short to buckle on the tops of your shoes). 

We're so used to people flaunting their undergarments now that it's hard to even remember that feeling of intense embarrassment we had over a wayward bra strap. Ah, a more innocent time.

But the ideal of jeans gently bent on the top of your shoes was so deeply embedded in me that when cropped pants and capris came into style in the 90s, it was several years before I could bring myself to participate. 

Aside: as I'm typing this, I remembered the 60s. When I started elementary school in the midwest in 1966, we weren't allowed to wear shorts to school. We could only wear shorts under a dress or skirt. When we moved to Dallas in 1969--new for me, but a return to Texas for my parents-- our school allowed shorts as long as they were longer than your fingers when your arms were straight down at your side. Same for the length of skirts.

Anyway. Back to pants. Here is an approximation of a conversation I had with my 30-year-old daughter last month.

Me: (holding out my leg with my skinny jeans carefully rolled an inch or two above my shoes): I've noticed that we're rolling our jeans now

(Daughter smiles, holds out her similarly rolled jeans)

Me: But I was surprised to see bare skin showing over booties even when there's six inches of snow

Daughter: Well, we're trying to avoid this (in a tone of voice that indicates a moral travesty has occurred, as she rolls her jeans down to the exact length that I have always considered to be perfect)

Me: (looking confused) what's wrong with that?

Daughter: (as if stating the patently obvious) It just looks so messy

Whaaaat? I have subsequently read in a couple of instagram posts something to the effect of "neatly rolled" or "neatly cuffed" pants, so I guess that is the prevailing wisdom. 

We're gonna dress like it's 1979

It occurs to me that when women our age are wearing something sadly out of date, it's not that we're "still wearing the styles that were in fashion in 1980," as we are sometimes accused. 

It's that we've been through so many different variations of hemlines (mini skirts, maxi skirts, midis, skorts, just below the knee, just above the knee, micro-mini), types of shoes (platforms, earth shoes, flip flops, gladiator, ankle straps, mary janes, ballet flats, block heel, stilettos--remember when 2 1/2" was a "high heel"?), length of shirts (belly shirts, low neck, tunic length), types of pants (bell bottoms, stirrup pants, jeggings, gauchos, flare legs, low rise, mid rise, high rise, and lord knows what else)-- we've been through so many of those, that we just can't be brought to care anymore. 

That's right. We just freaking don't care. Wear what you like. One of the joys of age-- you can ignore the trends, and instead of being horrified, people will just condescendingly assume that you're doddering on into old age. And secretly, we know exactly what we're doing because given the whole wide world of styles to choose from, why not wear what is comfortable and feels good. 

Amen.

ch ch ch ch changes

When I have my occasional a-ha!! moments, after they're over, they often seem so obvious that I'm a little embarrassed it took me so long to figure it out. Surely everyone else already knew this.

That's how I felt about my realization that at age 59, I am no longer in the same demographic that I was at age 49 (the original posts are here and here). Well, DUH, as we used to say when I was in junior high. How could I possibly have thought that I was? 

But I've continued to read and listen to people and podcasts, and you know what? I'm not alone. I'm not the only woman in her 50s who is having trouble making this mental switch. It's not so much that we mind our encroaching age. After all, by the time we've reached this age, we've lost friends and loved ones and we know how lucky we are to make it to 60. 

It's that we don't feel old, at least not the way our youth-obsessed culture defines old. We don't feel irrelevant, and that's how our society views "old" people. And my friends who have already turned 60 don't seem like senior citizens, at least not the way I thought seniors were when I was 40. I think that is more about my misunderstanding of what a senior is like than it is about 62-year-olds being different than they used to be. Our society really is remarkably stupid about aging.

I think the key is that we have to change how we think about age. We can't do much about changing how young people think-- I can remember being that younger woman who rolled her eyes when someone in her 50s would enthusiastically tell me that "50 is the new 30." That younger me was not convinced. 

But we can change what we believe about ourselves, and about age. We've internalized this idea that if you're not at the center of making things happen, your usefulness as a human being is gone. So we keep chasing after that feeling of being in the "maker" stage, the influencer stage, the making a difference stage. I want to feel like I matter.

But you know what? We do matter. We just do. We don't have to manufacture this, or change our culture, or convince anyone, we just have to believe it ourselves. Instead of trying (unsuccessfully) to continue to shoehorn ourselves into the mid-life category, we need to change how we think about people in their 60s. Yup, I'm old. Yup, I'm no longer on the center stage of what is happening in our world. But I am still a badass.

What if we just move forward? Instead of accepting what our culture tells us--that if you're not in that cultural sweet spot of mid-thirties to mid-forties, you don't matter-- how about if we dump our own anti-age prejudice and know down to our core that american culture is wrong about aging?

Because if we don't do this, if we continue to try to pretend that are in that center stage phase, that's exactly when we become ridiculous. To be clear: Do what you want, wear what you want. Ignore the YouTube tutorials about "seven things women over fifty should never wear" and "six makeup tips for looking 35 again." That's not what I mean. 

What I mean is: recognize that the generations have shifted. The women who are in their 30s to 40s have a different cultural context than we did. They have a different set of priorities and a different set of challenges. We can't talk down to them as if the things we did at their age were important, and theirs are just window dressing. We can't tell younger women that their a-ha moments are unnecessary because our generation already did that (not kidding, I came so close to actually saying that a couple of months ago).

Every generation has to figure out certain things for themselves. Their generation is being forced to manage their kids' online education while figuring out how to organize their homes during lockdown and track their Instagram feed and monitor their kids' use of TikTok and Snapchat. It's a whole different world out there. 

Our lives currently include aching knees, unrestful sleep, chin hairs, and not understanding why anyone would want four social media apps. Own it, my friends. We got this.

****** a blog note ******

Last week we spent the entire week smothered in a thick fog that was actually smoke, blown in from forest fires on the west coast. Like many people with allergies and smoke sensitivity, it was a miserable week for me. But-- of course -- not even close to as miserable for us as it is for the people who are actually experiencing the fires.

It finally rained a bit over the weekend, which at least temporarily cleared out the smoke and let my brain start working again. And when it did, I remembered the post I accidentally published last Monday. It wasn't supposed to go up until Tuesday, but it's easier than you would expect to screw that up. I quickly figured out my mistake and "unpublished" it, and for the first time ever, I managed to delete it before it went to the RSS feed so it never appeared in my reader. But then the smoke descended and I forgot about it until yesterday, so that is why a post that is dated last week was just published yesterday, and why those of you who are email subscribed received at least two copies of it (three?). Oops.

Mentor in training

Another memory: about ten years ago, I was eating dinner with a group of friends, mostly my age except Liz, who is about fifteen years older. My friend Ann was struggling with how to deal with an opinionated and adversarial daughter-in-law after her son's marriage a few months earlier. (We've all heard about dealing with your mother-in-law, but more and more of us are discovering how difficult children-in-law can be, yes?) 

Liz, my older friend, had kids who had been married for years, but she listened without comment while we all commiserated with Ann over how difficult her daughter-in-law was being. We encouraged her to stand up for herself, not let the young woman manipulate her, etc. We were being supportive, because that's what you do with your friends.

Finally, Ann turned to Liz and asked her if she had any advice, since she'd been dealing with this for years longer than any of the rest of us. Liz said, a little sheepishly, "I think you should let it go. You're in this for the long haul. They've been married less than a year, and she doesn't know you or trust you yet. If you make a fuss about this now, it could be years before she gives you another chance."

Which led to dead silence because of course Liz was right. Then we all started laughing, because we were so far off base in our response. Why did I think Ann needed my opinion? My kids aren't even married!

Maybe I'm making too much of this, but it keeps coming to mind when I think about being a crone/wise woman. Liz listened. She didn't jump in with her opinion. She waited until she was asked for advice. (Oh, lord, do I have a hard time with that one.) She stated her opinion and her reasoning without making it sound like she was the ultimate arbiter of the right thing to do. She was talking about a subject where she had direct experience, and she knew what she was talking about.

In other words, she was helpful instead of overbearing. I could choose a worse role model.

(as always, the names in this story have been changed)

exactly how experienced are we?

Here's a memory: my grandparents were disapproving-- in the purse-lipped, silent way their generation did so well-- when I proudly told them I often paid my own way when my boyfriend and I went out on dates. Their values for dating were completely different than mine. They couldn't imagine dating outside of courting-- looking for a potential spouse-- for one thing. And for another, when the man pays, it shows that a) he is financially stable enough to afford it, b) he will (presumably) take good care of his future spouse, and c) he knows how to toe the line in a way that shows respect for the values of his elders. 

But I had been introduced to feminism by a bunch of feisty Californians, and even though it was the 80s, I was still in 70s second wave feminist mode. I didn't need a man to pay for me. I didn't need a man to support me, and I certainly didn't need to make my decisions based on an outmoded set of rules that no longer applied. 

I've been thinking about this a lot lately as I think about how my feminism is different than the feminism of women 15-20 years younger than me (and yes, it does shock me to realize that someone who is 15 years younger than me is in her mid-forties). Because probably when I gently (and unforgivably) point out the errors in their thinking, they're probably having the same reaction to me that I had to my grandparents back in the 80s. 

There are a whole cascade of things that are just so different now. We refused to wear a lot of makeup or dress in provocative ways, because our mothers had to do that stuff to be attractive/acceptable to men, and we sure as hell didn't need men's approval to feel good about ourselves. We were more than happy to use convenience food products or store-bought food because we weren't going to be trapped in the kitchen the way our mothers were. 

Aside: whenever someone goes off on preservatives in food. I have the hardest time not saying do you think Lewis and Clark, or Ma Ingalls, would have been interested if you'd told them that they could stir something into their food and never have maggots or moldy food again? Because, seriously.

But what we discovered when we jettisoned all of that happy homemaker stuff is that some women--maybe even most women, and a lot of men-- are happy homemakers. There are thousands, maybe millions, of people who get a huge amount of satisfaction out of making oreos from scratch and whipping up their own homemade ketchup and knowing that their children have never had a happy meal from MacDonald's. 

Me? I thought about buying stock in MacDonald's (symbol: MCD). I could sit and read a book while my kids played for an hour and half in the germ-filled ball pit and everyone was happy. I had a hard time limiting it to once a week. And also, I don't remember them ever getting sick from it, germ-filled as it may have been. In fact, they have the impressively robust immune systems.

It's just a different world out there. So when I said a couple of weeks ago that being a crone meant being experienced, what does that even mean? What good is experience if it's completely irrelevant? Because if we're going to be wise women, we need to have something to offer, don't we? 

I think this exact dilemma is what has led a whole bunch of the people who are 10-20 years older than us to turn their backs on any kind of mentorship at all. They're headed out to their second vacation home or their monster RV, and don't call us, we'll call you. 

That's what I'm thinking about right now. More thoughts to come. 

And by the way, thank you for clicking, if you did. The tally was considerably more than I was expecting in my worst moments, but not quite as many as I was hoping for in my more extravagant dreams. So what I decided was to keep posting until I finished my current crop of ideas and then decide what's next. In other words, nothing has changed. Ha. 

Call me Hecate

I told you a couple of weeks ago about my newly discovered crone status, and of course I've been thinking about that quite a bit, since over-thinking is my superpower.

Like any good survivor of 90s feminist spirituality, I can't think much about being a crone without thinking of the triple goddess archetype, The Maiden-Mother-Crone. Feminist spirituality is all about The Goddess and her three eternal faces, the virgin with her sweetness and limitless potential, the mother with her creativity at full power for self and community, the crone, the embodiment of wisdom and experience.

The idea got applied everywhere-- even as a description of business cycles and the creative process: the germ of an idea (Maiden, limitless potential), the hard work of making the idea into reality (Mother, the maker), and the successful ongoing idea (Crone, wisdom and expertise that come with experience).

I've been thinking about how this might apply to me. How different is it to be in the "experienced" phase of life rather than in the "maker" phase of life? In the maker phase, you are working your butt off to get your life the way you want it, or to hang on and survive the hard work of living out the vision of the idea you had -- for a family, or a business, or a career, or all of those. And maybe the idea dies or fails (you get laid off, illness strikes, your marriage fails, bankruptcy) and you have to start again, but always the idea is to make the life you want.

When you're in the maker phase, if the vision isn't working or if it implodes, sometimes it makes sense to blow everything up and start over. Move to a new town, end your relationship, change careers. But maybe once you're a crone, the priorities are different. That's not to say re-creating doesn't happen to older people-- women way older than me have blown up their lives and started over, sometimes by their own choice, sometimes because circumstances force them to.

But maybe being a crone isn't about a specific age, it's about being smart. Instead of blowing everything up, maybe there are minor tweaks, incremental adjustments that can be made that will be just as effective. I don't want to say being a crone is about maintaining, because that sounds like stagnation. Being experienced might mean you recognize that you've already built a foundation and now it's time to be smart about how you want to preserve what's good, while moving forward into what's coming. Blowing everything up and starting over may not make sense anymore.

Hmmmm. Lots to think about. I have a houseful of company coming tonight so not sure when I'll post again.

7ToF: changing my demographic, headaches, and my favorite Kind bar

The color of spring

1. Years ago, I realized one day that one of my best friends was the same age as my younger sister (i.e., less than two years younger than me). When my sister and I were young, twenty months seemed like a huge difference. But with my adult friends, I never think about age differences. It's always seemed like all women between mid-thirties and some unspecified older age were my peers.

2. But it has been gradually and then suddenly dawning on me that this is no longer the case. Finally at some point last week the whole idea burst into bloom in my head all at once: I'm in a different age bracket now. I think it's been evident to my younger friends for years now-- no, you are waaaay older than me, not just a little bit-- but it was news to me. After the initial shock of realization, I'm totally OK with this. I am embracing my inner crone. I envision rocking on the front porch with friends and a pitcher of vodka tonics and cackling over inappropriate jokes. I think it took me so long to figure this out because I was still a mom with a kid at home until I was 55. That's my excuse, anyway.

As you can imagine, there will be more on this topic in the future. Can this still be a blog about mid-life? Am I a senior citizen now? The AARP has been sending me stuff for years, so they certainly think so.

3. Since I may be offline for a couple of weeks, here is the headache update. I am way better, and same as the last time I tried an elimination diet, there weren't any foods that made a difference. Stretching and working with my neck and shoulders seems to be the key-- which means I need to avoid spending all day hunched over the computer or curled up with a book. DAMMIT. So I've been getting out more and reading less, and reminding myself to get up and stretch, etc etc.

4. Elimination diets are interesting. Since I've never done one unless I was desperate--three weeks of headaches will do that to you--I never do it in an organized enough way. There are so many variables, and unless you can go live in a convent somewhere, it's just impossible to shut everything down. Or at least, it is if you're me and you don't really care about it that much. I ended up going about two and a half weeks with no alcohol, sugar, or artificial sweeteners, and about one and a half weeks with no dairy and no grains (gluten or otherwise). I've slowly been adding stuff back over the past ten days or so, and since at the moment I've only been headache free for five or six days, I don't think it's any of the food items.

5. Over the last few days, I've added back corn-- I waited on that one since I was a little suspicious about it. The worst migraine I've had in a couple of years was after I had tamales for dinner the previous night. But I've had corn every day for the past three days, and I feel great, so I think that's ok. I still haven't had any peanuts or peanut butter, so that's the only thing left to add back in. But I think it's going to be fine.

6. The "no dairy" and "no gluten" evangelists, I think, would say I didn't give it long enough. And yeah, maybe they're right. But I know people who are gluten sensitive or lactose intolerant, and they can tell within hours if they've eaten something they shouldn't have. If that were me, I would totally get on board. It wouldn't take five minutes for me to sign on to that program if it made that big a difference. But if you have to avoid something for weeks, and then three days after you add it back in you still can't tell any difference, I'm not convinced it's a problem. The stretching and the activity level seem to make a much bigger, more noticeable difference for me.

The color of spring #2

7. But there are headaches, and then there's how I feel in general. And doing this did remind me how much better I feel (headaches aside) when I avoid sugar. I feel no need to become a zero sugar person, but I do feel better if I limit sugar, and if you want specifics, at the moment that means that I'm avoiding anything that has more than 6g of sugar, which I somewhat arbitrarily picked because my favorite Kind bar has 6g of sugar. I feel noticeably better when I'm not eating a sugary snack two or three times a day-- and that can happen if I'm not paying attention, because I have a definite sweet tooth.

On an entirely different topic: I've been learning a lot recently, and we've had a couple of significant life changes--like MadMax moving back home after college-- but it's not stuff I'm ready to type about yet. And also, we're headed out to our favorite lake for the holiday weekend, so I'll be out of range for at least a few days. And since I'm supposed to be spending less time at the computer, I thought I'd take advantage of the opportunity to be offline for awhile. So, not sure when I'll be back-- probably soon, I don't seem to be able to stay away-- but I hope you have a great weekend and a good start to your summer.

Things worth reading/listening to:
- This older post about writing and storytelling from Jenny Crusie
- Modern Mrs. Darcy's Summer Reading Guide (you have to sign up with your email address)
- Book rec: Nothing to See Here by Kevin Wilson (heavy on the profanity but sharply observed)
- Fascinating podcast episode of the week: An interview with Ezra Klein on the Ten Percent Happier podcast, episode #248. Klein dissects our polarization and what can (and can't) be done about it. I'll be thinking about this one for weeks.