Today is my birthday. And yes, I'm in my ( late....) forties

Sooner or later we all discover that the important moments in life are not the advertised ones, not the birthdays, the graduations, the weddings, not the great goals achieved. The real milestones are less prepossessing. They come to the door of memory unannounced,
-'people' that amble in,  bringing along the 'awakening touch' that simply makes you never want them to leave.
Our lives are measured by these....

I'm looking back, considering all the things I have never accomplished -- all the things I have yet to do!
At the same time, I'm looking at all the things I have done.

In the past year, since my last birthday, I have learned so much, and believed I have really grown in many ways with that.

I have travelled a little further, I've met a lot of special people... a few extra special ones as well.
I've grown a 'tougher skin' and gained a lot of self-confidence.
I have come to learn more of who I am and what I can do.
I've realized the possibilities in my life are almost endless, and I've picked up a lot of new challenges.
I look at the world in a positive way now.
I am ready to take on what comes along.
 Life is looking good.
I know it won't always be easy, by any stretch of the imagination, but I also know I'm able to survive.
I will be okay...

And that is what life has taught me in my 40s. It is a much more comfortable place to be than in my 30s ( counseling myself ?). I can only wait to see what life brings next!

I still find each day too short for all the thoughts I want to think, all the walks I want to take, all the books I want to read,  fulfilling my passions for crafting and all the friends I want to see.

Yes, this weekend, I turned 48—a fairly uneventful birthday in the grander scheme, but the narcissistic forties seem to demand a hyperawareness of every passing year, all in relation to the dreaded 5-0: Party!!!…Okay, I’m nearly halfway to fifty…Hmm, I’m closer to fifty, and therefore ....death (?), than I was last year…Crap, I’m as 'old' as my mother  when I last remember saying how 'old' she was … Gosh, I’m halfway through my late-forties, what have I done with my life?…Just breathe?, just breathe?, I’m touching the year that touches fifty....that is half of a century  (100 - 50= 50)...noooooo!
 After spending the years dutifully applying serums and antiwrinkle creams, my let’s-be-real-here-still-not-very-old age is finally beginning to show, and now is when I actually can start bristling at those eye crinkles and deepening forehead lines and slowly-but-surely 'flabbering' arms and legs not forgetting the buldging belly ( sigh* sigh* ) They’re no longer theoretical.  THEY ARE HERE TO STAY!.
And yet, I feel 'comfortable'  ( after few comparison ) I am 'cool' with being who I have become.
 I do things now that would have been unthinkable when I was in my twenties .
I even have no worries going out without makeup or go braless instead of wearing a massively padded  push-up( oops! cat out of the bag )
The older I get, the more I realize I couldn’t give a toss about winning approval from those around me.

 “No one can make you feel inferior without your consent.” 

I have  applied this  to my relationships, my  life, and, yes now to beauty.
 Sometimes we’ll stop ourselves from doing things out of fear; other times we’ll do things to advance ourselves in others’ eyes.  damn it!—Be and look your best—’cause you’re awesome and you feel like showing it off, by your own standards, no one else’s!  (eventhough everyone says I'm too 'thin'  ???)
aaaahhhh...who cares..I love just the way I am.
It's my birthday, I can afford to be selfish today.
Haha...
Until a few years ago, I never thought I'd like this decade. How frightening, I thought. But I'm pretty much at peace with it. I'm feeling old, but it could be a lot worse!