Relative Beauty

The other day, Simon and I were down in Phoenix buying a cargo van with the intention of turning it into a camper van (that's for another post...don't worry, it's coming...there's just not much to tell right now). I happened to catch a look at myself in the rearview mirror, and without even thinking about it, I said, "I feel ugly today...and not just today...pretty much everyday." Simon, having known me for as long as he has, knows that I'm not one to fish for compliments, and therefore didn't respond with compliments or arguments or tell me how silly I was. Instead, he told me how sad it made him feel to hear me say things like that about myself. So we chatted about it a bit. I said that I don't like my face. I don't like the way I look in photos, and that I hate having my picture taken, because as the years have gone on, I've developed more lines, more wrinkles, my hair is rapidly turning a (frequently complimented, oddly enough) shade of silver, and when I smile, one of my eyes get squinty, and that wasn't always the case. I told him that there are mornings when I can't bear to even look at myself in the mirror, with the remnants of sleep evident in the bags under my eyes and the wrinkles from the pillows still pressed into my face. To this, he responded with something along the lines of: you're getting older, it's normal, in 10 years you're going to look even older and you'll wish that you looked how you look right now. All of those things are true. And I know this. It's just that some days are harder than others to accept the fact that I'm not a fresh-faced 20-something anymore.

I've loved my 30's (good thing I've still got about 4 more years of them before I have to grapple with my 40's). My 30's have been so much better than my 20's, for various reasons. I'm much more centered than I was in my 20's...I feel like I know myself better, and I don't feel the need to apologize for what I like and what I don't like. Not that I'm callous or uncompromising, but I spend a lot less time worrying about what other people think than I did a decade ago. I do what makes me happy, and I don't feel bad about it. In all reality, making myself happy first makes me a much more pleasant person to be around...you can't make others happy if you're a miserable human being yourself. I learned that...in my 30's. :) I don't feel like there are these big momentous things I've yet to accomplish...I know that things will happen all in good time, and if they don't happen, well, the plan will just change and something else will come along. I don't spend a lot of time thinking about where I think I should be at 36. I'm just here...doing my thing...taking stock of where I was, where I am, and where I might like to be in the coming weeks and months...I get overwhelmed if I think out too much farther than that. I try not to stress too much about it...my life is relatively simple these days. 

I work with people who are quite a bit younger than me, and I hear them lament about turning 25, because turning 25 means they've only got 5 more years until they turn 30. It's funny how devastating a number than be, and how that devastating number is different for everyone. I don't know if I have a devastating number. I guess if I had to pick one right now, it would probably be 50...not because it seems old to me, but because I don't know what I'll be like then...what things will be important to me, what things will scare me, what things will no longer matter, what friends I will have lost and gained...those things change so much over the years. I can't imagine 40 will be that much different than 36, but I know that 50 definitely will be, and that's why it's my current scary number. But I know that as I get closer to 50, that scary number will change.

I remember when my parents and their friends all started turning 40, how old they seemed to my junior-high self. Now that I'm closer to 40 than 30, I think about how young they must have felt as they entered their 4th decade of life...because I'm almost there and I still feel relatively young most of the time. It's funny how the parties were decked out in black balloons and tombstones and lamentations about the birthday girl or guy being "over the hill." 40 is nothing. 40 is barely halfway through what would be considered an average lifespan. When I think about it now, I think it's kind of awful to treat any age like you've got one foot in the grave. I know it's done in jest, but there are people who are sensitive about those kinds of things. In a perfect world, growing old is something that would be celebrated, not mourned.

Age is nothing but a number...it's so arbitrary that it can be reduced to nothing but a way of keeping track of how many times a person has gone around the sun. It's kind of fun to think about it that way...I've gone around the sun 36 times so far, and hopefully I'll get to go around a bunch more times before it's time for me to exit this existence. It's funny, my friends in Flagstaff range in age from a 20 year-old with a sweet, old soul, to a shit-talking 70 year-old with a heart of gold. All of these friends have been craftily curated by me based on their willingness to accept me, for me, and by me accepting them, for them. Lawrence might make me gag when he tells me that I'm the same age as his mom, and Thomas might give me crap about trying to make him fat with my cookies, but our interactions are so genuine and real that we can hang out for hours and at the end of the night, it feels like mere minutes have passed...we've traveled just a little father around that sun...together.

So there's that. I don't necessarily attribute my random feelings of being ugly with my age. It's more a disappointment that I don't look like I used to, and really, what a silly thing to be hung up on. It's safe to say that there are 36 year-olds who look younger than me and who look older than me. I don't know what 36 is supposed to look like, I just know what I look like, and there are days when I don't like the face looking back at me. That's just how it is. Most days, I don't think about it much. Truthfully, even on the days that I do think about it, I don't think about it for very long. After Simon and I had that conversation in the car on Tuesday about how I'm not actually ugly, I didn't think about it again for the rest of the day. We bought our van, we had a celebratory beer, we went to Trader Joe's and bought some of our favorite treats, and had an all-around really good day. And my appearance had not one thing to do with any of it.

I am, however, currently one of those people who have a pet as my Facebook profile picture. I always found it a little odd when people would have profile pictures of things other than themselves. The reasoning for the pet profile pic is multi-factorial. One, I took the picture of Cooper with a Christmas bow on his head back in December when I was wrapping presents...it was super cute (as is he), and it was appropriate at the time. Unlike me, he just gets cuter as he ages...he went from a cute little puppy to a cute little dog to a cute little old man. Photos of him are far cuter photos of me...although maybe a little less interesting, as he never goes anywhere very fun...most of his photos are taken from the comfort of the couch. Fact of the matter is, I've just been too lazy to change my profile picture. That and I don't have very many pictures of myself. I'm not into selfies...at all. I hate that the word 'selfie' is even in my vocabulary. Perhaps I'm just bitter that my arms aren't long enough to take a decent selfie. Even if my arms were long enough, there's still that squinty eye to contend with...hahaha! Honestly, I think most of us look best with a little distance between us and the camera...close up pictures of faces are just kind of awkward...unless you have really long arms (or a small head), then they're less so, I guess.    

I didn't write this with the intention of my readers to come back with comments about how I look...good, bad, or otherwise. In truth, how others feel about my appearance doesn't really change the way I feel about my appearance. I know there are days when I look a little worse for the wear, and there are days that I look acceptable, and the few times a year when I actually do something with myself, I look pretty darn good. I think regardless of age, we all have ugly days...some (thankfully few) are just a little more ugly than others. I've kind of gotten to the point where I don't spend a whole lot of time fussing with my appearance, since I'm not the one who's going to be looking at me all day. But...due to that, there are days when I think maybe I should care a little more...maybe then I won't be so disgusted when I catch my eye in the mirror, a large window, or the silver paper towel holder in a public restroom. 

I hope I get the opportunity to age gracefully, that I will be able to chalk these ugly days up to nothing but fleeting insecurity. I have a good life. I have great friends, I live in a great town, I have a little dog who thinks the world of me, I have a partner who is a much better companion than I ever could have hoped for, I have the means to live comfortably and to make plans for the future. My life is good, and that person in the mirror? The one with the wrinkles and the grey hair and the squinty eye and the armpit chub? That's just a facade for what's inside, because that's truly all that should matter in life.