Happy Birthday to Me (Sigh)

I will christen​ returning to my blog on my birthday. I am 35 (shut up, those of you who know I’m not; just go with it). I like that age. If I had to be stuck at an age, like on that TV series “Highlander” where the Immortals stayed the age at which they were killed, I’d say I’d like to be stuck at 35 (can you imagine being stuck as a teen? Almost a fate worse than death).
 
I am actually 54. I feel I must admit this since many of you know I have an adult son, and I don’t want anyone thinking I had him when I was like 12 or something. I’ve also considered saying that I’m 70, which would elicit comments on how amazingly good I looked. But then no one my age would want to hang out with me and I’d never get a date.
 
So why am I such a 35-ish fan? I figure that your 20s are fun, and you’re probably as hot as you’ll ever look, but it’s still a time of figuring yourself out. Once you get into your 30s, at least for us women, you’ve gotten past all the drama of youth, you may be in a committed, mature relationship, and you likely have a real job in your career. Your 20s are for trying life on. Your 30s are for wearing it.

In your 30s you’re still young. Especially these days with all the stuff you can do to yourself to look better. I truly believe 40s – even 50s – are the new 30s. Sure you start getting the middle aged issues and your metabolism hates you, so you have to watch what you eat, exercise, etc.  But most importantly, you have moved from the acquisition of knowledge to the wisdom of life experience. And that only gets better with age. 
 
They also say your sex drive is even better, at least for women. Whether it is or not, the point is you know what you’re doing and are probably a better sex partner than you’ve ever been. If you can stay awake.
 
Of course, the fact that I am not actually 35 can be depressing. Sure, inside my head I’m totally 35. Sometimes I’m probably younger (to the point of being goofy and immature, but I have fun, so deal with it). The frustrating, even depressing part is that I feel like a 30-something trapped in a 54-year-old body. It’s as if I traveled into the future and can’t go back.
 
Bottom line is, and you know it’s coming: “you’re only as old as you feel.” This is basically true. No, you won’t look that age, but you can act that age. Just because I turned a certain age, I didn’t start wearing reading glasses around my neck, buying support stockings or taking up crocheting doilies. I live about the way I did at 35. I still like the same type of music, I often use a youthful vernacular (could just be that I’m around college kids all the time), I go out with friends and act silly (but not stupid silly), I enjoy talking about subjects that have nothing to do with retirement or the need for bunion removal, and I try to look as young as I can within reason (I’m always asking my stylist, who likes my hair long, to let me know if I get to the point where I look like I’m trying to look too young and start coming across as those women who try to look too young but instead look pathetic).
 
Unfortunately, for those of us over about 40, time is perceived as moving faster (actual psychological fun fact), and even when we feel young, we can’t escape the age we really are and whatever comes with it. So when you meet an older person (“older” being relative to your own age), don’t judge us or write us of as “out of it,” “uncool” or worse, unable to hold down the same jobs younger people do. Hey, I’m a Gen-Xer. I grew up with MTV and video games and can use the hell out of a computer. Instead, hang with us; get to know us, and see what it’s like to be 35, or 54 or 97 or whatever 😃  We may have more in common than you think.