It crept up on me. I mean, that’s what you say every year, right? But, 22 year old me couldn’t imagine being older. I was in a tough place that lasted several years, and couldn’t imagine a time outside of everything being tiring and painful (emotionally — I’m a super sensitive person, wouldn’t you know, and it’s taken years to grow a thicker skin and learn how to process all the things).
For many reasons, at midnight on my 40th birthday, I began to cry. It had been a weekend of contemplating the passage of time. Mostly, the time since I moved away from home (the first time), the time since I met my husband, since we had our kids.
I watched our friends’ older kiddos play basketball with their dads and be gentle and playful and I got choked up. I looked out at mountains and I wandered the woods and I thought, I’m so fortunate to have seen what I’ve seen, experienced love and beauty, to be truly cared for. That no matter what happens, I have those memories with people I love, views of vastness that make me feel small, that make the dark times small.
To have learned that pushing through the pit in my stomach was worth it, to learn over the years that the passage of time is often what heals the pit. It’s realizing that the minutes keep passing when it’s painful, and you just keep breathing, and then all of a sudden it’s been a year, or 18 or 35, and you realize that the pit has been gone for some time now.
Here at 40, I cried because I’m grateful to be here.
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