It’s snowing. I keep watching for the coyote. There is usually just one around at this time. I have seen two. It was in the afternoon a few weeks ago.
Anyway, they have me distracted. The coffee is good this morning. I slept well. After months of terrible pain it feels so luxurious to sleep through the night.
Today is the eve of what feels like a pretty significant milestone birthday. Tomorrow I turn seventy! Seven decades. Three decades before one hundred! Seems impossible. Only three decades and one year since getting sober. Thirty years plus of life before that.
Looking backwards and forwards at the decades induces a bit of existential anxiety. Or maybe existential vertigo? It’s getting late. What will I do with the time? Who will remember me? Why would anyone? What matters? What have I done?
Eight fifteen now.
Last year sometime I was chatting with a friend about these big birthdays. She asked what I would like to do to celebrate. There’s the “ifs and buts”. If I had a bunch of cash I would… take a big trip. Patagonia or New Zealand? Rome and Berlin to visit my dearest gal pals. Then I said that I should send out invitations for a “spinster” birthday and send it out to all the relatives and friends that over the years have had wedding showers and weddings and baby showers and kids birthdays and graduations. Old spinsters should get some recognition. Perhaps?
Seems kind of too self aggrandizing for me. My whole adult life has been more about less grandstanding.
I am content. I feel comfortable in my own skin. It has been an arduous journey, task, whatever you want to call it. Years and years of going deep into the causes and conditions. It’s not for the faint of heart, this examination of the ugly underbelly. I am so incredibly grateful every day for the stamina to stick it out. By no virtue on my part, I believe I have been granted some measure of grace.
So, for the celebration of my seventieth birthday I am grateful and content to feel safe and warm in this apartment, in this place. To get a glimpse of a coyote early in the morning. For a cup of strong coffee. For an orchid that bloomed in the bathroom window. For swimming aerobics at the Y and the super cute fun ladies in our class. For a little Thai food lunch with a friend. For a homemade cake that I will bake myself later this evening. For the splurge on a pedicure.
☮️🙏🏻🦋
Spinster Life 