You Are Not Old

I am sitting at my sister’s birthday brunch. They’re turning 24. 24 years old, one year before that frontal lobe is fully formed. Every year for their birthday I plan a huge event, trying to find a way to have each birthday top the last. Birthdays have always been monumental for me, I can remember essentially every birthday I have had, from the really lame ones to the exceptionally iconic ones. Each represented a new milestone. My sisters too, watching them grow up and evolve. Its supernatural almost. Freaky. Watching time just go by. Lately I have been so consumed by time, the sense of lifetimes and timelines and what is after this life, is there anything after it? Are the mistakes and lessons learned here the only lessons and experiences I will ever have? I’ve been racking my brain thinking about life’s conundrum, turns out there’s actually a medical term for this, they call it ‘reincarnation OCD’, basically having this feeling or inability to accept the unknown resulting in intrusive thoughts that come to the surface repeatedly…Here I was thinking I was simply having a  deeper spiritual awakening.

These thoughts have been floating around me for a while, but more so recently as I look at my life in actuality. Everything I have manifested as come true. The things that I have wanted and worked for have come to fruition. Sometimes it feels surreal, when I look out the window of the best view I have ever had in an apartment,  a home I always dreamed of. When I clink glasses with a friend at an empty lounge on a rainy day, staring at a person who holds a friendship I have always longed for. When I feel the hand of my lover resting on my shoulder, because my presence brings him peace, a love I always knew I deserved. All of these should be evidenced that this beautiful life exists, because I am a powerful worthy being. It’s evidence that God and this Universe are marvelous and must be bigger than I could ever imagine.

I started to wonder, why do I struggle with wanting the answers, when I could simply trust that my soul will always do what is best for me? I mean I made it this far right?! My fear of needing to know it all continuously gets in the way of being present.

I feel like a broken record, and just as I feel myself fall into another river of thought, I snap out of it as I listen to a buzzed loud beautiful brown girl sitting across from me. I’m at brunch, for sisters birthday. They are turning 24. Be Present. Be Present. Be Present. It’s my sisters best friend, with a worried expression directed towards me, droning on about how she’s so old.

Old?

I look at her for a moment, long and hard “How old are you?” I ask, curious and releived to be out of my own thoughts.

“I’m turning 26 soon.” She replied. I stared at her blankly, now I am very aware I am the older sister, and careful to not fall into the cliché of the bitchy sibling, I tell her almost instantaneously.. “you are not old.”

What I really wanted to say is “Boo you are just at the beginning.” I remember 26, in fact I loved 26. I was so beautiful, I traveled to a couple countries, I had just gotten a hang of my affirmations and post 25, I was serious about my love life. In fact, 26 was when all my manifestations really began. To put it bluntly, 26 was hot.

In fact I have never actually really cared about age, I never actually consider myself old to be fair. It dawns on me,while I’m freaking out over if reincarnation is real… are people afraid of being old now?

It made me think of my commute on the train I had the other day. I was in between podcasts when I overheard two women talking, they looked older than me, but one had NASA intern name tag hanging on her backpack, I wondered to myself  “Good Lord how long do you have to intern at NASA before you get a job? Whatever thank God I work in public service.” Then I heard one say she had a knees brace on cause she tore her meniscus ,which I learned from Bravo’s Southern Charm happens in your knee essentially due to getting older, the guy on the show who tore his was 38 so I figured yea that makes sense maybe these girls are in their 30s … but it was when I heard the other woman say “yea we’re getting old, once I turned 22 everything went downhill” that I froze.

…EXCUSE ME?

22? 22? Do you know how young 22 is? 22 is drinking at brunch and going out later and feeling fine the next morning. 22 is eating whatever you want, and not having heart burn hours later. 22 is being broke and that being okay cause you’re 22. 22 is making prime mistakes and that being totally alright because you learn from them so you don’t repeat them when you actually get older. 22 is a lifetime ago, 22 is so young that I still feel young now so I cannot imagine how I felt then.

As our stop approached and the train doors opened I watched these two women wobble off the train, following, and then  subsequently walking past them, because my knees are still in tact, I thought about them for the rest of the day. I thought about how much we fear age, and here I was now, months later, at this brunch staring at this young gorgeous girls whose hair looked perfect, without a wink of make up on, who had thrown back at this point 5 mimosas, and I winced. It was worrisome to know that so many of us think that we are old. Like time has completely run out for us. That there was a youth that was so precious and now we are approaching a decrepit point in our life that deems no end.

People have often told me that I look younger than I am, even if they don’t say it, they say it. Co workers at my office naming someone from the 80’s and asking if I have heard of them, or wondering if I knew what life was like before Instagram? Social media in general for that matter. And flattering as it is, there is the wonder of why it is flattering? Being youthful is not the same thing as being beautiful. We think that we have this prime, and I admit I have had eras in my life where I found myself in backyards of rockstars sipping tequila sodas in my bikini, to cuddled up on my mom’s couch with only 500 bucks in my account, to graduating from college and grad school, to crying over a boy I swore I’d marry even though he wasn’t even close to who would essentially be the love of my life… I have lived in eras and none of them feel like a prime to me. None seem like the best of the best, cream of the crop.

I don’t think they should, I think life is about ebbs and flows. When I hear my dad or anyone for that matter, tell me that the 4 best years of their life were college, I get a twinge in my neck, there is so much more life to live, it also simply was not the best 4 of mine, though it probably was one of the most transformational.  My point is, being young for as exciting it is, isn’t the end all be all, and there is such beauty in growing. Sometimes we look back on us when we were younger and we either look at all of the gold and glitter that it was, we romanticize that version of us, because we have this fear of getting older.  I wonder if maybe we do this, because we feel like we are running out of time. Running out of the best part of our lives, and putting a lot of pressure to be the happy ideal versions of ourselves, we think it lies in some version of us that is 18 or 19 and that just isn’t true. For all the excitement and firsts if you really look back you’ll remember some things you experienced that the you now probably wouldn’t repeat.

There are so many times where my life should have or could have stopped, where the timeline could have completely changed or shifted, there are so many times where God and this Universe had my back, quite frankly getting older is privilege. I can still move, and dance and walk and talk and kiss and hug. I am building a life where my memories are meant to comfort me, not result in envy who for I was, but pride in who I allowed me to become.

And while I’m at it, the power of the tongue is strong, if you keep saying you are old instead of honoring your growth you will find yourself looking and feeling that way. Your face that was once recognizable will appear as a stranger, simply because you have spoken yourself so far away from your soul. If you’re not careful, you can become what you fear instead of appreciating what you get to experience. I always have felt as though age is a social construct, you can have a spirit that is timeliness if you really want too.  You can be just as active, and attractive, and excited as you want to be, and still be evolved, wiser, and more experienced.

We let society bog us down with what we think we should be doing or think we should be feeling, when the truth is nothing is really promised. Nothing is guaranteed, 80 years old isn’t guaranteed, shit seeing 50 isn’t guaranteed. You deserve to live a life where you can look back at your past years fondly, knowing your experiences whether bliss or learned lessons, are apart of  the you that exists now.

The you that is proof of survival, the you that is proof that this earth is continuously moving and not stuck in time. The you that is so lucky to be here.

I am excited about getting older, really I am, I am excited because I know that means there are more versions of myself I get to meet. More goals I get to accomplish, different environments I get to be in, and there is nothing I love more than reminiscing. The other day I ran into an old friend, well an ex to be exact, I sat on the other side of the bar and we chatted, it felt so warm to hear his laugh, a reminder of a version of me from before who got to know a version of him too. That same warmth came when talking to one of my closest friends, she’s a mom now, and I told her about my thoughts on getting engaged, that I hoped it would happen soon, we laughed about boys that had broken our hearts before, and scenarios I’d found myself in at 24 that didn’t suit me now.

There is nothing wrong with getting older, its an opportunity to continuously to grow and get to know more of you who are or whoever that is you decide to be.

Jaiaya Johnson, an incredible writer once said “be in love with the season of your life. love your way through. You are not being moved from moment to moment. You are moving your moments. You are the things that is happening to each moment”  in his book Daughter Drink this Water he talks about how society makes you fear getting older, especially women, that they are the forgotten beings after a certain age. Shame on society, cause it isn’t true. I look at my mother with the light stripe of gray at her roots, she looks more beautiful now than she ever has, and its honestly because she’s happy. She’s the healthiest I have ever seen her, she’s the most accepting and graceful, and truly grateful to have made it this far, and it shows.

You are not as old as you think you are and it isn’t about your age, its about the way you’re spending your time… doing the things you love to do, exploring and learning, living with a sense of peace. Be impressed that you made it this far, and think about the future version of you, who will look back at you fondly, who will run into a familiar face at a grocery store and recognize a past part of yourself in their smile. Embrace who you are now, where you are now, and appreciate how much time you may get to experience.

And if none of those deep statements resonate with you, remember that you’re only as hot, smart, funny, outgoing, young, old, as you think you are. You have the ultimate decision on how to view yourself, so why not pay a little homage to you and think of yourself kindly, because God willing you’ve got a long road ahead in this life.

And do you really wanna ride with a knee brace on?