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Pony: 32
2.7.2005
It is just about midnight, and I am listening to a truly excellent cd that Honky made and sent with love from him and Becky from South Orange New Jersey. You know, I have to give that Frank Black solo stuff another try, and dig my Replacements cassettes out of the basement. And that song "under the milky way" by The Church just rocks in the most unapologetically sentimental way.
Chris is at the computer in the living room. I have the laptop with me in our huge bed.
I had strange dreams last night of werewolves, hot cars parked in the sun, and a lean, confident old lady who borrowed a blue mountain bike.
In less than half an hour I will be thirty-two years old. I am not gawkily slumbering through high school in poorly-fitting vintage ensembles. I am not lugging around a backpack of filthy clothes while gamely climbing to the highest vantage point of a city in a country I am visiting for the first time. I am not a student in Jerusalem or Montreal, attending potluck dinner parties with the pervasive three-bean salad and using the word "lover" without sufficient irony. I am also not just entering the workforce and going dancing on weekends in ironic t-shirts and returning to an apartment with roommates who are not my friends.
When does the switch happen from young to old, and do you notice when it occurs? I try to imagine how I would see myself - as a kid, a teen, a university student - if I were I to spy me walking down the street at 32. And I fear that judgement : mostly, these days, when I get dressed, I think of comfort over concept. I try to moisturize, though I don't buy into that wacky anti-aging cream. Mostly, when I dance, it is in my apartment.
I have probably written this before. In fact, I am sure I have. But those people I aspired to be at different times in my life- they don't make sense at all anymore. And I think that every passage of time reflected on involves re-imagining the person you want to be.
I was talking to Sarah around Xmas about how we never go out the way we used to with into the late-night with the urge to be part of the zeitgeist. And while we are happy reading in bed next to the object of our affection, there is some sort of guilt. To who, though? We both decided that it was our future selves.
So 32. I am surrounded by so much love and goodness. I am lucky in more ways than I can articulate. So I think I will tell my past and future selves to (respectfully and lovingly) shut up for a day and enjoy the cake.
