Turning Forty...on the road to 2012

I feel old. I feel slow, out of step and my greys have taken a life of their own. Is THIS what almost 40 feels like?

I’m watching all these younger people around me, living their life, going after their dreams aggressively and I feel like I am standing outside the storefront just watching it all unfold. I don’t care to leave the house much anymore, I don’t want to socialise, I just want to sit in front of my flat screen and hug a cat like an old cat woman…but I don’t have a cat.

I have two young children who need me to be energetic and play horsey and drive bumper cars and take them to the movies. I have a very HAWT husband who looks like he never even heard of ageing and definitely ain’t ready to embrace an old woman in his life. I have a job that needs me to be fun and social and outgoing and aggressive.

Maybe I need vitamins, maybe I need a drink. Maybe, I need cake…ummm..cake.

As part of my 40th birthday celebrations I plan to play mas. My band of choice is Tribe. I’ve played with them before and the service is the best I have ever experienced as a masquerader. On Saturday I went to the launch of the 2012 presentation entitled Take Me To…

The costumes were typical, lots of plumage, teeny tiny bikinis with beads and sequins. And they were all modeled by very tall, leggy, cellulite free girls who looked splendid as they wined and wiggled their costumes for all in attendance to see. 

I must admit that standing so close to the stage looking up at these scantily clad beauties was a lil defeating on the self-esteem but nevertheless I made up my mind that come hell or high water, fat and cellulite, I am playing next year and I am playing with Tribe. The costume I like is designed by Peter Elias and is called Johannesburg. 

My trainer (God bless his chiseled form) told me to hand myself over to him and he’ll make me fit into that costume. The body is willing but I am not sure about my mind. But still, if that costume isn’t motivation enough, what will be? So here we go…

It’s Saturday night, you dress up, you look FOINE, you with FOINE almost-40 women, you are out on the town, it’s late, you are revved up for a real late night lime, you hit up a swanky restaurant and everyone orders tea. TEA??? TEA!!! And not just ordinary tea but Jasmine tea, no milk or sugar…

Then to top it off, they all start to yawn and complain that it’s past their bedtime…at 11.30 pm.

In the meantime, there you are with a mudslide, defiantly swallowing your yawn and ignoring the giddiness taking over your head because you had nothing to eat all night so the vodka is having a party in your empty stomach.

I thank God for my media job that allows me to go out on a regular basis and hang out with people who can still party till dawn. I am not ready to hang up my wedges. If this is what lies on the other side of 40, Lord trust me, I am going into the good night with my fingers gripped firmly around a martini glass stem.

Okay, I fell off the wagon. Blame my pinky toe. I fractured it, couldn’t put on my sneakers, ergo, I couldn’t go to the gym. And my healthy eating bolted. So…I am trying to get back on the wagon…my toe hasn’t healed 100% but I am heading back to the gym next week and hopefully the nutritionist will forget about me until I am ready to report to her about the 10lbs I am yet to drop. AArrghhh, here we go again.

It was too much to hope that a year would pass without me damaging some body part.  Last year, it was my knee, now I have a fractured toe.

My first question to the broad faced Nigerian doc in the Minor OT was if I could exercise. He looked at me all bemused and said no, unless I wanted to be in pain for a long time. So, no gym for me. A pity though, I was on a roll. Two weeks is a long time in no-exercise world. It seems that just when I make up my mind to get this weight loss train moving, something happens to derail me.

I am trying to stick to my meal plan so I’ll keep losing weight in the interim but my son’s birthday cake is just there calling my name and tantalising me every time I open the refrigerator.

AArrgghhh, why does this have to be so hard?

Went to a cruise party some weekends ago and after spinning some of the latest soca and hip hop, the DJ announced he was going to play something for the mature folks. As my bum was about to hit the seats on the upper deck to rest while the mature folk got their groove on, I heard the strains to Frankie and jumped up excitedly cause that’s my JAM!!!

Then it hit me. Wait, I am MATURE folk? Since when did Frankie become old people music? Wasn’t it just a few years ago I was waiting patiently by the radio with my hand hovering over the pause button waiting to record this Sister Sledge hit on cassette?

Then again, if I actually know Sister Sledge, used cassettes and recorded stuff off the radio, I am OLD…uh…I mean mature. Sigh.

Children. While most of my school friends are dealing with teen angst, I am still in the toddler years. Yes, I am the mother of very young children. They’re six and two going on 35 and 22. They’re boys and they have energy for days. Way too much energy for me. I didn’t want to have kids in my 20s cause I wanted to live…party, drink, travel, study, drink some more. I waited till my early 30s to get this parenting thing going but now I understand why making children at 18 makes sense. You need to be young and energetic with good knees to keep up with these younguns.

I am overweight with a missing meniscus and low metabolism so basically I prefer to sit like a slug in front the TV rather than play football or whatever odd game the six-year-old makes up, which usually includes movement. Yes, yes, I know the time will fly and soon they wouldn’t even care if I am alive, unless they need money or the car, and I ought to make the best of these years. Well, I do. Just that I prefer more sedentary activity so board games have become my best friend. Hey, it’s not a cop out. I am teaching them valuable skills here even though I have to build all the words in Scrabble.