-Samuel Ullman

Ok, so I wake up this morning, my 2nd day of being 33 years old, (on my first day, i slept all day; i just couldn’t seem to get enough rest- another sign of being past your prime) and I feel like rolling over back into slumber.  However, the thing that prevents me is in the form of a semi-hairy devastatingly cute doggie wagging his tail and stretching his arms and legs.  Forcing myself to get up and see to my cute little obligation, I figure this must be the way most feel when one gets to middle age.  I’m not in a slump or crisis, I am perfectly contented and am in the moment.

My close friend tells me to get a new job, that people don’t feel successful without a career, but for the moment, I am enjoying listening to the songs of the birds.  [UNLESS they are making another nest in on the boards of my deck right above my porch swing; we’ve moved two nests in the exact same spot so far!]  And anyway, I do have a career already!

A mid-life crisis?  It’s a possibility, I’m around that age, but my realization that of “what have I done with my life” is constructive, not obtrusive.  I am doing what I have always wished to, writing creatively, and helping other people.  Sure, I got A’s in my college English classes and was pretty good at writing essays for other classes, but that was so 10 years ago.  Mostly though, I have a lot of life experience to record.

But…why I think that I have reached mid-life:

• I make lists of tasks that I need to do
• There is so much house to clean
• I need a nap after running through the house cleaning and just doing laundry
• My body no longer fits into the yoga poses as easily as a year ago
• I’m constantly losing things; most often my phone- but easy fix- (I can just call that) 
• I make a list of what to have for dinner the coming week
• All the makeup in the world won’t improve the bags under my eyes
• I can’t recall from my notes anymore the specifics…i.e. I was talking about this recipe to make for dinner, and i couldn’t remember anything that’s in it except for the word i scrawled down; good thing next to ‘shrimp’ was the page of the cookbook
• Or I just forget what I was talking about all of sudden
• make a cup o’ coffee at 4pm just to stay up till 1030
• Oh, AND my work partner started laughing when he saw a picture of me with my cheerleading buddies when I was a teenager and said “so this was when you actually HAD lips!” …ya haha

“Middle age is a time in which adults take on new job responsibilities and therefore often feel a need to reassess where they are and make changes while they feel they still have time.”

According to psychologytoday.com, midlife is generally around age 40, give or take 20 years.  Perfect, I am 33, and have felt wise beyond my years since I was 16

OK- I have had a job responsibility shift, and have had to reassess and make changes (like writing) while I still HAVE THE TIME.

Maybe I am having a crisis, the realization that I am in my ‘fun and flirty’ middle age.  It’s totally not a bad thing, just the realization of being a “grown up”