I Can’t Be Getting Older

Nothing bedevils a woman’s peace than the realization that she won’t be the woman she used to be in a matter of time. What woman deals with growing older with level-headed grace anyway? Not me. Not yet.

Even so, the milestone of reaching the huge five-O is set to arrive in a few years’ time.

Nope, no Botox nor cosmetic surgery in my future plans: You see, anything related to doctors, hospitals, clinics. needles petrify me. They do little to pep up a weary soul anyway. Maybe men could sail through the daunting waves by the setting sun, but women like me continue to contract apprehensions throughout the ‘ordeal’.

Aging is supposed to transport me to some larger thinking on compassion for my fellowmen, as well as to promote the rescuing of our planet for the succeeding generation. Pfft… how about letting me save myself first?

The ticking clock will soon plant itself against me in patterns that sidestep sensibility and protection. Soon soon, my ephemeral resplendence will be stripped off; Only the words are bound to remain for my redemption.

As the dysfunctional essence of maturity has become imminent — my boss, in a ribbing manner, started calling me “old girl.” Worse, I’ve begun taking it as a compliment.

I even trumped privacy in exchange for the opportunity to show the world, for the last time perhaps, that I have got it — before the dark birds of time finally snatch away whatever pleasant that’s still left in sight.

Still and all, I’m playing it out till the end — contending with the truth I am made of blood and thunder.

But please, please… spare me from the deep wrinkles and the impending crabbiness.

 

I know, I’m no great beauty. Well, I ain’t bad-looking, either. There was no photoshopping here at least. You see, teaching English to bratty uninterested foreign Asian students has taken its toll. Yeah, that’s my excuse.

Solitude On My Own Terms

Warm on the heels of famous women and their recent breakdowns, Demi  and Heather were the “It” girls of my generation who were both destined to become eternally cute and popular. Having been casualties of humiliating divorces, they’re also now both enduring the ruthless passage of time. Recently pegged as poor little rich women who’ve somehow lost their way, many have slammed them for being spoiled by their wealth and fame that they couldn’t deal with their current mid-life crisis like the rest of us.

How good can people get sometimes at creating a smokescreen that obscures their true feelings and plights?

The inclination of these hapless celebrities to succumb to drugs and alcohol has puzzled me for too long. What really drives them to give in to such pernicious temptations? Has their pain become unbearable, resulting to their inevitable free fall into the abyss that culminated in their self-destruction?

I’m in no position to cast stones at anyone this time as I have a gentle understanding of what these people have gone through. Melodramatic as it may sound, I too know what real pain feels like. The sickening ache that I’m sure can overwhelm even the strongest of hearts. How many times have I skirted on the very edges of despair when this soul of mine felt like crying out loud in the rain?

More than I’m willing to admit, I guess.

I don’t remember ever inviting drama into my life and yet it has come like a cat that has sprung unbidden onto my lap. Then there had been moments when certain kinds of melancholy or some sense of emptiness would creep in like a mysterious stranger in the middle of the night, and the only sensible way out was for me to relearn how to sail through the rough seas.

Growing up and even now that I’m an adult, I’ve always felt like an outcast. Exactly much the same as the eternal wallflower that prides itself on contemplating the paradigms of its existence, while possessing a pleasant awareness of an alternative route to an imagined realm at liberty from all things mundane.

Music, movies, literature, art, nature… They’re the outlines that characterize the wonderful breadth of my solitary world. The best friends I’ve had for so long. Even the stark beauty I find in the heart of loneliness has not shown any signs of fading.

Alone with my thoughts, I could conjure up happiness every now and then, muse on some lonesome episodes from my past, and in all its glory bring back the dead and gone..

Worlds might have come crashing down and prayers remained unanswered. I, who have gone off the deep end in certain unrelenting personal winters of my life, am still determined to tough it out.

As we’ve no choice but to soldier on.

I remember how my father, who had sensed my predicaments in his earlier ailing years, had told me these exact words with a smile, “Even if I want to, I can’t get too worried about you. You’re the true-blooded daughter of mine who can easily discern the correct path and decide on the right thing to do. You’ve always been strong.”

Oh dear father… if you only knew…