It's just a number, right?

Yes, and also, no. 

To begin I need to acknowledge that I know what a god damn privilege it is to have reached the age of 49. I'm not complacent enough to dismiss that as anything other than what it is - fabulous. Some might say, an achievement. If we're measuring achievements on surviving a number of rotations around the sun with the good fortune of doing little more than just getting up, eating and drinking water that is. With a level of exercise that gamely consists of walking a number of steps a day to register four figures on the jaunty phone health app, then I'm positively a high achiever. Getting here, to this point in my life however, often not so fabulous. A journey of beautiful ups and crashing, crushing downs. I can attest to some wins, I can also tally many losses. Just like you. Just like all of us. Probably. Is it wrong to say, hopefully?

At this point in my life, knocking on 50's door, a lot of things annoy me, myself included much of the time, but equally I find wonder and delight in the ordinary, the things I realise I overlooked in younger days. I get stymied with self doubt but equally have, ta-da, discovered a zero-fucks-to-give mentality that's calcified over the latter years and buoyed me through many a situation. I know what I like, I know where to find it, I finally know what makes me happy and I finally know what I want, yet I really thought I'd be more 'together', you know, more sorted, more organised - sleek perhaps, like a well-groomed racehorse strutting about after another win, a figure of wise authority - ha! I'm laughing just typing that, but I'm absolutely, certainly, definitely none of those things. It turns out I'm still just hurtling around, fumbling and falling through life as much I ever was, feeling not as put-together as other women my age. Maybe it is just a number after all, but who knew middle age was so conflicting and so bloody confusing? Did you? But ahh, maybe we're all just fumbling around? Some of us better at designing and constructing the trompe l'oeil?       

Aside from the obvious physical decline, the weird noises I now make when I either stand up or sit down and the manifold 'surprises' my body throws at me, knocking on is really not too bad.  The other option, if you think about it, is really not too good. 

One thing I struggle with however, aside from the need to have tweezers up the sleeve of anything I wear, is the lack of content out there that 'fits' me today. A straw poll tells me I'm not alone. Not to say that there aren't brilliant writers out there doing sterling, original work because of course, there are, but so much seems too earnest, too cool, too young, too old, too elitist, too up it's own arse, too focused on things I no longer give a flying fuck about. Newspapers aside, I can dip into a few favourite places for my fill but they're scattered and often sketchy.  Music that's not the mainstream is generally directed to men, fashion that makes sense is often really predictable and pedestrian, or it's too, err, fashiony or throwaway. I want food that sings to me (OK, there's loads of places for that), shopping - because god damn it, it makes me feel good - that doesn't scream mindless consumerism. I want the real, the funny, to unpick the uncomfortable, the sublime, the ridiculous, I want to remember why I went upstairs in the first place. 

So I thought I'd write it myself. For no other reason than I just sort of fancied it.