The Glory Of Age

The Gift That Keeps On Giving

I watch the clock that follows me relentlessly, stalking me like a shadow.

With one hand, it gives me pain in my lower back and a crink in my neck. My legs no longer move as I resemble the Tin Man with every echoing creek.

A youthful woman in the mirror has been replaced with a more haggard woman with the occasional silver streak.

I stare at this older person looking back at me and snigger, there is no way that person is me.

My boobs are sagging, my skin is sagging, my bum is sagging. Sometimes, I feel like a fabulous Barbie being left under a heat lamp, melting more and more by the second.

I curse the sand that trickles to the bottom of the hourglass, which bursts and sand embeds itself in my eyes, ensuring I see nothing else but the seconds that I cannot relive or return.

As I stagger around, blinded, I miss the brightly wrapped gifts that time has given me. That my ever-increasing age is not just a death sentence, but a privilege.

Time has given me the strength to tell my enemies to fuck off, that I will not sit and tolerate their abuse today. Time has made me grow strong in the face of danger, as I deal with it head-on, my enemies cowering at my feet as if the Incredible Hulk had burst his way into their lives.

Time has led to experiences which have led to wisdom. I look down at twenty-year-old me who was taught to value myself based on boys and popularity, rather than by my own standards.

Time has taught me that those perfect girls flaunted on the cover of magazines, bathed in diamonds and jewels are as fictional as Santa Claus. A man behind the screen tweaking her this way and that, until he is happy with the woman in front of him, real or not.

Time has allowed me to feel love and loss, knowing how incredible it can feel to be held and how destroying it can feel to be thrown away, I swim in a vast sea of emotions which may seem overwhelming but is a privilege the Gods envy us for.

Age is a gift, not all experience but we should all cherish, as one day we will find fate will take that gift away.