this is nothing new, exactly. there's been a very gradual increase in numbers, mainly concentrated on the left side of my widow's peak (my left, not yours). multi-hued hair (variations on 'brown') accommodates it well, really, so i suspect the transition to a silver palette will extend across decades. the pigment-free hair is, it seems, pretty much white - not silver nor steel & certainly not gray. and it is as wavy as my current mane, which went from silky straight to slightly curly and occasionally frizzy after having my children.
i have always had the tendency (ask my mother) to seek the future rather than fully dwell in the present (though i think i can also claim to only ever so rarely wallow in the past), but i believe i have resolved that to some extent when it comes to aging. i suppose that is inevitable once a body reaches beyond the half-way mark. and, really, this business of people thinking fifty or, even, sixty is some sort of half-way mark is just plain fantasy. i think most of us in my generation have surely reached mid-age by our early forties, if not earlier. the pinnacle. the mountaintop. the point where you hover, oh-so-briefly, and look out and see . . . sky and clouds and sun. before sending your gaze in search of earth tones once more and resuming the machinations of your life.
where am i going with this. not sure. while nothing is static ever, it does seem as if my life . . . our life . . . is about to (already is) evolve at a quicker pace than the past handful of years. while the transition to becoming parents was, essentially, an abrupt (albeit joyous and greatly anticipated) change, the transition to a post-child-rearing life promises to be exceedingly gradual & no less transformative. and it will all be new. but it won't be the newness of life before children, when the 'firsts' still far outnumbered the innumerables (or, even, the seconds, thirds, fourths, or fifths). it will be, well, old new, i guess. experienced newness. well, let's just say, it will be different.
so, i'm mulling it over . . . while it's happening.
i am resuming my investigations
(and refilling the corners, edges, hidey holes)
of me.
or, that is, of a me without an asterisk
almost always visible
(*mommy)
just as my oldest starts to do the same
(*child)
we are, of course, a sum
of all our definitions.
all of our clarifications.
our amendments.
they don't disappear.
maybe they are engulfed.
absorbed.
gobbled up.
as a new one starts shimmering,
like the birth of a star,
pulling us into a different place -
one where we would not be
without all that already was.
so
. . . . .
i'm mulling it over.
