​Reflections from the Brink of 60

I turn 60 in just a few days. It seems impossible — it happened so fast. In my mind, I’m still that 21-year-old newly minted adult, making mostly horrible decisions with an occasional glimmer of maturity tossed in, throwing myself into the drama and joys of life with great gusto, and playing at being grown up because in my heart of hearts, deep down where nobody knows, I’m pretty sure I’m still a child.

So now, I’m on the brink of 60, and here’s the God’s honest truth: I still feel like three toddlers in a trench coat. I still can’t believe that I’m not only an actual grown-up, but that I’ve been one for more than 40 years.

And what a 40 years it has been. There have been many times when my life felt like a giant pterodactyl shitstorm. I’ve frequently traveled the thinnest tightrope, perched above a pit of poisonous snakes, wearing a roller skate on one foot and a stiletto on the other, with a banana peel and an oil slick up on the tightrope ahead of me, ready at any moment to pitch me into oblivion. In those moments, my only choice is to move forward and step onto that banana peel, slide right into the oil slick, and then just close my eyes and pray that I make it through the precarious slide and finally reach the canyon wall on the other side. (Suck it, snakes!)

But oh, what a feeling when I make it to the other side, knowing that I’ve either narrowly averted disaster or lived through it and come out (hopefully) a little wiser than I was when I chose to step on that terrifying tightrope in the first place.

I have always been someone who, on the surface, appears to have it mostly together. I’ve been pretty good at masking all my life so that on the outside, I appear fine. I remember talking to my mom many years ago when I was going through my second divorce, and she said to me, “It’s always hard to know how you’re feeling, because you always seem fine.” Years of practice, Mom.

Inside, I’m almost always a roiling pool of emotions. On the surface, I’m fine, no matter what. That conversation with my mom has stuck with me all these years, because, until my own mother said that to me, I never realized I was actually pulling it off.

I used to volunteer for a local Crisis Clinic phone line, and every year when we trained new volunteers, the director would call me in to role-play phone calls with the new recruits. Let me tell you, I put those recruits through the wringer. At the end of the “calls” with me, they’d nearly be a quivering puddle of jelly, and they’d tell me, “Wow! You’re a great actress.” Years of practice, friends.

But the truth was, in a lot of those calls, all I was doing was taking the mask off under the guise of training. I was channeling years of anxiety and ineptitude into those “calls” because I could justify that maybe it was okay to show myself when doing so might actually help someone.

And in the real crisis clinic calls that I took every week? I always felt pure panic. I had no idea what I was doing, but at least I could listen and possibly help someone else who struggled as much as (and probably more than) I pretended I didn’t.

The other day, I streamed the movie Dear Evan Hansen, which is all about mental health. It’s an absolutely beautiful and devastating movie if you haven’t seen it. There’s a character in it called Alana. She’s the go-getter in high school. The one who is involved in everything: class president, speaking in front of the school, volunteering for causes. And she reveals to the titular character that, like him, she is filled with anxiety and depression. That she’s throwing herself into all the things and masking in front of the world. It’s her way of coping. It's her way of muddling through.

I’ve never felt so seen as I did when Alana sings a song called “The Anonymous Ones” (here it is on YouTube if you’re interested). I recognized myself in that perfectly presented musical moment, and I recognized millions of others who are just getting through every day in the best way they can.

That’s not to say that every moment of every day is spent on the edge of disaster. I’ve led a life of luck, joy, beauty, and love, too. I’ve had so much luck in my career, being able to do the things that I love. I don't think I'm any more talented than a whole lot of other writers, but I have had many lucky breaks that have allowed me to write for a living, and I am so grateful for that luck.

​And while I spent the first several decades of my life rather unlucky in romantic love (okay — mostly it was just making bad choices and luck had nothing to do with it),  my life has always been filled with people I love so deeply that just thinking of them and spending time with them brings me great joy.

I could sit here and count all my bad decisions, but what would be the point in that? Despite all my insecurities and anxieties, I’ve also always had a tremendous ability to cope (not always in healthy ways, but it’s the journey, y’know?). I have always found the humor in life. I’ve always been able to laugh my way through everything, and I’ve always been able to laugh at myself. That laughter has been one of the most important aspects of every moment of my life and will continue to be.

Likewise, I've always been wildly optimistic. I’m able to find that optimism again and again, and while it may make me seem a little (or a lot) naïve, it has been a saving grace. We all need hope in our lives, and I’ve been lucky enough to be an extremely hopeful person.

I’ve also always had a level of enthusiasm that would inspire Tigger. It’s that hope thing, again. I love nothing more than a new adventure. I love waking up knowing I have a full day of as-yet-undefined moments where I get to choose, over and over again, to shape it into something beautiful.

It’s such a dichotomy, isn’t it? Anxious, insecure, often terrified, but also optimistic, excited, and enthusiastic. Welcome to me, friends. I’m a beautiful mess.

But then, isn’t that life, really? A beautiful mess. An opportunity to stumble through, slide across an oil-slicked tightrope on a banana peel (sometimes falling off into that pit of snakes), and always emerging on the other side a little stronger, a little wiser, and a little more confident that you can do hard things.

Somehow, through it all, I’ve managed to stumble into a beautiful life. One with high highs and low lows. But I also recognize now that the highs are even more beautiful because of the lows. And to get through it, all I have to do is take one step at a time on that tightrope, pausing to look around at the scenery and take it all in. It’s each pause, each breath, each step, each glance. Moving moment to moment lets me focus on the present and look away from the past and the future (and all those anxieties) to see what really matters. Here. Now. Love. Adventure. Service. People. Joy. Music.

Here's the truth: Looking into the past only makes me see all the gigantic holes left behind by all the people who are no longer here, instead of being still and feeling their presence in my heart. And looking to the future only piles on fear and worry instead of allowing me to pause and savor where I am, right now, when I’m safe, alive, and there’s a helluva view.

And so, as I approach 60, the mask is off. This is me. I breathe. I move. I love. I laugh. I express. I feel. Right now. This moment. And you know what? It’s all pretty damn beautiful, even the scary stuff.