age ain't nothin' but a number-- and a whole new perspective on life.

okay, it's done. i'm 30 years old. unbelievable that i am now the age that my mother was when she gave birth to me. i remember when i passed the age my mom was when she got married-- that was weird because i was 19. then i remember when i passed the age she was when she was divorced. that was also weird because i was 22. but this is the heaviest-- this time i want the thing that my mother already had.

i've gained weight. i'm totally over weight watchers. well, i am for now. maybe some other day i will drag my pancake ass to the meetings and just do it. but until then i have to find a way out of this hole without having to go to the neighborhood temple for a weekly meeting with women who, at first, i got a real kick out of. the whole experience quickly went from kitschy to kvetchy. (do you all have your yiddish to english dictionaries on hand?)

side note-- i realized recently that the one good thing about people thinking i'm pregnant is that it means that people think i am actually having sex.

anyway, here i am in this picture at my 30th birthday party. you can see the ginormous piece of cake on my plate. it's okay to eat whatever you want on your birthday by the way. sans guilt. it really takes a lot out of you to be alive, right? so on your birthday what's really being celebrated is that you have made it through another year and still manage to have it in you to smile and to even leave the house. why we don't just stay in bed every day is beyond me sometimes. because sometimes it seems the only appropriate place to be. life is a real motherfucker sometimes.

a week before my birthday my grandma died. she was one of my best friends-- for real-- and losing her has been a nightmare. between losing my grandma and reaching 30 i've gained a sort of new perspective on things. on almost everything. there's just a new layer blanketing every aspect of my awareness. somehow, i just don't care as much about what other people think of me. and let me tell you-- this is something that i've really suffered with in my life. i'm not saying i'm totally over it and now have aspherger's syndrome, i'm just saying i think i've actually grown up overnight.

i just feel like it's okay to be me.

um, what? somebody cue the lights and the violins. we have grand sweeping statements gracing the stage.

if it's possible to change overnight i've done it. it's subtle but profound. it's not some big feeling i need to scream from the rooftops. it's just a little pouch in my stomach that is no longer longing for something. gross.

don't know what this has to do with weight yet. but i'll let you know. i have to lose weight, that's for sure. but maybe with some of my new perspective i can make something really happen.

i realized recently that the reasons for my gaining too much weight are no longer alive. i'm no longer plagued with the same deamons. but the wieght is still here and now i'm just stuck with my patterns. gotta break them.

we shall see, shant we. (that line is from the television movie version of "the secret garden" and i used to say it all the time thinking i was so clever and brittish.)

i need a new sign off. i have been loving barley lately so--

love and barley,
rachel