The day before yesterday I turned halfway to 90.
I am not sure how I feel about that yet.
It would be easy to say that I am starting to feel old,
but I don't want to say that.
Instead, I want to quote Sophia Loren.
"Nothing makes a woman more beautiful
than the belief that she is beautiful."
That is easier said than done.
At least for me it is.
I sometimes think that I like to complain about how I look,
that I somehow enjoy the self-pity of a dead metabolism.
(I like to blame a lot of things on "being in my 40ies".)
And then there's that word I've heard a few times in the last few months:
"Perimenopause"
The word does not do too much to make beautiful happen.
This may have something to do with associated words such as:
lack of energy, joint soreness, back pain, breast pain,
heart palpitations, dizziness, thinning tingling skin,
weight gain, urinary urgency or incontinence, heavy night sweats and
yes, hot flashes.
I don't know about you but now I need coffee. Or chocolate. Or both.
(And that birthday cake...already devoured.)
"Oh Ms. Loren, please remind me again of your wise words!"
I share a birthday with another beautiful woman.
Marilyn Monroe was born on June 1, 1926.
She was only 36 when she died but I would have loved to see how
this woman would've waltzed through the next few decades.
She dealt with insecurity.
She did not have the "ideal" childhood or life.
This woman struggled. A lot.
Yet, somehow she exuded confidence and I believe based on some of her quotes
that she believed that she was beautiful.
I think it is that confidence, more than any sex appeal, that made her so radiant.
"We are all of us stars and we deserve to twinkle."~Marilyn Monroe
So, I've quoted two movie stars but there is more to beauty than that.
My outward self was meant to waste away. It's just the way it is.
But when I renew my inner nature every day,
I am beautiful and it doesn't matter if I am 10, 20, 45, or 92.
In spite of the scattered gray hairs,
the wrinkles that aren't just there when I smile or frown but are now permanent,
the shoulders that are a little more rounded,
and all those above mentioned perimenopausal things ,
I am beautiful.
God said so.
In that I can be confident and twinkle.
Love,
Dianne
