I will be 40 in March. My best friend just turned 40, along with most of my graduating class. Some people I grew up with are turning 40 this year. Some are taking it well, some not and other are in completely denial.
Not me. Turning 40 is awesome and here’s why…..
I could give you some generic claptrap that ‘age ain’t nothing but a number’ or ‘you are only as old as you feel’ or better yet ‘I’m just celebrating the 20 anniversary of my 20th birthday’. But that is not it.
It’s a privilege to turn 40.
My father had a younger brother. He was a few weeks shy of his 21 birthday when he made a serious of stupid decisions involving drugs. In the course of events that followed, he was shot and killed. My 23 year old father was never the same.
Uncle Jim was just 20. He never got married, never had children,never bought a house and he never met me. I was born 3 months after his funeral. I was the niece he predicted would be born when everyone else told my mom she looked like she was carrying a boy. He told my mom the last time he saw her ‘Take care of my baby girl’ then rubbed her belly.
In honor of the uncle that loved me and never met me, I have decided to grow old in his honor. To take every year I am blessed to become one year older with grateful heart. I will do it for my father who didn’t live to see 60, which is a relatively young age now.
It is not so terrible a thing to grow older. At nearly 40, I feel more confident in myself then I did at 21. My life experience has molded me into a better person then I was, a more patient, loving person. I like who I am now.
40 is not so scary, 40 is awesome
Cheers
QE
Walk with the angels Uncle Jim <3
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