30 vs 47: A Birthday Blog

I first saw the movie Victor/Victoria when I was 30. "A woman pretending to be a man pretending to be a woman?" Julie Andrews plays Victoria Grant who plays Victor: Polish Count and drag queen. I was impressed that someone at the advanced age of 47 could sing, dance and emote the way she did. I found it sad that her character lost her hotel room and went hungry at such an advanced age. Now that I'm on this end, 47 doesn't look old anymore.

The first day of my juice cleanse (I'm now at day 18) I embarked the most thorough cleaning I've done since I moved into this apartment 2 years and 7 months ago--stem to stern, no stone unturned and a couple other mixed metaphors. I just concluded several deals and found myself with nothing to do during the slow holiday Christmas season. I bought a tree and put up lights in my windows, the only ones on my building and street. As many on my my block are waiting for their 6 month leases to expire so they can return to their square states (because dreams of stardom didn't pan out), holiday decorations aren't a priority.

I painted my bedroom. Deposit be damned, I had festively eradicated the corporate owner's assigned beige in the living room, kitchen and bath, this was the last frontier. I tried deep metallic bronze and hated it, too much brown. Then purple, hated that too. I settled on a soothing shade of blue which looks smashing with the 1920's trim and doors. I found 15 yards of nubby mid-century sea foam green fabric ($5 at St Vincent de Paul!) for drapes. The room is now minimalist and a nicer place to sleep.

 During the process of cleaning out all the dark corners, I unearthed a bunch of  old cards and LETTERS. Yes, letters. Some were from friends who are still in my life. Many of the holiday cards were signed by people I don't remember. In a previous blog The Cycle of Friendship, I talked about friendships being for a reason, a season or a lifetime. Sometimes we outgrow friends or they outgrow us and we have to let them go. I also found pictures of myself in my brand new Mustang.

When I was 30, I was living with a beautiful, dreadful man. It took WAY too long for me to leave him. Just before I did, I bought myself a late 30th birthday present, a brand new 2000 Mustang GT in "Atlantic Blue". I hot-rodded the stick-shift muscle car around Las Vegas where I lived at the time, the metallic paint gleaming in the sun. I found a "luxury" apartment with a private, enclosed garage, which ended up being a pain in the ass. Sometimes my remote would open my neighbor's garage instead of my own. One time it stuck shut for good and the management wasn't in a hurry to fix it. What did 30 year-old me do? I rented a car. At 47, I would have taken a fucking crowbar to that door and gotten my car out. I think I drove that rental for a week, an embarrassing (pre-cartruck apocolypse) model.

2014-2015 was a rough stretch. I went many months without a car and discovered payday loans. When collection agents called, I asked if they'd like some blood. I joked about papering one of my bathroom walls in 3-day "pay rent or quit" notices. In February of this year, I closed a deal large enough to pay off my bills and loans, take an economic trip to London and buy a car. My plan was to buy a clean 15 year-old 4-door Benz or similar vintage convertible BMW. I wrote a previous blog  "Nice Junk..." as I am an expert. Just trust me, I am (always look for 1-owner cars with Michelin tires). Weary from the search, I saw an ad for a primo 2000 Mustang GT. 15 years after I bought the first one, it was the same car in a different color for 1/10 the price. There was NO WAY it could be as nice as the pictures. I thought it might be a scam but went anyway. It was gorgeous and I bought it. My "new" GT gave me just as much pleasure as the first one I bought brand new. At 47, I'm over the whole brand new car thing. If I can't pay cash for it, I won't drive it.

I journal every day and have for years, amounting to a small mountain of notebooks. I've made it a habit to write 3 pages when I get up, then let go and never read what I've written. During the disemboweling process of my apartment cleaning orgy, I cracked open a journal from not long after I'd turned 40. "I'm old" and "I want plastic surgery" and "I want a time machine". Facebook just regurgitated a past birthday post where I expressed a wish for the 12 days of Christmas, each with a different plastic surgery procedure: "On the 1st day of Christmas, my true love gave to me...a facelift! 6 shots of botox, 5..." Pathetic. In our country, we have a perverse worship of youth. I've cancelled my subscription. At 47, I've transcended all that, plus I mostly don't care what others think of me. I don't feel old and I like my face the way it is--there's not a damn thing wrong with it. After I moved past the self-pity, I gained a special kind of self-confidence that I didn't expect. Obviously, it didn't happen for me right away. I feel no need to lie about my age and don't think about it most of the time unless a millennial throws "sir" at me like an accusation. In my family, we live into our late 90's if we take care of ourselves so I might have lots of time left.

8 days into my juice cleanse and project, my apartment  was transformed. With 2 weeks left in the year, I've let go of things I didn't need anymore. Like Victoria Grant in Victor/Victoria, I will sing and dance today, because I'm younger than springtime.