I'm entering that time of life when the image in the bathroom mirror occasionally startles in an unsettling way when I look bleary eyed at the vaguely familiar reflection which greets me first thing in the morning. When did I start looking like that? I say to myself inwardly shaking my head while fondly recalling a more youthful version that I'm still (Yup it's still there!) clutching under my arm.
Yes, I don't recognize my arms either. The skin on my forearms now links me with older women in the family - my mom and my grandma in their middle years. I don't need another birthday. Why didn't I notice until now?
And yet there's a tiny little tyke of the female gender which recently emerged from the dusty crawlspace of my middle school and high school years where she had retreated unbeknownst to me much too long ago.
Better yet I'm quite comfortable with the idea that human beings do not necessarily require one's bona fide date of entry into the world in order to bequeath to themselves a second chance - new perspective. While we can't go back the womb and redo babyhood, the fresh eyes we can bring to our lives, families and shared communities is a unexpected gift too precious and valuable to be ignored.
