I can do this....

Every day that I have been unemployed in a new city, I have to look for things to do that are constructive.  I have a routine and stick to it.  I wake up every morning, punch the coffee and take my dog for a walk.  I get home, pour myself a cup with a generous pour of Baileys and sit down at my computer and try to find something clever to say on facebook.  Check out my horoscope, and go to Craigslist to look for new job postings....  I never realized how difficult it would be to find work as a hairdresser in a new city.  I have walked into over a dozen salons, applied for positions online, even taking a position I thought was perfect and realized it wasn't.  That lasted a day.  Seems that a middle-aged woman in the beauty industry isn't a very valuable commodity.  My experience and maturity in a world of vanity and shallowness is better suited to the younger, self-absorbed twenty somethings.  As a former owner/employer of a successful business, I try to remember what I was looking for in a new hire.  Looks were important.  I wanted a certain look to represent my business.  What they wore to the interview; if they wore blue jeans, it was an automatic "no".  If they were heavy, I classified them as possibly lazy.    Their resume told me their age based on the year they graduated from high school.  I only wanted "older" hairdressers if their look was right.  Most were not, as the longevity of a hairdresser is around 5 years.  I quit the business for a year, vowing never to go back.  Finding myself in the middle of a divorce, bored and waiting for state residency so I can go to school, I can't wait to go back.  But now, no one wants to hire me for the same reasons I didn't want to hire someone.  Except that, I'm not heavy, I dress well and I look younger than my age, but the resume gives me away with the year I graduated.  I get classified as the "older" washed up hairdresser.  Sigh......
Every day I give myself a pep talk just to get out of bed.  It usually starts with, "Bob needs to pee, so get out of bed."  After I complete my morning ritual, I try to talk myself into a run.  Sometimes it works, sometimes not.  Lately, not so much.  Around 11 o'clock I take a shower.  If I take my time, this can eat up about 2 hours, but usually just an hour and a half.  Another walking of the dog and I'm ready to face my day.  Pathetic huh?  I have been working on furnishing my condo,  and for the first two weeks here it was a great motivator.  Now I'm trying to find things to do that don't involve large amounts of cash, like shopping or drinking and partying with friends.  I started to cook more.  This in itself was a huge deal, because I hate cooking.  I find that a trip to the car wash is a big outing.  The grocery store, an event.  I joined a runner's group to help me stay committed to a work out.

The days that my ex and I speak, turn into days when I can't leave the house.  I remain faithful to the anti-depressants until I get through this.  I have been told I am on Facebook a lot.  You would be too if that was the highlight of your day.  I play a game on my phone called "Words with Friends" and am excited when someone I'm playing, plays a word.  Now I'm writing this blog.  I know this is sounding like a plug for sympathy, but really, I'm just viewing it as a temporary state of being.
I am loving the new friends I am making and trying to become a person of more substance.  I based my entire last ten years on the shallowness of the beauty industry, telling people things they wanted to hear and kissing ass, burning myself out...  Now I'm ready to do it again, but, now the industry has turned itself on me.  Maybe I need to post a listing on Craigslist that reads:  "Middle-aged hairdresser looking for work.  Won't gossip about your clients, won't engage in petty discussions or create drama, great work ethic, responsible...looks remarkable for her age. " I could attach my avatar cartoon picture with it.
I would like to start dating, but I know that until the divorce is final, it's complicated.  Being single is  tricky and lonely.  Most days I'm good, some days not so much.  The days that are hard,  I question myself and doubt.  The days that are good, are really, really good, and I feel confident in my decision.  I've met good people, made good connections and tell myself...I can do this.  In the meantime, anyone need a haircut?

Aound Our Mother's Age

  I remember being in my teens, early twenties and judging my mom.  The things that came out of her mouth, the silliness she had, the jokes she told, her desire to talk to me openly about sex.  I was having none of that.  Being in my late forties has certainly given me some perspective on judgment.   I went to my thirty year high school reunion recently.  What an eye opening experience.  For one, after thirty years, there ain't no hiding who you are.  You were either successful or you weren't.  You either aged well or you didn't.  You either took care of yourself or not.  There was very little in between.  The grace and forgiveness of sins committed in High School were there too.  There weren't many of us that were not touched in some way by the harsh reality of what our lives turned out to be.  Sure, there were still those posers who were what they were then, but for the most part, we all turned out to be decent, nice people just raising our families and trying to get by.  The social stigmas of class hiarchy still remain, but we didn't try as hard to impress, we were just friendly and moved on if there was nothing to say.  We all had graduated to middle age.  Most of us past our predjudices and judgments.   My journey to this point in my life took me 28 years.  I've always been my own person to a degree, but I cared too much what people thought for so long.  I was the envy of all my friends.  Outwardly, it looked like we had the perfect life, the perfect family.  I wasn't a perfect wife or mother, I just played one in real life.  I was always trying to be something for someone else.   I'm willing to bet that most women my age find that their life didn't turn out the way they planned and are faced with a crossroads of decisions...Do they stay to the right and go status-quo because it's comfortable and all they know?  Or do they turn left and embark on a journey that may or may not have a happy ending?  These are the questions I have asked myself this year.  These become the decisions by which others judge and pronounce "MID_LIFE CRISIS".  Dum dum dum...How do you explain what happened in a 28 year marriage?  It wasn't just one thing.   But it was about me.   I was tired of supporting someone else's dreams and giving up on mine.  I was tired of giving up everything that defined me.  It's a tired cliche...I had to find myself.  The truth is, I found myself alright...right smack dab in the middle ages of life.  Just like every young adult that makes that crack about someone being "old" (such a relative term these days...), they never expect to find themselves here.  But here is where I'm at, and call it what you will, and the beauty and horror of being "here" is filled with irony.  Lauren Bacall once said that she wishes she could keep her 50 year old mind but stay in the body of a 30 year old.  I can relate.   Wisdom is priceless.  Aging is... expensive.  My body, I'm just sad about.  I'm just trying to come to terms with it.
I've made decisions this past year that I wish I could take back, do over or make earlier in my life.  That's the problem.  We find ourselves around our mothers' age and we finally figure out what the hell we should or shouldn't have done when we were young.  For one, I should never have married the man I did.  But then, there is the other part of that...if I hadn't, I wouldn't have the four great kids that I do.  I was young and in love.  A wise-ass, but not wise.   Immature and certainly not ruled by logic.  Young love and lust...god I miss that.  Living on love, just like the song says.  As we got older, we learned to fight differently, love differently.   If only we had kept fighting the old way, kept  making love with all that crazy imagination, maybe the passion wouldn't have left.  Maybe the love would have stayed...instead we learned to fight with passive aggressive weapons of mass destruction.  It was much more...massive...and destructive.  We learned the enemy's game like the Art of War.  We learned that even if it was eleven o'clock and we should have sex because it had been several days but still wanted to catch the weather at 11:15... it could be done.  It's sad. 
I judged my mother unfairly.  I was embarrassed and mad at her for some of the decisions she made.  She left my dad, she dated a younger man...she wasn't acting her age, she was being foolish and silly.  Now, here I am.  Being judged.  Leaving my husband, not acting my age, being foolish and silly.   My kids are angry and embarrassed.  I've been accused of changing.  I've been accused of a lot.  I've been judged for putting myself first.  I've been accused of being selfish.  Guilty as charged.  I reached this age and wanted something more.  The verdict comes down and the hammer swings.  Your kids decide, your friends decide.  They sit in the seat of God and make their judgments.  The irony is this:  I, who judged m mom so harshly, am being judged by all, except...by my mom.  She gets it.  I get it.  I just had to reach the middle of my life to get it.
Before I filed for divorce, my husband told me he felt sorry for me and that I would come to regret leaving.  I've regretted many things in my life, but the biggest regret?  I let myself get to my mother's age before I knew what I wanted...but as Lucille Ball once said, " The secret to staying young is to live honestly, eat slowly and lie about your age".