What does it mean to me to be AGING BUT DANGEROUS?

AGING – one look in the mirror, and I have my answer.  I have Nora Ephron’s neck, my grandmother’s jowls in the making, and my dog’s silver whiskers are somehow making a cross-species leap.  Who is that person, I ask myself every morning?  She looks a little like me, but she looks more like my mother.  Yikes!  At 44, I am a little behind the “acceptance” curve when it comes to aging.  I am just not used to the changes that are seeming to come faster and faster in my mid-40s.  But I look forward to the day when I can look in the mirror and see “me” – not my mother or grandmother – smiling back, and see the person I have become and be happy with the view, wrinkles and all.

BUT – okay, I am talking about my own BUTT on this one.  It seems to have become more full and less firm.  Yes, gravity happens.  But to my butt?  How many steps on the raised treadmill does it take to reverse the effects of gravity?  Can I get a butt lift?  Hmmmm.  I aspire to Suzanne’s butt,  quite honestly.  When I first met her, I was floored by her beauty, of course.  But I was really impressed by her butt.  She looked great in her butterscotch colored leather pants, but the “wow!” factor comes from the tattoo she got to celebrate her 60th birthday. It is strategically located on her firm and lifted back hip.  Now, that is AGING BUT DANGEROUS!
DANGEROUS – the art of living dangerously is something I don’t quite have down yet. 

As a type-A control-freak kind of gal, the only danger I probably encounter is when I recklessly let my kids eat lunch without wiping down their hands Howard-Hughes style.  Germs- how scary!  Jean is one of my heroes when it comes to living dangerously.  When Jean turned 60, she jumped out of an airplane at 14,000 feet with her 91-year-old father.  OMG!

To me, one of the key aspects of being AGING BUT DANGEROUS is having and becoming a role model for other women who are going through this same precarious, exhilarating, confusing, powerful time of life.

Thank you, Suzanne and Jean, for being AGING BUT DANGEROUS and for being such amazing role models.  (And thank you for letting me remove the “ghost” in front of “writer” as my career description.) 

By Robyn Hall