Happy Birthday to...ME! (thoughts on turning 40)

Today is the dreaded day. The one everybody warns you about. Yep, it's the big 4-0! (Imagine, if you will, creepy music in the background and a piercing scream.)

All I want to know is this: How in the world did I get to be old??

Well, actually, I don't really think 40 is old. In fact 40 is quite young. I am in the prime of my life!

(Hey! I can hear you chuckling and saying to yourself, "She's in denial!")

But so many people seem to think that I am now ancient, over the hill, etc. Sure do wish we lived in a society that had more respect for the old and less obsession with the young and beautiful. It is really sad to see the extremes that people go to, especially women, to try to look younger than they are. They spend incredible amounts of money on cosmetics, color their hair, and have surgeons cut them up in desperate attempts to hang on to their youthful appearance.

Even I am brainwashed by this type of thinking. I can not tell you how very gratified I feel when someone says to me, "You don't look old enough to have 7 children!" I guess that deep down inside, I am just as vain as the next woman. I want others to see me as young and attractive.

But you know, the more I think about it, the more I think that there is a balance that God has built into the human race. Be really honest. How many of you would like to go back to being as stupid as you were when you were 18? Not me!! So you see, earlier on in life we get youth and outward beauty. As those begin to fade we gain (hopefully) wisdom and depth as a person (i.e. more inner beauty). The outer beauty fades as the inner beauty increases. It is only fair and just.

So I hope and pray that as this outer shell ages one more year, the inner me, the real me, will grow and mature and become a wiser, better person. Perhaps a stranger may look at me and see "old," but hopefully, those who know me will see "beautiful."