40 - the new 20

I don't get on here much and just chitter chat, but today, well, I'm stuck on the couch and dog-gone-it I'm stinking bored, so I thought I'de ramble on a little about my boring life and air some of the crazy ramblings that go on in my mind. This weeks topic-

"40 - the new 20"

        This seems to be the new catch phrase of 2012 at least for the middle agers. I just recently read it on a magazine cover, and I've have heard it in conversations a few times lately. And let me say,  I'm more than a little curious about who started this new oxymoronic concept. I'm going to go out on a limb here and assume that it probably wasn't a 20 year old, because there is no 20 year old sitting around saying , "Oh, you know what I can't wait for? Turning 40! I mean , Oh my gosh, won't it be stinkin' amazing when I'm 40.  Like I'll never have to spend money on designer bikinis to go over my rock hard body again. Or waste my time goofing off with zero responsibilities. Think of how much fun it's going to be wearing fake lashes everyday and not just for special occasions. I'll get to try out all those nice neutral shades of lipstick that won't bleed into the cracks on my upper lip! Oh, and best of all I'll never ever have to worry about being hit on by an old 40 yr. old guy again!"

         I'm also pretty sure it wasn't spawned by the 60 yr. old crowd. I'm sure I'll never overhear them saying, "Hey, don't you wish we could go back to our 40's? Remember how much fun it used to be  running around like a crazy person to meet all our children's schedules. Remember the thrill of trying to figure out how to get the money out of retirement to pay the kids college and then getting it back in before the government figures it out and penalized us! I mean, wouldn't you just love to go back to that day you when you got that letter from your gynecologist letting you know that you are now at the perfect age for your first mammogram, you know, the same time you quit getting Victoria Secret catalogs and started getting advertisements from your local plastic surgeon.

        No, I'm pretty sure the phrase was coined by us- the not quite young, the not quite old; wish we still had it, but haven't completely lost it crowd, the 40 somethings. I am not generally a pessimist I'm more of a realist I'de say, but in my opinion, No, I do NOT think that forty is the new twenty! Granted 40 isn't dead, but when I was 20 I remember running all over the park with my children and not getting tired, now I can't run to the mail box without an oxygen mask and a fully staffed respiratory unit on call. I used to stay up scrapping until the wee hours of the morning, now I find myself doing nothing but weeing in the early hours of the morning. The only wrinkles I ever had to look at were the ones in my husbands dress shirt and thinning hair was the process my hair dresser used to add texture to my trendy doo.

         Now I'm not saying that all you bad mammajamma midlifers out there gotta trade in your sports car for a rocking chair, like I said 40 isn't dead, but for some of us, it might be time hang up the bikinis, pack away the spandex, shelve the bright glasses and save the dark red lipstick for when you're 80!