15 years of marriage conveniently fits inside of 5 x 9 storage unit. Everything I had when I went into it and everything that I got after it fits perfect. I thought there’d be more. He had more, lots more.
My best friend told me today that she admires my mid-life crisis. She finds it encouraging to her now to make sure that she pursues her dreams so that she doesn’t end up at 43 looking back at her life and wanting to have done more, done something, sooner. She’s 30 and for a brief moment, I really hated her. What could I have done at 30 if someone I knew had had a mid-life crisis and inspired me to really go after my dreams?
Well, I wouldn’t be half the director I am now. The years between 30 and 43 have been filled with life experience, endless hours of working with and watching other directors, both good and bad, and finding myself as a writer as well.
What I couldn’t really tell her is how it feels to be 43 and knee deep in mid-life crisis. I mean, she understands a lot about it because she’s been one of the few who has actually held my hand through most of this. But I don’t think she can understand the deeper feelings, the ones that I’m not sure I understand myself.
For example, the terror of being here at 43. Who the hell am I? I’ve been defined for the last 15 years as his wife, his partner, his, well, you fill in the blank. I’m sure he was defined as my “fill in the blank.” But I stand here by myself and consider myself in the mirror.
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