A Woman In Her Forties…

It happened overnight.

I suddenly became an older woman.

Must admit I didn't really expect it. Was too busy with men. Moving from one story to the other. Giving myself totally to the men I loved. Surrendering to their moods. Not really aware of that love-yourself concept. Not realizing that each step I was taking brought me closer to death.

For the duration of each story, I was simply a woman in love.

With someone else.

So devastatingly in love, that I had sights only for the man of the moment. His approval of me was the barometer of my happiness. The women he smiled at were my enemies. I was in constant competition. In constant fear. Of female shadows. Of men leaving. Of not being good enough. Of being replaced with someone better.

And when each story ended, I'd simply wait for the next story to start living again. Not really knowing what to do without the presence of a man.

Or his shadow.

Nothing had meaning when there was no love interest. Real or imaginary. I'd ignore everyone and everything around me. I'd lose my theatrics, my famous love for life, and my ability to take care of my body, to take notice of my family, my friends.

I'd lose my confidence, my presence in society, my love for hobbies, my need to travel and discover new places. My inner strength that usually allows me to hold my own in everyday life. My ambition to become a better writer.

If there was no man, I simply froze. I did not exist. I simply waited until I was love-struck once more to embark not only on a new adventure. But simply to embark on life's boat.

And years passed.

And suddenly I was 40.

And society started treating me as a has-been at a time when I was certain that my life hadn't started yet. I was simply warming up.

For a while I believed them. Those cruel, negative people who want you to be nothing- exactly as they are. And I submissively waited for the man of the moment to validate me. To be my ticket to whatever glimpses of life he allowed me.

And years passed.

And suddenly I was 40.

And out of nowhere, I severely injured my back. And for a long time after that, the negative people's prophecy became my reality.

I became a forty-year-old has been.

I lost my energy. As a result, I happily and willingly stopped fighting. For what seemed like forever. It was not really a depression. It was a new lifestyle. Giving up. My new motto.

And I became obsessed with my health.

Will I ever walk properly again, will I ever smile again...And this pain that accompanied me day and night...it was a hidden dress that only I could see for long, exhausting months.

Suddenly I was an older woman.

Whenever I looked at myself in the mirror, I saw pain's smile haughtily engulfing my very thin figure.

I lost my interest in love.

I spent my days at the doctor's clinic or at the mercy of the physical therapists. With each passing day, new symptoms related to my worn out muscles would appear.

I waited for them the way I used to wait for men. I hid in the corner for a long time. And months dragged into two years.

I was just there. Somewhere midst life's arena, but not really there.

Symptom after symptom, the panic attacks turned into constant companions.

I was a 40 year-old has been.

And then the weird symptoms were accompanied with the sudden realization that mum and dad are gona die, and I won't be able to take care of myself or handle the pressure of not only my back pain's haughty smile, but also mean people's arrogant looks towards me.

"This is called mid-life crisis. Wait it out, you'll see, when it ends, you'll not only feel liberated, you'll gain a new life. Or maybe a new perspective on your life", my sister would constantly say to me, as I sank deeper and deeper into this glorious mid-life crisis festival.

And then suddenly a strange thing happened:

One day I found myself throwing things I didn't need in my room.

I couldn't stop throwing and organizing as if I suddenly saw my surroundings. It lasted hours. After the throwing and organizing I started cleaning. Not your usual mundane cleaning.

No.

CLEANING.

As if I was removing the stains of these past two years on the furniture.

And afterwards I started moving to other rooms in the house. I wore a back suspender and I worked very slowly so as not to hurt my back further more.

I threw. I organized.

And then I started swimming. One stroke after the other.

And I couldn't stop.

Then one day I discovered, that whilst that I was using enough detergents to clean a country, mum and dad had become my children.

I forgot about their ultimate death it seems and somewhere along the way I started taking care of them.

And somewhere between cleaning the bathroom and swiping the floors I accepted my own inevitable death.

And that was when I started to live.

I bought tens of canvas, coloring notebooks, doodle books...And I started coloring and drawing as though there were no tomorrow.

My visits to the doctor and the physical therapists stopped, and my muscles grew strong.

And I grew stronger by the passing of each day.

And along the way, I no longer found a reason to be meaner to mean people. I just ignored them.

I snubbed them.

I was too busy building a life. Before it was time to go someplace else. Their hatred for me grew stronger. And I was busy creating a life.

And the men...

Why, I started treating them as though they are part of a whole life I was slowly but surely sculpting.

And they were.

And love...

Why, I found it in the smallest details. In celebrating every single step I happily, deliberately took in my quest to live it, and really live it so that when it ends I won't even need to look back at it...let along have any regrets.

And my writing in the newspaper...

Why, I started making love to the Arabic language once more after years of what seemed like cheap sex!

And suddenly I became a 43 year-old sensual, strong, fit, happy, light, grateful woman.

And I started treating each day as a mastery course where I would prove to life that I could slowly, erotically tackle one chore after the other.

And then at the end of the day I would rest my feet on a pillow and say out loud: "Damn, woman. That was a fine performance".

Every day I virtually wear my exquisite lingerie, my suspenders, my high heels, my red lipstick, and my black bob...And I straddle life the way I have come to virtually straddle men...

I then whisper:"Let me show you what a woman is capable of doing".

And they both love it.