So let me jump right to this. While I was out to dinner last night, I was told I look 21. Then, no, wait a minute, 14 not 41.
That would seem like a compliment to some. If not that I have been trying to look and act my age--I have an age thing going on lately--you know? An age thing. I'm not sure what that means.
I'm trying to figure out how old I am. Really. Arrested development. Or something. So I've been coming out in this more grown up way, letting the wisdom of my years show for the first time, changing the way I dress some, those tall shoes and things like that, and then I get: 21, no 14.
Shut up, Jeneane, you're saying. Find something else to complain about. We know you have plenty.
But it's all related.
After I say my thank yous, I'm sitting there FEELING 14. Why try, you know? I feel my step father ready to belittle me. That's what 14 means to me. Dinner table arguments and drama. Become invisible--that's the answer.
The thing is, at 14 I didn't look 14, I looked 21. "You blossomed early," my mother would say. I'll say.
What does it mean--certainly it's not "the look" people notice when they tell me I look young as much as what--my manerisms? my humor? the way Jenna and I crack each other up? My vulnerability? My ....?
The harder I try, the younger I get, in some respects. In others I must be 100 by now. Maybe everyone's just too kind to say, 41? I thought you were 100!
I had an aunt--Aunt Gussie--the kindest woman on the Slavic side of my family. She never married and was the coolest of the cool, accepting and ever generous. She made tons of money during her lifetime, which she always shared with the children in the form of savings bonds. Aunt Gussie grew the best tomatoes I've ever tasted in my life.
She lived with her sister and her sister's husband in Ohio. They were mean to her, mean to everyone. They were just NOT nice people. Very unhappy. I remember the belittling that went on in that house when I would visit them with my grandmother. And I would think--but why does Aunt Gussie take it? She's the smart one, she's the rich one, and she's the cool one?
I don't know why she stayed. She never seemed to let it bother her, but it must have. I don't know. There is a lot I won't ever know. What I do know is that Aunt Gussie had a big laugh and a husky voice that always made me feel warm.
She lived to be 90, and she never, not ever, ever, ever, had a wrinkle on her skin.
I am serious. No wrinkles. Not one. I can't tell you how odd it is to look upon a woman of 70 (the last time I saw her) who's skin is as smooth as a baby's. Pure. Not one line. No one ever guessed Aunt Gussie's age right.
But it was more than her skin that kept Aunt Gussie young. It was something else. It was a reverse kind of thing. The something else WAS what kept her face and skin from showing her age. What was it? What was it? What was it?
Love? Joy? Fun?
Oh you should have seen her eyes. Sparkley blue with cheeks that rose to meet them when she smiled. I'm remembering her writing this, these words are forming her face for me, her laugh. Her bending down to pick me a plumb tomato.
I forgot her voice until I started writing this. Now it's in my ears and with me. Thank you, blogging.
Hello Aunt Gussie. I'm okay. I miss you.
