age is just a number

sometimes i forget my age. in a physical sense, i feel it's what it is and yes, i'm 56. on a mental level, i feel nowhere near that. and which one counts? one, the other, both? i have no idea. i want to wear sparkly things and pretty shoes and plenty of highlighter. and at the same time, comfy sneaks and sweatpants and a hoodie are fine. what is age anymore anyway? we're expected to work into our 70s, but workplaces already write us off in our 50s, especially if you happen to be a woman. i'm more digital and plugged into what's happening in the world (chatGPT) and especially on tiktok (i'm looking at you, wes andersen trend) than many of my colleagues who are young enough to be my children. where does it leave me? age is both a reality and to some extent a social construct. 

i'm thinking about this because it occurred to me that it was around the age i am now that my mother was diagnosed with type 2 diabetes. and one of the consequences of growing older is that it's hard to keep weight off. a long, dark, rainy winter didn't help that. so i went to the doctor for a check-up and i've asked for ozempic. i have to jump a few more hoops (blood tests, etc.), which are fair enough, but i expect to get it. 

i went to a running shop this week and bought new running shoes. i'll probably mostly walk in them, at least at first, but i'm also going to work on that. the guy in the shop was super kind to me. i even got on a treadmill and he assessed my running style (i told him i wasn't currently a runner), and made sure i got the right shoes. this is now known as no excuse. i'm even listening to born to run by christopher mcdougall, not because i expect to be an ultrarunner, but because it's inspiring. and it makes running sound like such a natural thing that we humans are supposed to do.

speaking of natural things humans are supposed to do, i'm so eager to get all the plants into the ground in the garden. we will still have frost some nights, so i'm going to try to restrain myself, but i am so eager to get everything planted. trying to be content with preparing the beds this weekend and then planting everything next weekend. we'll see how that goes...

a new happiness wardrobe or is it the happiness of a new wardrobe?

i did not buy all these dresses, but i wanted to. i do have some restraint. but at the same time, i am working in the more dressed-up world of shipping again and i needed some new work clothes. my old shipping wardrobe had been hanging in the closet for ages and was pretty out-of-date and just didn't feel like me anymore. i'm a different person now than i was then. and this person needed some new clothes.

i've been drawn to navy blue for awhile now, i think it's since i picked navy blue glasses about a year go. slowly, i've added blue items to my wardrobe. today, i went in to my current favorite store (COS, which is H&M's answer to banana republic) to have them remove the anti-theft device they forgot to remove from a necklace i bought the last time and there were new styles in the store. and frankly, i couldn't resist them. black isn't far from navy blue, but everyone needs a good little black dress and the cut of this dress? swoon! and to push myself out of the blue rut, i grabbed the mustard dress (those pockets are dark blue in reality, tho' they look black in this instagram photo, so there's still a bit of navy) and made myself try it. it didn't look like much on the hanger, but i fell in love with it. i didn't fall in love with the one in the middle, so it stayed in the store, but i did like the burgundy, pink and navy combo.

i think best of all, i realize in looking at these photos, snapped in a dressing room mirror, that i look happy again. and feel worthy of pretty new clothes. it's been far too long since that happened. i think it might have something to do with all those ships.

crystal knows

i heard about crystal on the note to self podcast (formerly known as new tech city). crystal is an online tool that helps you write better emails, because it runs a profile analysis of the person you're emailing and gives you ideas of the best approach. and what with me being a bit of a geek for such things, i had to sign up to try it out. and in this me-centric era, naturally what i was most interested in was what it would say about me. they want you to sign in with your linked in profile and i believe they use that and possibly a whole lot of other stuff they find via your email address online to analyze you. i had been hoping to directly point it here to my blog, as it's the biggest collection of my writing and surely reveals a lot about me. but even just using linked in, i think it's pretty accurate.  here's what it advises about me.

for the most part, i can recognize myself in these statements, tho' i'm less keen on emails that are full of abbreviations than it indicates and if you spell "you" with the just the letter "u" forget about it! i don't think i'll extend my crystal profile beyond the 14 day trial (where i expect that you probably have to pay for the service), but i like the idea of it. maybe someday such tools will be built right into our gmail and we'll all start to communicate much more effectively (hint, hint, google, you should buy this start-up).

do you look like who you are?

you would think that the older you get, the more familiar to yourself you become. but these days, when i look in the mirror, i'm not sure who it is looking back at me. i see more and more of my father in those jowls and that crooked grin. but whether it's me, is another question. i've never thought i looked particularly like him. i even had a cousin once removed who once told me "my mom says you don't look like anybody." and i think that somehow stuck. i can see my mom in my hands, which is quite reassuring somehow, as i always thought of her hands as especially capable. but my face? i used to think i knew it, but that's changing and looking in the mirror is like looking at a stranger. perhaps this is just a natural consequence of growing older, but i don't even think it's the lines and the wrinkles, it's something else, something alien and unfamiliar. and i can't put my finger on it. 

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super interesting interview with li edelkoort.

she says fashion is dead.

and her reasons are very interesting.

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99% invisible (it's a podcast, of course) recommended this blog.

humans in design.

i think my father-in-law would have loved it.

they're at the intersection of humans and technology.

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it seems that some of the right questions are beginning to be asked about the germanwings crash.
tho' focus is still on training practices, i think it should be on crewing practices.

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i recently saw marco pierre white on master chef australia and want to read this.

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is the past holding you back? and by you, i mean me.

if i were...revisited

if i were a month i’d be september.

if i were a day i’d be friday.

if i were a time of day i’d be midnight.

if i were a font i’d be courier.

if i were a sea animal i’d be tuna.

if i were a direction i’d be true north.

if i were a piece of furniture i’d be one of those awesome foldable swedish tables.

if i were a liquid i’d be chardonnay sur lie from delheim.

if i were a gemstone i’d be a sapphire.

if i were a tree i’d be a maple.

if i were a tool i’d be a paintbrush.

if i were a flower i’d be a sunflower.

if i were an element of weather i’d be thunder clouds.

if i were a musical instrument i’d be a saxophone.

if i were a color i’d be aqua.

if i were an emotion i’d be content.

if i were a fruit i’d be a mango.

if i were a sound i’d be the purr of a cat.

if i were an element i’d be hydrogen.

if i were a car i’d be a smart car.

if i were a food i’d be forest mushrooms in garlic butter.

if i were a place i’d be home.

if i were material i’d be linen.

if i were a taste i’d be salty.

if i were a scent i’d be sisley no. 2.

if i were a body part i’d be hands.

if i were a song i’d be sheryl crow's all i wanna do.

if i were a bird i’d be a swan.

if i were a gift i’d be handmade.

if i were a city i’d be istanbul.

if i were a door i’d be painted blue.

if i were a pair of shoes i’d be stilettos.

if i were a poem i’d be ithaca by constantine cavafy.

and don't forget to check how i answered back in 2010 and 2011. i had completely forgotten about this list, i found it by following one of my own link within links, which is odd, because that's not something i normally do.  it was rather fun to just listen to my intuitive answers to the questions. drop me a comment if you try it too!

teal blue hair

yes, i got a bit of blue put in my hair.
if i can't have a blue room, i might as well have blue hair.
i wonder if this is what a midlife crisis looks like?

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as always, terry eagleton makes me think. and laugh. and want to head for the pub.