Turning 60 years old!

Today’s blog is a little different than the others.  It is not about my travels or new experiences living in the Middle East. There will be no pictures of toilets, diagrams and descriptions of crazy driving.   It is about turning 60 years old last week!

I have never been a person to worry about any of my other age milestones.  I guess that going from my 20’s to 30 was “something”.  I can’t really come up with a word for it.  I wasn’t upset.  It wasn’t tough.  I guess it made me pause and think about it, going from the image of the 20’s as being fun loving to the 30’s as a little more serious.  But at 30, Ken and I were living in New Jersey, beginning our new professional lives after having been in college for 8 years,  having a high time of hopping into New York City for great restaurants, going to festivals in Little Italy, exploring Chinatown, going to wonderful fall festivals in the Watchung mountains of New Jersey and New York State, and actually experiencing winter and snow and learning how to snow ski!  My time was filled with so many new experiences.  How could I be upset about a number?

Then again when I was turning 40, I was so busy!  We had just moved back from 3 years in Belgium.  We had a new house to furnish.  The kids were in new schools.  And, of course, I volunteered to be the room moms for both kids, the computer class helper, the art class helper, Bike Rodeo coordinator, Chess Club coordinator, food coordinator at the school carnivals, basketball, soccer and volleyball team moms, etc.  So, I had no time to think about what it meant to turn 40.

Turning 50, I still had two teenagers at home.  I was a concession helper for the volleyball team and the team mom for the lacrosse team.  My son was not driving yet, so I was driving him everywhere. Although busy, I did pause to think about this one, because 50 was supposed to be the BIG ONE.  Even though I didn’t feel old, I began thinking more about the mortality side of growing old.  I realized that I had probably lived more than half of my life now.  Yuck!  There was nothing that I could do about it, so I pushed it to the back of my mind, just occasionally pondering a world without me in it.  That would be weird.  J

Last week, I turned 60 years old.  I thought, well, if I am lucky and stay healthy, maybe I will have another good 30 years left.  I could not dwell on these gloomy thoughts very long because of family and friends.  I had come to the US on a visit because Ken has to leave KSA every 6 months for his visa, and I just planned to visit everyone.  When I went home to New Orleans, a week before my birthday, my aunt and uncle gave me a beautiful birthday card and my cousin gave me an adorable pillow.  My 3 sisters-in-law and my sister took me out for lunch, which ended with a bread pudding dessert with a birthday candle and birthday presents!  Unfortunately, that day, I had serious jet lag and did not take any pictures of the lunch.  L  My other sister and brother-in-law gave me presents!

Then, I travelled to Houston.  My very thoughtful daughter had planned a Birthday DAY for me for all day Saturday!  We went to one of my favorite places, the Museum of Fine Arts in Houston, had lunch, then with the beautiful weather, walked around Hermann Park, watching the people in the paddle boats and the kids laughing and playing, then had an incredible dinner at Reef Restaurant in midtown, with Phillip joining us. 

It was perfect, except that Ken, Devin and Shane weren’t there.  Ken had to go back to KSA and Devin and Shane were in Wisconsin, just back from their honeymoon in Tibet.   

On Monday, a group of Clear Lake friends that I have known for between 15 and 20 years took me out to a Cuban restaurant and I received funny and nice birthday cards and another yummy bread pudding with a birthday candle! 

 

On Tuesday, my cousin, treated me to a great lunch with a bottle of wine and a trio of ice cream desserts, including olive oil ice cream (!) on a plate that had the written message of “Happy Birthday” in chocolate. 

 

On Wednesday, I met with my Canasta/Adventurous Dining/Theatre buddies at a new very interesting restaurant in Houston called Pass and Provisions.  I received wonderful birthday cards and presents and for dessert, I had a Nutella soft serve ice cream with crumbled potato chips on top!!

 

On Thursday, a friend fixed an incredible brunch of Brunch of Watermelon Mimosa's , Sangria , Masala Dosa ( Crepe with potato filling ) Semolina vegetable Upma , cilantro and Mint chutney , Spinach and mushroom Quiche and 5 ladies from the Monday lunch brought MORE yummy food!

 

On Friday, I flew to Istanbul where Ken met me and on Monday, my actual birthday, we went to a restaurant that served authentic Ottomon Turkish food and had a table on the terrace of the 3^rd floor overlooking the beautiful Blue Mosque, lit up at night, with the birds circling the minarets, topped off with my incredible husband smiling at me!

Then, when I returned to the compound, one of my first friends here, the one who would not let me retreat into my villa and kept showing up at my door to walk me to coffees and teas by the pool, etc, so that I would make friends, gave me an adorable wind chime to go with my blue patio set! 

After all this, how could I possibly be upset about turning 60???  Knock on wood, I am happy and healthy, extremely fortunate to have such wonderful family and friends and am having an incredible adventure living in the Middle East, meeting a lot of wonderful people!  I turned 60 and life has not slowed down yet.  It keeps taking me on new incredible paths and I am loving the ride!!!

Life is good at 60!