We went to Snallygaster (read: big/rare beer festival in downtown DC) yesterday. The last time I went to Snallygaster in 2016 it resulted in me throwing up and passing out for the rest of the evening in lieu of hanging out with friends; in 2019, well, the past repeated itself. The worst part of day drinking -- especially day drinking when the beer in question is artisan/craft-y type stuff where the ABV is frequently over 10 percent -- is that the hangover starts 2:30 a.m.
Woof.
While it was overall a pretty fun day, I'm feeling a leeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeetle bit melancholy today because of a selfie I took with my husband. We were drunk and I don't really remember snapping it, but it's up on my Instagram account for all to see. In it I just look... old. You can see my forehead wrinkles, as well as the wrinkles around my eyes. I've already written in here about how I feel about my crooked smile, but I also have some gum recession happening in there, meaning that I literally am long in the tooth.
How old I've started to look is really bothering me. For one thing, other people have obviously noticed. I've had several strangers make remarks to me that indicate they think I'm much older than I am (a woman asked me if I was my 93-year-old grandfather's daughter as opposed to his granddaughter; a 47-year-old woman said "we're the same age, right?"; a man at my boxing class chatted with me about a house guest and remarked, "She's Gen X, so younger than us" -- he thought I was a Baby Boomer?!?!?!).
Another part of it is that I've seemingly aged really rapidly over the last five or six years. I feel like Ryan doesn't look any older than when we started dating, and I worry that people are going to start thinking I'm his mother instead of his wife.
I get self-conscious going into the fertility doctor's office, feeling like everyone there is looking at me like, "ah yes, another woman in her 40s trying to be a mom." Ugh. Ugh ugh ugh.
But it's also really bothering me because I feel like I haven't done anything noteworthy with my life. I have Date Me, D.C.! -- that was my 15 minutes of fame. I'd never trade that time for anything because it was a period of such monumental self-discovery and it catapulted me into the job I have right now. But in the 10 years since I started the blog, I've just sort of stagnated. I've climbed the ranks at work as much as I can, but I don't really feel like I'm doing much to contribute to society. I've done nothing toward leaving a legacy.
I feel a yearning inside me -- to do something, to accomplish something, but I have no idea what that would even be. I feel like I need to take more risks and put myself out there... but with a wrinkly old woman's face would anyone even notice? Or care?
I've made another therapy appointment for this upcoming week, and this is going to be something I address, I think. I want to get my butt in gear and quit whining about all of this and DO something for a change.
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