What I Love About You Monday...Growing Up Edition

Friday night I had a dream (a nightmare, really) that I was eighteen again and had the chance to do it all over.  I felt completely wigged out, overwhelmed, and wanted nothing more than to go back to my forty year old self.  


I was walking with a faceless, nameless someone through what I think was a gymnasium while discussing my options and I still couldn't think of any one thing I really wanted to do differently. I didn't want a second chance and was relieved to wake up and realize that it was all just a dream and that I was actually still in the year 2011.  


And I don't think it takes a genius, a dream dictionary, or a shrink to interpret that one.... 


I want to keep on being me. 


And that's a good thing.  


I think growing older gets a bad rap.  And while I realize that I still have quite a few milestone birthdays yet to hit, I'm finding that I am growing more fond of me as the years roll by.  I like the woman I am now, at forty, a little more than the one I was at thirty and a whole lot more than the baby faced one I was at twenty.  

So today, for this edition of What I Love About You Monday, I think I'll list a few of the things I have come to love about growing older/up...

~The valuable life lessons I've learned that could have never been taught in a classroom or by reading a book.  

~The thinking about something that seems to have only happened just a few years ago and being hit with the realization that it was more like twenty years ago.  It doesn't really make me feel old.  It makes me feel that I have acquired a true past...a history...and the wisdom to know which things worked and which ones didn't.

~The ability to stay home on a Friday or Saturday night and feeling perfectly happy and content instead of like I'm missing out on all the excitement and fun that is surely being had elsewhere in the world without me.

~The knowing when to speak up and when to keep my mouth shut. (at least most of the time anyway)

~The realization that while traveling the world is a wonderful experience (and wanting to do lots more of it), there is no place like home and it has always, and most likely forever will be, my most favorite place to be.   

~The comfort I feel in my own skin that I just didn't feel when I was younger.  I am much more forgiving and accepting of myself now and have stopped trying to make my body be something it was not meant to be.  

~The way I have learned to forgive by realizing that nobody is perfect and holding onto grudges only hurts myself.  

~The ability to relate to so many different people on so many different levels because I have been where they are.  

~The wisdom to know that sometimes things just have nothing to do with me, personally, being able to suck it up, put it behind me, hold my head high and carry on.  It has taken me a long time to get here. 

~The good memories....so many priceless memories that far outweigh the bad and that I hope to only continue to add to and to never, ever lose...