“In the course of my life, I have often had to eat my words, and I must confess that I have always found it a wholesome diet” – Sir Winston Churchill
I have long fancied myself to be a natural woman. Having worn denim for a larger percentage of my days than all other fibers combined, never having changed the color of my hair, succeeding in four unmedicated childbirths (like it was some sort of contest), remembering with grimaced face the few times I have been peer-pressured into manicures. For over 50 years, I have run pretty much on my own steam, glorifying in how well this machine was holding up, how tough and independent I could be. Well, baby, it’s now time for me to take her in for the 50,000 mile checkup, and I’m not liking it.
I resent the fact that things now require ‘attention’–on a regular basis no less. I need to watch my diet, exercise like a fiend, respect my sleep/wake cycle and use moisturizers like there’s no tomorrow, just to keep from being sucked under the quicksand. This is not a beautification program, it is (bluntly put) to keep from becoming a crippled blimp. Realizing that my choice is not much of a choice really makes strong-willed, overachieving me angry.
I am not the kind of person who wears makeup and cares about fashion. But maybe I need to be. A little bit anyway. I find that, these days, I feel better about myself when I’ve put some effort in. The stranger I see in the mirror isn’t quite so strange. Having long prided myself in being able to get showered and dressed in under 10 minutes, that’s tough to swallow. These little routines—hair conditioner, lotion, finding a pair of earrings—double time I consider wasted. Ugh! When I add them onto the exercise program, and then try to find clothing that fits and I can bear wearing (but isn’t a t-shirt and jeans), I might as well forget doing anything else.
Eating words is a great skill to be learned before one exits this fine world. It reflects the fact that one has truly changed inwardly, taken the leap to behave differently, and been duly bathed in humility. This giving up, and opening up, seems a likely path to a freedom and wisdom I can only imagine.
I have been eating my words for many years, but lately the meals have become increasingly robust. I just didn’t get it. I didn’t understand what it would be like to raise toddlers and teenagers until I actually had them. I didn’t know how tiring it could be to parent an adolescent with mood swings at the age of 54 until I tried it. (Hint: it was easier in my 30’s). My political and religious beliefs have changed drastically in 40 years, shaped by actually living in this world among real people (instead of projecting theories based on limited experience and knowledge). Despite experiencing that turnaround, I assumed things would continue pretty much the same in my body, working just as they did, at my same energy level, in my same mood, indefinitely, without periodic hot flashes, maintenance requirements, and miscellaneous malfunctions.
So, a few days ago, when for whatever the reason (medical science has still to figure it out), I was unable to walk on one leg because of some arthritic/long-hike produced injury/Lyme disease/misdirection of qi, I got a glimpse of a terrifying picture –it could happen. I could lose the ability to do something that every day I take for granted–see, hear, walk. It happens all the time to other people. It could happen to me. And until it happens, I could possibly just go on my merry way, thinking I could put just a few more miles on the car before the gas runs out.
Nothing says I can stop anything, or even slow it down. But I am stubborn. Stubborn doesn’t only work for staying stuck in an ineffective rut. “Use it or lose it” is very true with many functions of the human body, and there are many things I will not voluntarily lose. I am channeling my obstinacy into reframing the maintenance as something good. Nature Girl has had her time; Pit Stop Girl is taking over. I don’t need to spend inordinate time preening, but changing the oil, keeping things running as best I can, doing whatever I need to do (even if I said I’d never ever do it) needs to become a way of life. If wearing a little makeup (horrors!) makes me look and feel better, I am going to learn to be all over it. If I need to use pharmaceuticals, I will choke them down, along with my herbs and vitamins. Quality of life is important.
Instead of hanging onto the diet of that determined young woman who did her best, but didn’t always get it, I will heap onto my plate a slew of tantalizingly forbidden and formerly disdained selections, more appropriate for a mature palate. My tastes, after all, have changed over the years.