Just the other day, I had a realization…… I am old.  I think I may have been thirteen when I decided what old was. Meaning I became aware of how old my parents were and how completely uncool, out of touch and well old they were.  After all they were thirty-five and forty and that was just OLD!  I couldn’t imagine being that old. Then a funny thing happened, I kinda became that old.  I can still vividly remember being that thirteen year old girl judging her parents and thinking to herself ” I will never be like them”.  As time passed and I grew up, got married and had children a strange phenomenon occurred, I was exactly like them; old, out of touch, out of style, and somehow (after having teenagers) I no longer knew anything.

So here I am supposed to be all old and whatnot but, I don’t feel old, or out of style, or out of touch. In fact, I feel pretty spectacular.  I no longer worry about what others may think of me.  I feel comfortable in my own skin.  I have resigned to love my body as it is. I have chosen to be happy, to live my life with the best of intentions. To spread warmth in a cold world and to be happy with who I am.  Too many times we get caught up in our ideals of how things should be and we forget to live the life we have.  You can always strive to have more, to become better, to reach for your dreams.

Just don’t forget to be happy with who you are and what you have at the moment. And no matter what don’t ever let anyone tell you that you are too old to do anything. Because age is simply a number.  If I could, I would go back and tell my thirteen year old self that twenty-five years from now she isn’t going to feel old. That in fact her roller coaster ride of a life was just beginning and when she gets to be almost thirty-eight she is going to appreciate just how vibrantly alive she feels.

No matter what your number will be in two thousand and fifteen, embrace it. Appreciate who you are and show yourself and others you are as young as you feel. No one gets to decide when you are old. Because after all, age is just a number and you can live your entire life being as young as you wish. It really is all up to you.