I've never really been a person who wears colour. I always tend to go oh pretty but still buy black.
An evolution seems to be taking place in my closet. Lately my favourite piece of clothing is this yellow cardi.
It's lightweight and easy to throw on.
But what I love most is the colour. Yellow. Who'd have thought a girl who grew up with an absolute hatred of the colour yellow would end up loving this.
You might be wondering what did the colour yellow ever do to me?
When I was a little girl my parents decorated my room. Wallpapered the walls with tiny yellow flowers. I hated it. I was a girly girly and I longed for a frilly pink room.
Ever since then I have disregarded yellow out of hand.
But something about this yellow cardi begged me to pick it up. Such a bright happy colour after what seemed a year and a half of winter weather.
My flatmates say I seem much more animated when I wear colour.
Now my major drama is not overloading my wardrobe with colour until its a jumbled mess of items. When I shop I always think what do I have that will go with this? And I won't buy anything that doesn't work with at least something else in my stash.
Well that's not totally true. I did end up buying a floor length pink dress the other day that I am not overly sure about. I'll give it a few months in my closet to grow on me but if It doesn't its gone. Space is at a premium in my closet. I'd like nothing better than to convert the back room into a walk in but I doubt the flatmates would understand that.
I've heard about the idea of capsule dressing month by month. When I actually have more than 30 pieces I'm going to try that.
For now I'm concentrating on what to wear with those two toned shoes i bought the other day.
Seems I have a ways to go yet before I become one of those stream lined put together women.
Tonight I should have been having a lovely dinner out with my boys for my birthday.
I should have been primped and prettified in a beautiful floor length red silk dress. My make up having been expertly applied by someone who understands the complexities of mascara and eye liner. My hair should have been tamed by a very snooty hairdresser named Brett into a glamorous do that I could never achieve without tearing muscles and ligaments and very possible doing a triple flip backwards into a bath.
Instead I woke up and felt kind of off. My bones ached in my shoulders and my arms. My head ached and I felt weary and nauseous. This did not bode well for my mystery night out.
In the end I decided to cancel the evening and rebook it for a night when I wasn't feeling so under the weather.
The only upside to this unfortunate series of events is this - I have been scouring everywhere looking for the perfect pair of shoes to match my dress because I just can't see myself being happy wearing black shoes with this magic dress. I want the ruby slippers to go with the ruby red gown.
In a side note the ruby slippers from the Wizard of Oz was a film adaptation, the original slippers were silver. I could use some silver slippers as well.
I ended up spending the day reading fashion blogs. Something that I admit I have sort of disdained a little bit until now. I read Vogue mainly for the photography.
Fashion and fashion mags, blogs etc are the fairytale books for adults.
It has taken 40 years to see that although you may not be able to afford the premium priced clothes on view you can take lessons from these magazines and blogs.
About cut,colour, style and how to organise a wardrobe.
I realised that these women are just like me,but with a more defined sense of style.
Which proves you are never to old to learn something new.
I may not have made my dinner date but my afternoon was spent uncomfortable but productively. I now have a swag of links to other writers who I look forward to following.
For years I've worked in the worlds of child care and then welfare with extremely disturbed teenagers.
The last few years in the industry were mental torture and there is only so many horror stories you can hear before it starts to affect you.
Eventually I had to get out of the industry altogether, simply shifting specialities wouldn't have been enough to help me sleep at night.
Going from working sixteen hour days to doing nothing but reassessing your life turns your world upside down.
For the first two years I slept almost constantly and my wardrobe consisted mainly of pyjamas.
Now, having made the decision to go back to work I am faced with the question, what do I want to do career wise?
I know for certain that I will never go back into the welfare sphere. Although I did enjoy working with the clients the management left much to be desired. No debriefing, hellish hours and at times even more hellish conditions.
So using the skills I developed working in the trenches isn't an option unless I decide on an exciting new career as a bouncer.
This means retraining in another area and that's a daunting option at 40 years old.
I read a quote the other day that said, if your not happy with your job quit and follow your dreams. Life is too short to be stuck in a job you hate.
What I loved most about working in welfare was teaching the clients how to cook.
Cooking is the one thing that I really get a kick out of. It relaxes me, even when I happen to be cooking for 30. There's something comforting in knowing that mixing chocolate with hot cream makes the most heavenly icing for cakes.
This is a love that has developed over the last ten years. Nothing makes me happy than having a houseful of people to feed.
This is what I will be concentrating on next year, an apprenticeship as a chef. Learning from scratch all of the fundamentals of this craft will be as much a pleasure as it will be hard work.
I only wish I had come to this realisation ten years ago.
It's finally arrived, my 40th birthday.
How do I feel today?
40 feels like 30.
Today I feel great but it didn't start out that way.
This morning, after being spoilt by good weather for over a week I awoke fully expecting that I'd see bright blue sun kissed sky.
Nope it was overcast and hazy.
Well I wasn't having any of that. So I did the only thing I could, I rolled over, curled up under the covers and went back to sleep until the weather changed.
Thankfully the next time I opened my eyes the sun was shining.
I had nothing planned until a dinner at my parents house and that didn't start until 6pm. The day was my own and I spent it in the sun on the back veranda soaking up as much Vitamin D as possible. And it was bliss.
For years I'd imagined that 40 would hit me like a tonne of bricks.
Instead I felt upbeat, light as a feather and seriously happy.
Forward Momentum, my new personal mantra.
Well its here, the very last day that I can say I am a woman in my thirties.
Tomorrow marks the beginning of a new decade.
Today I met my friend and we went out for lunch.
I'm not a social butterfly, I'm more of a shut in so this is progress.
Lunch was wonderful. Not so much for the food which was average to say the least. A roasted root vegetable salad in which every vegetable tasted the same all with a heavy dose of cumin thrown in to make the tongue tingle. I'm trying to stay away from "safe" ordering. Usually I'd order the fish but I really do need to broaden my horizons and so now when I am out to eat I try things I never would have.
However our meal was eaten Al fresco beside the water on a gorgeous spring day, you can't ask for better than that.
I had forgotten just how pleasurable it can be to sit with someone and talk and laugh and share a meal.
For years I have been an angry angry girl. Being infertile and unable to do anything about it meant that I hated life and did everything I could to disassociate from everything and everyone.
This means I missed a lot of the social aspects of being a woman in her thirties.
Being a shut in means you never have anyone to judge you.
It also means you have no mirror except that which you walk past without taking any notice of.
So you forget how to dress for social situations.
Twenty years ago I simply slid into my favourite black mini skirt and threw on a top and I was good to go. Ten years ago I wriggled into my favourite jeans and shrugged on a shirt, added some boho accessories and same thing, good to go.
But now, not only do I not know what to wear I also until quite recently didn't have it in my wardrobe if I did magically find the answer.
So people watching at lunch becomes more a homework assignment than a way to pass the time.
Sitting directly behind us was a large table of women obviously quite used to being the ladies who lunch. All in their late thirties or older and not a monster stroller insight anywhere. Women who were all wearing the summery type outfit that I have never been able to pull off. Those triangular baby doll type dresses that look like they belong on pre schooler's.
You have to admire someone so comfortable with the shape of their knees at 40 years old.
I was sitting there in a pair of capri jeans and a black tank and strappy sandals taking it all in. Why did these women all look so put together when I looked half done?
And then I realised, accessories, I was wearing none and they really do complete an outfit. Jewelry, a scarf, a handbag make all the difference.
So the last lesson of my thirties is this - look in the mirror and see what's missing.
Further to yesterdays musings today we spent sorting out the accumulated debris from the move.
Shift a box, make a decision, all of a sudden things begin to take on a life of their own.
Four years ago a weekend would have found us joined by a crew at a cabin on the river. We don't have that any more and until today we really didn't understand the impact that not having that in our lives had on us in terms of the life we led.
Weekend used to be spent in the sun, in the water, around a table eating a barbecue and the nights were lit by starlight and a roaring fire.
This afternoon we had a barbecue, lit a fire, albeit in the backyard but still if you can't have everything compromise.
I spoke to my mother this afternoon and she was talking with some animation about a trip she has booked to Tasmania. My parents have recently been touring in the middle of Australia to Ayers Rock and surrounds and they have the travel bug. We've been telling them for years to go out and explore the world and they've finally taken our advice. My parents are in their late sixties and early seventies. What I realised from that phone call was that I don't want to just be waking up to life at that age.
I make so many excuses, put things off, think I'll do that another day. And every day I do that I waste an opportunity to be living my life.
Part of my plan for my 40th birthday is to stop making excuses, to start living my life, and to do that I need to start saying YES.
So YES I'm up for everything, except skydiving.
Lately I have been hearing a lot of the same question - "So you're turning 40, how do you feel about that?"
I think people expect you to be dreading the day, as if I waking up on your birthday will produce crows feet, grey hair and all of those other things you expected when this day came.
Fortunately time has so far been kind to me.
My sister on turning 30 was a hysterical mess, you'd have thought her life was over. She hadn't accomplished what she thought she would, she wasn't where she thought she'd be, she was just damned unhappy.
It's true you can sit back and lament what you haven't achieved, what you haven't got so far in life but what is the point? Its not like you can go back.
A month ago if someone had asked me how I was going to celebrate 40 and how I'd feel this week I couldn't have told them. It was still an abstract idea.
This week is shaping up to be a festival of celebrations. Three dinners to attend and a lunch date. That's more social than I have been in ten years.
At my fortnightly psych appointment I was talking about milestones that I hadn't achieved or hadn't been able to achieve. A wedding, a baby, first dates, being kissed on New Years Eve.
While there are things that I can't ever have (the baby) there are aspects of the others that I can do something about.
I'm not overly fussed about a wedding but this week I'm dressing in a gorgeous long red silk dress, buying the ruby slippers to go with them and having my hair and make up done just as you would for a wedding. So the fuss the primping and the pampering and a great meal without all that extra stress that goes with a wedding.
A baby, can't have it and over the years I have felt left out of a huge part of being a female. I don't belong to any stroller wielding mummy's club that goes regularly to lunches and coffee dates. My girlfriends all became mothers and I became for some time aunty baby sitter. But these friends have drifted away, as much my fault as theirs. They shut me out of certain things and I responded by freezing them out. Acknowledging this won't bring them back into my sphere but at least now I can let it go to some extent.
A kiss for New Years Eve, something to keep in mind for later in the year.
Milestones aren't always automatic. And the older you get the harder you sometimes have to work to clock these perceived adult milestones. That's what this next year will be about, changing my thinking, accepting that which is inevitable, being proactive about what I want to get out of this next decade.
