Seems time was slower in the past. And it seems my mind could live more in the moment rather than being cluttered with things I must do, have put off doing, am trying to ignore, am trying to prioritize and so on.

I see the beautifully decorated homes that I drive by and wonder how long it took them to put up those lights and decorations. How long will they stay up? And how long will it take you to take them down and put them away. I tire just thinking about it. I can’t imagine having to do all that work for a few weeks or even days worth of display for mostly others to see briefly, for a few seconds as they drive by. Is it worth it?

It reminds me how I don’t understand big functions like weddings. I can not undertand the time, effort or money going into one day’s celebration.

But I have drifted off.

Tomorrow is Christmas Eve once again. Next week another new year. I wish it could all be slowed down. I can not pick up speed in myself to keep up with it, if that makes sense. I should be doing more, moving faster, thinking quicker to keep up the pace. Seems time is passing me by and I am standing still. And yet I am aging fast.

The problem with thinking you are young is that one day you look in the mirror and ask what happened, who are you? If you are taken for 10 years younger or even more, and date 10 years younger or even more and you are a woman, that day comes abruptly. Suddenly you, in number, are seemingly upon middle age yet still look like a kid. And all of a sudden you grow up and can not enjoy that in between time and you must jump from young to old immediately without settling for a while in between. And people see you so differently. They react so differently to you. Once you were a beauty and all eyes on you, now you are invisible and a burden. And I am not even yet a senior and this is the case. Invisible is what you are when you are a woman, middle-eged, living in the United States.

So these are my reflections this a.m. the day befoe Christman Eve, 2015.

Merry Christmas.