Feeling O.L.D.

I turned forty-two last month. There's nothing special about this birthday number. Its just making me one step closer to forty-five, which means I will soon be fifty.

I loved my thirties. I couldn't wait to turn thirty, and I always felt like I was in the prime of my life. But once I hit forty, well, I can just see things going downhill. I'm no longer climbing that hill. I am, indeed, going over the proverbial hill, and about to start heading down. How's that for depressing?

Adding to my depression, I was excited to receive a lovely wedding-sized invitation in the mail recently. With a Harry Potter stamp!! (Where does one get these stamps??) Which one of our friends or family was going to be getting married? Clearly, it was someone who knew me well because they sent ME the Harry Potter stamp.

Turns out it wasn't a wedding invitation. It was a graduation announcement. From one of my best college friend's daughter. As in, I'm now really, really REALLY old. Old enough where my peers aren't getting married. My peers have kids graduating from high school. My peers have daughters going to Mount Holyoke. My peer has created a LEGACY.

Something I will never be able to do. Its my only real disappointment in having had two sons, next to the afternoon tea parties I don't get to have. I would just LOVE to have a daughter to send to Mount Holyoke. I've got nieces, though, so I keep up my donations just in case.

I've thought long and hard about what to send Emily for a graduation present. I remember getting lots of money myself, and I was pretty happy with those gifts. But what is the going rate these days? In the end, I went online and found out that Mount Holyoke's bookstore is now online and I ordered her this charm bracelet, to help her start creating some wonderful new memories.

So apparently, this is the new world of  approaching 50. The wedding invitations have dwindled in recent years. And we are moving into the era of graduation announcements. I don't think I can handle when we reach the next stage - the wedding invitations of our friends' children. Or our children's friends. Or our children.

I'm so freakin' OLD.