Some things are guaranteed to make you feel old. Being
called
”
ma’am
”
at the supermarket by the 12-year-old boy loading your groceries
in the car.
Some things are guaranteed to make you feel old. Being called “ma’am” at the supermarket by the 12-year-old boy loading your groceries in the car. Realizing that you can afford a sports car, but you can’t buy it because you’re afraid your back will give out one day and you’ll be calling AAA for towing service – and it won’t be the car they’re towing. Oh, and June.
That’s right. I hate the month of June. June makes me feel like a little old lady.
I know it’s crazy. I mean, January doesn’t make me feel old – cold, maybe, but not old. And August. Heck, when August sizzles all I feel is a trifle hot-flashy, if you get my drift. Of course, I actually like April, although I’ve never done April in Paris, which I think would make April even better.
But June makes me feel like I should just get out the walker and be done with it. Because June is when the mailman becomes my enemy. June is the month when THOSE THINGS arrive. You know, those pieces of engraved papers that arrive daily inviting you to weddings or announcing graduations. The return addresses are always from the homes of your oldest and dearest friends. The people who went to high school or college with you. People who are the same age as you. And that is why I have an absolute loathing for June.
You see, the other 11 months of the year, it’s easy to feel young. It’s easy to look in the mirror and say “not yet” to Botox. Or even “I don’t need liposuction yet – I’ll just work out more.” And I’ll tell you, it helps to have a 10-year-old running around the house.
It’s virtually impossible to feel old around an active child. I’m always doing stuff I would normally think I’m too old to do. And every month but the sixth month of the year, this works. But once June comes along, all bets are off. That’s because once I open up an invitation or announcement I think to myself, “Holy cow! Rhonda really has a daughter old enough to get married?”
And then I remember all the good times with Rhonda. The times we cut ceramics class or calligraphy. Or the time we smoked clove cigarettes right outside the convent gate and nobody caught us. And of course, all the time we spent trying desperately to pick up on the guys at the nearby college. We’d head out just after algebra. We’d tie our white uniform shirts up around our equally white bellies and stroll onto the college campus like we owned it – or at least like we thought we might attend there someday.
We’d saunter around, sit on the grass and eat sandwiches from Togo’s. And we’d smoke real cigarettes, even though they made us cough like crazy and made our eyes tear up. Before we knew it, three coats of black Maybelline mascara were running down our faces, making us look like extras from a movie called “Evil Catholic Schoolgirls Cutting Class.” Was it any wonder we never met single guys in two years of doing this?
But those memories would take me back, and before I knew it, I’d be looking fondly at the invitation, remembering Rhonda and our tied-up shirts and wondering where the heck I’d put the bootleg tape of “Frampton Comes Alive” so I could listen to it just one more time for old time’s sake.
And that’s when it hits. Just about the time I’m happily skipping down memory lane, I realize something so horrifying that all the Botox on earth won’t help. I could be Rhonda. I could be the MOTHER OF THE BRIDE.
I’m telling you, once that realization hits, nothing will get you out of that funk. And it’s the same for any engraved piece of paper that arrives in June.
Graduation announcements? They’re killers, too. For pete’s sake, your friends – the ones who are the same age as you – have a child graduating from college or high school, or the most horrifying of all, graduate school. Thank goodness that one hasn’t happened yet. I mean, how old am I if my friend’s kids are graduating from graduate school?
And that is why June is evil. I can handle all of the other months. I just have to keep strong and repeat my mantra, “just 20 more days until it’s over. Just 20 more days …”
