Time Flies When You Aren't Paying Attention

Well, damn, I sometimes realize I'm not 21 anymore or even my favorite age of 32. I look in the mirror and see a few gray hairs and I probably could use a brow lift. But that's just the outer appearance. What has happened that really floors me is the change in my ways of thinking, the bubbles that have been burst, the illusions that have been uncovered and the joy that lurked amidst the rubble of it all. Born at the very heighth of the baby boom, I thought all things were possible for me except having a career as something other than a elementary school teacher or a nurse. I was schooled by my mom to marry well. I did marry well eventually, but she was dead and I was much older. And, I married for love rather than money. As someone once said, "i've been a fool for love many times but never a fool for money." I was the baby boomer, the semi hippie chick, the political anti-war protestor, the fighter for civil rights, the young woman who loved the blues and Austin music, the artist who had no belief in her own abilities and a host of other things.

One of my oldest and dearest friends referred to me as living my life like a movie in my mind. And yes, this life seems to have encompassed several movie plots, Sasha the nerdy kid, Sasha the teenager madly in puppy love with her high school boyfriend....picturing a life with picket fence and babies and ...well...I didn't go much further than that, Sasha the hippie and political activist, Sasha the music follower in Austin during the very best time to be in Austin, Sasha the black sheep of the family, Sasha the superior student, Sasha the artist, Sasha the apprentice of her hero, Sasha the woman who suddenly lost it all and could not leave her bed for months , crippled by depression, Sasha the 4.0 grad student, Sasha the technical writer, Sasha the celibate, Sasha the community college teacher, Sasha the wife of a man 20 years older, Sasha the caregiver of her dying parents, Sasha the grief stricken, Sasha who picked up and moved from her long time home and friends to Arizona....1000 miles west, Sasha who converted to Catholicism, Sasha who married the man on the internet who she loved, Sasha the vintage clothes collector and dealer and Sasha who is waiting for the next chapter.

I'm sure I have left out some of the incarnations of this woman I call Sasha, but it boggles my mind when I think of all I have seen and all I have done and the fact I am where I am right this very minute. If someone had told me that I would find a home in the desert with a German/Catholic/Jewish man born 10 days before I was, I'd say they were crazy....even though I have had a crazy life.

When quite young, influenced by Jackie O, Isadora Duncan, and many other woman, I decided I wanted a full and extravagant life. I wanted to taste and savor all that life had to offer. The Sasha who lived in small town East Texas could not see herself living there forever. She wanted to see the world, to learn, to experience, to feel, to have great loves, to suffer, to bleed, to laugh, to drink, to smoke, to laugh madly and to escape the nice, safe existance that my mother and dad had plotted for me.

I, Sasha, did manage to escape the trap that I saw in an early marriage to my high school boyfriend. He went to the commune and I went my own way and explored life on my own terms. I looked around, in my twenties, and couldn't imagine myself married in the way my friends were married. I wanted something grand. I wanted a great affair of the heart. I did not want mediocrity. And, I did not find mediocrity. I found all I was searching for in those long ago days. But, what I didn't know then, and I'm glad I did not, was that I would pay dearly for taking a big bite out of life. I would have to nearly lose my mind before climbing out of the abyss and becoming who I am now. And, who am I now? I don't know for sure. I'm still changing. I'm still morphing. I'm still eccentric. I still love the big life but I have also learned the value of and joy of comfort of peace. Peace is what I have found in large measure...although I still have my demons...the fears that haunt me deep in the night. But, it's a ride I wanted. And I'm enjoying the ride.

And, while I was living this movie in my mind, I changed in some ways and remained very much myself in others. I still have a soft heart, I still fight for the underdog, I'm still stubborn, I'm still somewhat bawdy, I'm still a lover of black humor and incongruity. I'm still sensitive. I still cry easily. I still love strongly. I have never moved to the dreaded burbs nor bought a SUV.

Today I live a strange life. Not strange to me of course, but not the normal life of most of the world. I stay up late into the night. I am a creature of the night. I do not drink. I quit smoking when I passed a milestone birthday. I still am not a Donna Reed housewife and never will be. I still have a soft heart. I still know how to love and I also know how to finally let go of the hurts of the past...most of them anyway.

I recommend growing older. It's so much more interesting and the world is so much larger. Your thoughts are based on many more experiences. Life does not have to be a cliche. And, I, Sasha, sit here typing away and indulging in cliches while trying to be iconoclastic. Yes, I'm an iconoclast but I can't force it. That's contradictory to be a true eccentric. I have become who I have become and I will become Sasha with other layers added as the years pass by. I once ran from change. I now see that change is inevitable. Some hurts so much that you feel as if you are literally choking and some makes you soar with a joy that knows no bounds. It's an interesting trip and I've enjoyed it in it's whole even though suffering moments of tremendous sadness and hurt.

I guess I am a grown up. But, I'm one of the weirdest grown ups you will ever know. And that's good.