Life in a Circle (Never Ending, Never Beginning)

Someone asked me if I wished I were younger.

The impulsive answer would have been: “Of course.”

Young is healthy, beautiful, energetic, vibrant, hopeful, dreamy. Young is peak season for work and play and love.

But my perverse nature – I hate giving predictable answers – made me backpedal and chew ever so slowly on the question.

“Hmmmnn?” I cooed instead.

My hmming and hawing took me back to when I was 30.

When I was 30, I was young and dreamy, alright. But also worry-warty, Back then if anyone asked me if I had problems, I’d hold up three fingers -- count them – three. These are keeping my household help, avoiding a fourth pregnancy, and keeping my footloose, barkada-prone husband home at nights and weekends, not necessarily in that order. But these weighed more heavily on me than the heft of the whole universe on Atlas’ rippling shoulders.

At 30, I still rankled from the loss of my secondborn, though on the way to recovery. At 30, I was tentative and insecure -- feeling never fair enough, smart enough, nor kind enuogh. At 30, I had yet to suffer the pain of betrayal, the wasting away of parents and their eventual death, and a major upheaval at work.

So 30 may have been summer, but I remember the storm.

And when finally I said: “No, I don’t really wish to be younger,” I almost meant it.

What I really want -- after more chewing and hmming -- is to be allowed to move at will from 10 to 30 to 50 to 70 -- depending on my needs or whims. To be at the center of things one day and at the fringes the next. Back and forth and forward and the reverse. Gathering wisdom from one season to be factored into the other. Getting second chances, and third and fourth and then some. Hopefully making more sense out of life's jigs and saws.

Wouldn't you also like to live life in a circle -- "never ending, never beginning, like an ever spinning wheel?"