Beauty in Hindsight

 

Being absolutely certain that one is right is part of growing up

and so is realizing years later

that the truth may be more nuanced.

Rebecca Meade

 

As you gather with loved ones this Thanksgiving, what will you count among your favorite blessings?  I am thankful for great health and the freedom to create happy memories, the constant love of friends and family, the joy of working with the inspiring and generous women featured on this blog.  I am most thankful for the wisdom that comes from looking back on my life and seeing the big picture, how things eventually work out for a good reason, if we hang on to our sense of humor through the desperation and disappointment of not getting what we want. Then there are the the many little things we may take for granted, like the first one on this list of comforting quips from What I Wish I’d Known in the book compilation The Most of Nora Ephron:

The empty nest is underrated.

If the shoe doesn’t fit in the shoe store, it’s never going to fit.

When the children are teenagers, it’s important to have a dog so that someone in the house is happy to see you.

The plane is not going to crash.

There’s no point in making piecrust from scratch.

Anything you think is wrong with your body today you will be nostalgic for a decade later.

Write everything down.

Keep a journal.

Back up your files.

Overinsure everything.

Whenever someone says “Our friendship is more important than this,” watch out, because it almost never is.

Take more pictures.

You can order more than one dessert.

You can’t be friends with people who call after 11:00 pm.

The world’s greatest babysitter burns out after two and a half years.

The last four years of psychoanalysis are a waste of money.

Overtip.

Never let them know.

If friends ask you to be their child’s guardian in case they die, you can say no.

There are no secrets.

You never know.

Click on “Leave a Comment” (top left) to share what hindsight makes you thankful at last. Happy Gobble Gobble!

xoxox

 

 

 

 

 

xoxox

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© Sharon Birke

Managing Member, DoubleSmart LLC

201 697 1947

Sharon@PowerfulGoddess.com

www.PowerfulGoddess.com

Glamour Portraits of the Goddess in Every Woman

Sleepless at Fifty

 

 

Looking back, it seems to me

that I was clueless

until I was about fifty years old.

Nora Ephron

 

 

A handful of women I know are celebrating their 50th birthday with some trepidation.  Having had a couple of years’ head start, I am here to assure everyone that the water is perfectly fine! The perks of this golden age include the 20/20 vision of hindsight–The more years you rack up, the clearer things get!

The quote (above) on turning fifty is by Nora Ephron, a prolific journalist, author, and filmmaker whose books, newspaper columns and magazine feature articles were irreverent as they were funny.  Widely known for her trilogy of romantic comedies starring Tom Hanks and Meg Ryan: When Harry Met Sally, Sleepless in Seattle, You’ve Got Mail. I love this woman for her courage in frankly writing about the best and the worst of her life, including the screenplay for the witty movie about her husband’s infidelity in the middle of her pregnancy. I love her evolving collection of five adjectives that she chooses to describe herself with each passing decade. Admirably, “victim” was never among them even through the cancer that eventually claimed her life to the great grief and surprise of friends and colleagues whom she chose to keep in the dark until the end.

Her commencement address to the Welleslay graduates of 1996 is relevant to the rest of us today:

When I was your age, I would have described myself as ambitious, Wellesley graduate, daughter, Democrat, single.  Ten years later, not one of those things turned up on my list. I was journalist, feminist, New Yorker, divorced, funny. Today, not one of those things turn up in my list: writer, director, mother, sister, happy. Whatever those five things are for you today, they won’t make the list in 10 years–not that you still won’t be some of those things, but they won’t be the five most important things about you. Whatever you choose, however many roads you travel, I hope that you choose not to be a lady. I hope you break the rules and make a little trouble out there… The first (half) of your life is over. Welcome to the best years of your lives!

Click on “Leave a Comment” (top left) to share the five most important things about you in this brave new decade.

All photos on this page from Google Images

xoxox

xoxox

Give the women you love the most unique gift

of elegant and timeless portraits with a

Powerful Goddess Gift Certificate

for a most memorable photo shoot for up to three people!

Buy Now Button with Credit Cards

© Sharon Birke

Managing Member, DoubleSmart LLC

201 697 1947

Sharon@PowerfulGoddess.com

www.PowerfulGoddess.com

Glamour Portraits of the Goddess in Every Woman

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