Culture Bitch

…as in, the big four-oh. Forty. 40. I’m typing it a few times, in an attempt to become comfortable with it. Because, you see, this Wine Bitch is turning forty (gulp) in seven days.

I woke up this morning and had a moment of sheer panic. When did this happen? I feel like it was only yesterday I was turning 30. Those ten years - the best of my life so far - have flown by in a blur of apartments, job changes, travel, family, friends, travel, buying our first home, and more travel, all shared with the best man in the world, Book Bastard. So fun, but so fast.

Actually, it’s not that I mind having a birthday, per se. I don’t mind that I’m getting older; everyone does, it’s no big deal. I’m certainly not one of those people who bemoans the loss of my misspent youth. I love my life, I’ve done lots of cool things and plan to do more.

No, what I’m having a hard time with is the sound of it, the actual word: forty. FORTY. I loved turning thirty. Thirty sounded fun, exciting, mature in a good way. Forty, on the other hand, sounds old.

And the problem is, I don’t feel old. I certainly don’t feel forty. A couple of years ago there were articles declaring that “Fifty is the new thirty!”. So does that make forty the new twenty? Well, I guess I don’t really want to be 20 again. But I also don’t want to “be” forty.

Perhaps the problem is the way it sounds in English. Quarante. Definitely sounds better in French. Je suis quarante. OK, not so bad, I can get used to that. I could embrace it: Ich bin vierzig! That sounds fierce, like some Germanic tribeswoman. Er, not quite the image I’m trying to project. Jeg er førti. Not enough subterfuge in my Norwegian heritage, alas. Sono quaranta. You can always count on Italian for making anything sound sexy.

But in my head, I can distinctly hear my very sensible Scottish great-grandmother, who lived to 84 and looked at everything with a glass-half-full eye, say, in her inimitable brogue: “Och, aye, so you’ll be forrrty, dinnae greet abou’ it, lass! Hav’ a wee cup o’ tea.”

Quite right…with one exception: my wee cup o’ tea is going to be a big ol’ bottle of Veuve Clicquot, shared with good friends. Eh bien, je suis quarante. Santé!