The 43rd Year

I want to write about my 43rd year - a year of complete insignificance.  43 marks exactly nothing, except perhaps the continuing degradation of collagen in my skin, energy in my body and sparkle in my eye.  43 has neither the stigma of 40 nor the dignity of 65.  It is not special.  And that is exactly the point.  We have 1^st birthdays and those are special.  And then there is our 13^th.  And our 16^th, 18^th 21^st and 30^th.  And from there the milestones are fewer and farther between.  The truth is that most of our years are not special.  Most of our years pass one after the other, some smoothly, others less so.  And we fight our insignificance, we fight the passage of time, the aging of our bodies, our children, our parents and friends. 

My significant other isn’t so sure I should be writing about 43.  Sig Other suggests that perhaps it would be better to write an expose about the movie business – the insider’s scoop on all things scandalous and silly in Hollywood.  He offers to set up a blog for me to do just that.  Except the truth is, the business is no longer particularly scandalous or silly.  It is no longer terribly seedy or glamorous or intriguing.  What might have been an interesting insider story twenty years ago when I first started out (long before the era of blogs and e-access) is now just the story of a mid-level executive struggling to remain excited, striving to remain relevant and hoping to remain employed. 

Twenty years ago when I arrived fresh from college with my one good suit (a $300 gray Eli Tahari number with shoulder pads and a coordinating qiana shirt) and my eyes wide open, the hallways were rife with affairs and drug addictions and inappropriate behavior.  I remember being shocked at the number of men cheating on their wives, women cheating on their husbands and single girls willing to be mistresses.  Stories of executives sleeping off an all night binge in their offices were pretty commonplace.  And of course there was the office bigamist (who was also the office sociopath), who provided endless fascination not to mention gossip.  Sadly, those days are long gone.  Studios are nothing more than corporate conglomerates and the days of sordid affairs and cocaine dust on the ladies’ room counter are long gone. 

And so, I tell Sig Other, I want to write about my 43^rd year.  Sig Other is, in fact, my Husband. But so many years prior to our recent spectacularly fun and incredibly amazing wedding were spent intertwined in perfect unwed synchronicity that I still refer to Husband often as Sig Other or BLuP (Beloved Life Partner).   

But this is not a blog about Sig Other.  And in spite of Sig Other’s protests of “What about me?” THIS is, in fact, about ME.  And my 43^rd year.