Through a new lens

I spent the morning of my 51st birthday wearing camouflage and hunkered down on the edge of a cornfield.

Holding my heavy camera still, eyes trained on the distant stalks, I tried very hard not to laugh at the shrill screech of my husband’s turkey call.

From the top of my messy hair, stuffed carelessly into a random baseball hat, to the tips of my brother’s old tennis shoes, it was a far cry from a year ago. For that milestone birthday, I tooled around Chicago in a new black dress and fancy hairdo, toasting merrily with family while frantically bemoaning the swift passage of time.

I’m looking at life from a different lens for my second half century.

It’s a little more relaxing on this side of the hill.

For my next half-century I intend to be less frenzied, and more engaged.

I’ll be kinder when I look in the mirror, and less leery of shopping and scales.

I hope to lose less sleep to worry, and more to making plans.

I’ll still fill my plate with colorful food, start my day with a good cleansing sweat, and stand straight and tall, when I remember.

But, I’ll also eat apple bread pudding and chocolate cake, stretch out on the couch with a good book, and find time for a front porch sit.

With this next 50 years I will:

• Make time for my old friends and be open to new ones
• Seek advice from my children and listen to their wise counsel
• Laugh
• Avoid complaining and the people who do
• Dance with my husband, even though neither one of us can remember the steps to a Foxtrot
• Dive into the water without dipping my toe
• Do crossword puzzles in pen
• Moisturize
• Support local musicians
• Hand write thank you notes and remember to mail them
• Wear the yellow sundress my sweet daughter sent me
• Watch the whole sunrise

For my 51st birthday, I bought a new camera lens. And, I intend to spend the next 49 years looking carefully through it.