#50finethings 16 – 20

  

16.  Do a menopause test

I raced into Boots, desperate for help. 

I didn’t know if I was in the middle of a panic attack, a high fever, or what some people refer to as “hot flashes;” but I knew that a pharmacist would help.

A young man, with a name tag that said “Barney,” came to the counter to help me. 

“Would you like a menopause testing kit?” he asked me, after I explained my symptoms to him.

He didn’t look like his name should be Barney, but that’s what the name tag said, so I had no reason to doubt him.

“I can buy a menopause testing kit?” I asked breathlessly, wiping away the salty sweat away from my lips, forehead, and elbows.

“Yes, I’ll show you”.

Barney took to me to the shelves where the menopause products were, and advised me to buy one for €11.99

“It seems so easy,” I said to Barney, and he nodded at me, sagely.

An hour later at home, I peed on a stick and the results were clear:  I was “in the process of the menopause”.

Some doctors and the Internet disagree with the veracity of these tests, but for me and my menopause, I felt a joyful sensation of relief.  It made sense of the sweating, the mild headaches, the slight irritability, and the occasional, irrational tears.

The variant of the menopause I have caught has annoying symptoms; but it’s come with something else.  I am increasingly able to call out bullshit and I can speak my mind in a new way.  Hopefully, I’m not being a dick about it either, but I believe my menopause has come with hidden strengths.

It’s like a super-power.

After 50 years of life on this planet, I feel like my opinions are valid and my experience matters. Like most people, I didn’t celebrate my first or my last period, but I will celebrate and be grateful for the fact, that I am in the process of menopause. 

Well done me.

17.  Adapt

Isn’t it funny how we cling to non-essential distractions and continuously claim that permanence is possible when we know that everything here is as intangible as a daydream?

Everything moves and alters with alluring speed and rapid force, and our bodies and minds adapt to meet the new features.  I was once an unfertilised egg in my mother’s body, and one day I’ll be ash, or nutrients for soil. 

Those are some changes, and it’s fine.

Adapt, change, alter, evolve.

Learn, get better, improve, and play the hand that’s dealt.

If it rains, take an umbrella and if it’s hot, put on a sun hat. 

18.  #pledgetoplant

The Irish Hospice Foundation launched a great campaign last week, called #Pledgetoplant.  The idea is that you grow some flowers or plants, and then sell them as a fundraiser for the Hospice later in June.  My seeds arrived this morning and I can’t wait to get cracking.  I live in a small apartment, with a communal, shaded back yard, but I look forward to my harvest. 

19.  Write a message to the future people

This year, the Irish census form came with a section called “the time capsule” for people to send messages to the residents of Ireland in a hundred years from now. 

I couldn’t think of something to write for the longest time, until it dawned on me that these people would be the grandchildren of some children I know now.  Then it felt easy to write to them and send them unconditional messages of love. 

I hope that they will enjoy it; the grandchildren of the children I know now.

20.  Swim

There’s another new moon tomorrow and we celebrate it with a sea swim! 

I’ll meet Julia and Teresa for our first dip of the season and I’ve no doubt that the water will be freezing.  Our last swim was 18 December, so it’s been a while and I can’t wait to get back in.  The benefits of sea-swimming are well documented, but for me the purest moment is when the dread and fear turn into giddiness and joy.  Even thinking of the water makes me feel better, I honestly can’t wait for the shock of it.

Therefore, I’ll leave you this month, with a quote from Shantaram about the water.

I wish you a very happy new moon, and I’ll see you again at the next new moon, next month.

Shantaram Gregory David Roberts (p. 374).

“Our life, it probably began inside of the ocean,” Johnny said quietly. “About four thousand million years before now.  Probably near hot places, like volcanoes, under the sea”.

I turned to look at him.

“And for almost all of that long time, all the living things were water things, living inside the sea.  Then, a few hundred million years ago, maybe a little more – just a little while, really, in the big history of the Earth – the living things began to be living on the land, as well”.

I was frowning and smiling at the same time, surprised and bewildered.  I held my breath, afraid that any sounds might interrupt his musings.

“But in a way you can say that after leaving the sea, after all those millions of years of living inside the sea, we took the ocean with us.  When a woman makes a baby, she gives it water, inside her body, to grow in.  That water inside her body is almost exactly the same as the water of the sea.  It is salty, by just the same amount.  She makes a little ocean, in her body.  And not only this.  Our blood and our sweating, they are both salty, almost exactly like the water from the sea is salty.  We carry oceans inside of us, in our blood and our sweat.  And we are crying the oceans, in our tears”.