Welcome! I’m so glad you’re here! 

Today, February 5, 2024, is my 49th birthday, and this is the inaugural post of my very special blog, The Edge of 50. There are exactly 52 weeks until I turn 50, and I plan to use them to share with you all kinds of things I’ve learned over the past 49 years. Being a woman in the 2nd half of life is not necessarily easy, but I think if we stick together we can find inspiration, strength, companionship, and love for ourselves and each other as we embark on this journey. 

For now, the blog will come to you via email once a week on Monday. Eventually, all the posts will live on my website, and you’ll be notified by email when they’re available. 

Feel free to reply to this email address with any questions, comments, or things you’d like to hear more about. I’d love to hear from you. And please feel free to share this link with anyone you think might enjoy this blog, so they can subscribe, too.

That’s all the housekeeping I have for now. Let’s get right into it…

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Week 1 - 49 years old today

I was thinking back the other day to when I was very young and my parents were still married, and realized that I’ve always been a Daddy’s girl. I had never really thought about it before, but the truth is my dad and I are so similar it’s almost weird. We even look so much alike that people who don’t know us, immediately know he’s my dad. Looking back, there’s always been a special bond between me and my dad. 

So I guess it makes perfect sense that he’s the inspiration for this very first blog post of The Edge of 50. Allow me to elaborate…

The other day I had lunch with my dad. It’s something we do on a fairly regular basis, and it’s a tradition I absolutely cherish. When the bill came, he took the receipt to figure out the tip and the total, and I noticed him pause for a while. I knew he was struggling with the math, and I offered to help. My dad had 2 strokes within a couple of weeks of each other a few years back, and his short term memory isn’t what it once was. Figuring out the bill, with those tiny numbers, on that tiny receipt paper is not the easiest task. Hell, I have to get my calculator and reading  glasses out to do it myself. 

My dad handed me the receipt and let me pick up where he left off. For the record, the calculations that he had done to that point were all correct. It was just the “carry the one” part that was confusing. And here’s my point - he handed the receipt over to me and accepted my help without hesitation. With no noticeable shame or embarrassment or frustration. I don’t know exactly what he was experiencing inside, but from my perspective he was cool as a cucumber. 

Let me tell you why this matters so much to me, and what it has to do with being a woman on the edge of 5o. When I handed him back the receipt to sign, I made a comment about receiving help. My dad said something to the effect of - When I go out with my friends I just hand over my card and let them do it. I don’t give a shit what anyone thinks about it anymore. 

We talked about how forgetting things is frustrating, and asking for help or allowing those who offer to assist us can be hard. My dad is a stoic man. He is proud and brave and strong. He entered the jungles of Vietnam as a young, naive Marine, and lived through experiences that I can’t even begin to imagine. He has survived devastating personal loss in his life; the kind that many of us don’t ever come back from. And through it all, he has kept a soft, open heart and an infinite willingness to grow and learn and love. And that, my dear readers, is the point. 

I have learned that no matter what we’ve been through by the time we’re perched on the edge of 50, there’s always more. More to learn. More ways to grow and expand as a person. More life to enjoy. More love to give and to receive. If we’re still alive, there’s more life to be lived.

My mom died when I was 9 years old, but more importantly she died when SHE was only 36. As I approach 50, it’s not lost on me how much living I’ve been able to do that she never did. My mom never got to have a mammogram or a colonoscopy. She never had a hot flash or night sweats. She never got wrinkled skin or gray hair.  Lucky her, you may think, but you’d be wrong.

She also never got to help her daughters dress for their prom, or pick out her Mother of the Bride dresses. She never took a long, sniff from the heads of her 7 grand babies, savoring that sweet new born baby scent. She never got a retirement party from the bank where she worked, or to travel to the USSR. She never even knew it’s no longer called the USSR! 

She never got to see her grandkids graduate from high school or college. She didn’t get to travel to Virginia for Thanksgiving and see her ENTIRE family all together in one beautiful place. She didn’t get to pick out the perfect gift for her baby sister on her 60th birthday. She never even got the chance to be on the edge of 50 herself, and fret about getting old. I’d like to think she would have embraced her age and dove head first into her 2nd half much like I am, but I can’t know. 

While there’s lots of things about mid-life to complain about, there’s infinitely more things to feel excited and appreciative about. And it’s entirely our choice where we place our attention. 

I hear women my age complaining almost every day about how getting older sucks. And I get it. I really do. From the time we’re in our mid to late 30s our bodies begin undergoing the ultimate ‘caterpillar to butterfly’ metamorphosis. We go in as a young woman and we come out as a wise sage. It’s perfectly brilliant if you ask me. It’s a perfectly orchestrated, absolutely divine plan. And it only becomes a problem when we refuse to embrace the next chapter as equally important and exponentially more fun than the previous ones.

But who can blame us? From the time we’re born we are immersed in a culture that celebrates youth, sets impossible beauty standards, pits girl against girl, and then hangs us out to dry like a tomato in the Tuscan sun as soon as we begin to show signs of maturity and aging. We’re meant to be pacified by phrases like “You were so beautiful… when you were young,” or “Wow, you must have been a lot of fun back in your day!” 

I’m sorry, what? 

I won’t speak for you, but I for one am beautiful now and fun still. And I only plan on getting more beautiful and more fun the older I get. I plan to slide into my grave 100 years old, 10 minutes late, with a cheeky smirk, a dirty face, and a dirtier mind; having lived my life so passionately and copiously that there’s barely a nub left. 

The past 49 years have included many blessings for me, not the least of which are my 4 children. And those years have also been riddled with struggles, set backs, shame, guilt and fear. I have fought to keep my head above water until I felt like I had no strength left with which to tread water.  I look back at certain times in my life and sincerely wonder how I was able to carry on. I truly don’t know. 

The hot irony in it all is that during most of those tragically difficult times, my fear and shame ran so deep that I felt my only choice was to hide my struggles and pretend I didn’t need help. It never worked. It almost always ended with my situation reaching critical mass, and someone having to step in and bail me out. 

Somewhere along the way I erroneously learned that asking for help showed weakness. I believed that I had to do things on my own, and figure everything out myself. This life strategy led to mess after chaotic mess, and ultimately to a level of shame and self isolation that at times I thought I’d never be able to break free from. 

For the record, I’ll never be able to fully show my appreciation for my family, and how they’ve helped me over the years. I’m sorry that I waited for the shit to hit the fan before I asked for help. I thought if I didn’t do it alone, I would be a failure. Turns out, I couldn’t do it alone. Also turns out that it was the ‘not asking for help’ part that created my failures, not the ‘getting help’ part. 

I didn’t want to be a failure. I thought I had to prove that I could do it on my own in order to be taken seriously. I thought I wouldn’t be loveable if I needed help or attention or support. I thought I wouldn't be loveable if I messed up or couldn’t do everything on my own.

I was wrong. 

The older I get, the more certain I am that we are not meant to do this alone. We are not meant to go through life, any part of life but especially the 2nd (and BEST!) half on our own. We are sisters. We are friends. We are united in our majestic womanhood, and we are meant to be together. We are meant to encourage and inspire and support each other. We are meant to believe in each other, and see the best in each other, and hold hands as we walk each other home. 

No, not all women are interested in or available for this kind of brazenly unapologetic sisterhood of women on the edge of 50, but if you’re reading this I’m willing to bet that you are. And that, my dear friend, is sacred.  It’s why I’m here, and it’s why I’m writing this blog. 

It’s my intention that every week for the next 51 weeks, I will show up in your inbox with some sort of reflection, encouragement, story, thought for pondering, or whatever else tickles my fancy. It is my intention that with these weekly emails, we will hold hands and guide each other from the edge of 50 into the next and best half of our lives. We will find ways to celebrate our experience and wisdom. We will release ourselves from long held inhibitions. We will unlock our dreams and unleash our magic. We will figure out how to live passionate lives full of vitality and joy, no matter what our first half was like.

I am on this journey for myself, and for my daughter, as well as my sons. I’m on it for my nieces and my nephew, and for my sisters, and especially for my mom who never got to the edge of 50. And I’m on it for you, if you’re willing, so that whatever it is your heart desires, you know there is at least one woman out there (Me!) who fully believes in you and is unwaveringly cheering you on. All I ask is that you show up each Monday and read my blog. We’ll figure the rest out as we go. 

Let’s do like my dad and be brave and strong, and keep our hearts soft and open and full of love. Let’s allow ourselves to receive help and support without giving a shit what people think. And let’s embrace The Edge of 50, as the beginning of the BEST of our lives, no matter how near to the edge we are. 

Blessings and beach days forever,

Katie