This is 40

​Growing older has never bothered me. At least, it hasn’t so far. I remember when I was about to turn 30 and I kept waiting for it to freak me out. It never did. Of course, that was the year I got married so maybe I was just so excited for the future, the number seemed inconsequential in comparison.

​I had planned on writing out something really deep and profound, but the truth is, a 40th birthday isn’t that big of a deal. The way I see it, the older I get, the more great memories I have, the more friends I have made, the greater the vastness of my experiences and lessons learned. I feel I’m still at a point where life just keeps getting better. I still have so much to look forward to, while appreciating what my life has been so far. I will admit, however, that for the briefest moment this morning, I did have the gloomy thought of “Well, nobody can call me young anymore.” Then I realized that isn’t a bad thing. I don’t WANT to be young. I don’t want to go back to the days where I didn’t realize how confused I was, and and had to deal with girl drama, and worryied far too much about things that really didn’t matter. I rather enjoy the wisdom and peace that comes with age.

​Not entirely unlike Erik Erikson’s stages of psychosocial development, each decade of my life has had a theme of sorts. Loosely speaking, my 30s were about marriage, motherhood and business. My 20s were about being in the Air Force, traveling, and developing deep friendships. My teens were about education and extracurricular activities (I had a LOT of both.) I’ve always been fully involved in life and I can’t wait to see where my 40s are going to take me.

​In the meantime, I’m celebrating today. So far, I’ve slept in, went for the Venti at Starbucks, and now looking forward to mimosas and cupcakes with friends this afternoon, knocking off work early to hang out with the kids and then dinner out with the husband tonight. Life is good.

All images taken at our Yorktown studio. See behind the scenes from this session here.