It’s official… I am forty, 40. I sure don’t feel like it, though.
When I was younger, forty sounded like a line I would cross that would signal I had officially become a real adult. I’m pretty sure I imagined I would have it all figured out by then. Or maybe that I would at least feel like I knew what I was doing. Instead, the day comes and goes. I woke up, Justin made my latte, like he does every day, and we carry on. Nothing magical happens. No fanfare. No sudden clarity. Just life.
Maybe I thought it would feel like more. More settled. More sure. But the biggest thing that changed before I hit forty wasn’t about me. It was losing Tove and Sigrun. Our Norwegian elkhounds. Full sisters. Our kids, honestly. One to cancer, one to old age. Sigrun even shared my exact birthday. People say they’re just dogs, but when your whole routine revolves around them for over a decade, their absence changes everything. The house feels different. Quieter. Emptier in a way you don’t expect.
I also thought it might be something horrible. The “over the hill” moment. My dad said he was just pissed off. My husband had a pretty hard time with it. I’m sure some people enjoy turning forty. I felt nothing either way. Just that the year leading up to it was rough for me, losing both my girls.
My husband and I have moved more times than I can count. We’ve changed jobs, dealt with illness, infertility, and kept adapting to whatever came next. I’ve enjoyed living our life and growing up with him. We married young, but I don’t regret it and wouldn’t change anything.
Our lives haven’t followed a pattern or met anyone’s expectations. Maybe that’s what I love about it. It’s our life, the way we want to live it. We still have both good and bad times. That’s also life. But we’ve learned and worked through things together.
Turning forty, I’ve started to look more at the small family we have right now. Just me, my husband, and our dogs. And I realized this is it. This is the real life. It’s quiet. It’s ours.
I don’t need this website to be a brand or a big statement. It’s just a place to write things down as they happen. A corner of the internet that feels like me. No pressure. No performance. Just words, when I have them.
Here’s to a long, happy, simple life ahead. However it comes.