I remember reading Theresa Bloomingdale’s treatise on child rearing, I Should Have Seen It Coming When the Rabbit Died. Her elementary school-aged child calls her “about 50.” Bloomingdale calls it “the wrong side of 45.”  She says “about 50” is staring her in the face. 

I’m not sure what should be put in quotes there. I no longer own a copy of I Should Have Seen It Coming When the Rabbit Died. I read it to death when I was a kid because the author had 10 kids.  

And I thought I wanted 10 kids. 

Can you imagine? I barely survived one kid’s love of scuba. How would I survive another nine kids who might adore snakes, worms, bridges, airplanes, sharks, the dark, lakes, lake swimming, swimming over large objects, submarines, bathrooms, germs, wet hair, and running their hands over fabric?

I don’t know what’s up with that last one. Back in the ’80s, when the game show models ran their hands over the sofa or car interior or whatever it was the contestant might win — ugh. My spine just curled in on itself. Even now, you’ll never catch me running my hands over fabric. It’s like nails on a blackboard. Not a fear, exactly, but a distaste akin to gurdy meat. 

If you did not have a grandmother who was Pennsylvania Dutch by way of Fishtown and a Cornish mother-in-law, gurdy meat is ground beef mixed with allspice and oatmeal.

It’s, um, gross.  

And I’m way off topic here. I blame the four-in-the-morning beagle wake-up call and second glass of post-dinner wine. 

My birthday is this week. I’m channeling Theresa Bloomingdale when I say I’m on the wrong side of 50.  

Every few months after 50 brings something new and unwelcome, like my body is a corporation forced to pay quarterly taxes. Things grow. Things shrink. Neither happens where you want it to happen. 

Those cookies and French fries that once lingered so briefly now apply for permanent citizenship. A broken bone spurs questionnaires about your history of falling. You wake up in the morning wondering when your next opportunity for sleep will present itself. 

And who you are — or, rather, who you’re about to be — is a mystery.

And not a fun, Hallmark, Jessica Fletcher kind of mystery.  

No.  

It’s more like a Black Mirror kind of mystery. An Angela Lansbury circa Manchurian Candidate kind of mystery. 

And in case you’re wondering, never, ever attend your youngest child’s Accepted Students Day at college a week before a birthday you’d rather not have. 

But also, you know, don’t want to skip because you’re dead. 

In Gone Girl, protagonist Amy says she’s at a point in life where people say she looks good for her age.  

I’d like to take that a step further.  

If I did miss this birthday because I was dead, people would say, “Oh, wow!” Or, “Oh my gosh!” But they wouldn’t say, “How?! She was so young!” 

They’d just be like, “Heart attack,” with a knowing nod, because I exercise but I write about cookies far too much in this space for anyone to think my heart has escaped unscathed after a half-century of daily Oreos. 

With empty nesting, like the wrong side of 50, staring me in the face, I’m wondering, all existential crisis-like, who I am if I’m not getting scuba certified because my kid was basically born with gills.

Who am I if I’m not driving an hour and a half to New Jersey every week for a kid who has discovered a love of film, and like-minded brethren in the Garden State? 

Who am I without karate practice? Dinosaur chicken nugget dinners? School runs and pool runs? The runs and runny noses?  

I used to be somebody else. But that girl disappeared a long time ago. She used to go dancing and show up at bars with $6 in her pocket because the second drink was never on her.  

When I think about, as President Josiah Bartlet might say, what’s next, I think about careers and education and living somewhere else.  

But those are perseverations of the young.  

Because while my children are moving on, they still need me. Sometimes intangibly, like following my career and its reliable income for tuition payments. 

Sometimes it’s in discernible ways, like texts for social security numbers or explanations on what determines residence. While I’m, you know, doing sit-ups because no, French fries, you cannot live here permanently. 

If the kids were done with me, I’d be gone. I’d live in London while I attended Oxford University for a Ph.D. in books or I Should Have Seen It Coming When the Rabbit Died or The Hobbit or Robocop or something. 

Listen. I once saw a guy on TV who was a Dukes of Hazard historian, and I listened to a podcast where the guest had successfully defended a dissertation on the history of windows. If I want a Ph.D. in The Hobbit, I think I can get a Ph.D. in The Hobbit. 

And I’d so make you call me “doctor.” 

Also, just one of those guys was interesting. And it wasn’t the Dukes historian. 

Another also, there is perhaps nothing signifying your position on the wrong side of 50 more than finding the history of windows fascinating. 

Anyway. My point is this. It’s difficult to fully embrace what’s next when you’re in that liminal space between your kids needing you and your kids never needing you again. 

I recently saw the musical Mean Girls. One song asks where do you belong? 

Come take a walk, the song urges, answer my small questionnaire. 

Um, I did take a walk. It broke my arm. It bought me a questionnaire. 

Where do I belong? 

Seriously, guys. I’m asking you. Where do I belong? 

Because if you don’t know, I’m going to have to ask the Dukes of Hazard historian. 

And that’s worse than gurdy meat.