I am 35 years old, “advanced maternal age,” as a younger friend pointed out, accidentally, this weekend. I was a late spring, end of summer kind- of-flowering girl, yet somehow I appear to be prematurely embarking on a mid-life crisis. Nice. In one day, I have had all of these genius ideas. (Insert sarcasm.)Please. I know they sound crazy, but I still want to do all of them. At the same exact time. My husband kindly said, “You wanna go dancing? We can go dancing.” Then he suggested I should just pick a few. Ummm. No. There are definite signs that my brain is working overtime or potentially malfunctioning? I have determined that I may be in the warm-up laps and pre-stretching phase of:

A) Having a mid-life crisis

B) I have had too little of sleep and too much caffeine today

C) A combination of the two

It’s so hard to differentiate between the two. Having experienced one, but not the other. I had hopes of living past the not-so-ripe age of 70, but it’s really not looking that great. If, in fact, you multiply your mid-life crisis age by two. And boom, there you have it. Simple math. That’s your age at death. Perhaps I will just be warming up and stretching for a while. Exciting. Oh man. I think you will soon agree. Obviously, in staying true to my extroverted self, the natural yet, not that smart of thing to do, is throw some of the pseudo-crises out there for others to read about. I have kept a few  ideas to myself, for privacy reasons, I’ll have you know, before you get all “too much information” on me. But you are reading my blog, right?

Come on. Get that leg pat drumroll going.

You may be going through a mid-life crisis (or have had too much caffeine) if….

1. You want to sell your house and move to another country and live in an orphanage. Or work at the fistula hospital. Or work somewhere will you may not make any money at all.
2. You want to go back to school for something, but you just aren’t sure exactly what you should go back to study. Hmmmm. So many choices. What do you want to be if you ever grow up? So, you apply for your Masters of Arts in Counseling. Makes sense. Help others navigate their lives.
3. You also want to quit your job and go back to working at a coffee shop as a barista. Great tips, free coffee, lots of people to meet, talk to and remember their “regular.” That makes a person feel loved, important, and like they should leave you a big tip. Your brain can remember a grande non-fat, extra foamy latte, right?
4. You want to buy a food truck, and start a business selling some pretty stellar tacos for a pretty unbelievable price.
5. You want to get another dog, a big one, never a little one again. You realize that you have a small cat-like dog that wears a diaper and you also have promised your children hamsters, in a weakened desperate state. If and only if they can be more responsible. So, it’s looking like the hamsters may be waiting a while at Petland. Whew! Works out well. I didn’t want to have to get passports for them. Seems a little much. Hamsters in the overhead compartment of a plane, headed to an orphanage in a foreign country? Not. Happening.
6. You want to wear stilettos and go dancing in Phoenix, Arizona or maybe somewhere closer, but just not Power and Light. You’ve already planned on bringing flip-flops in your gigantic purse, for that moment, about an hour after you have worn the stilettos, when you can no longer walk. Or dance. All you can talk about is how much your feet hurt. What a drag. Slide on those Reefs, girl. And get your mid-life crisis self back on the dance floor!
7. You want to hop on a tour bus with your husband’s old band and home school your kids in that bus. Surely there is wi-fi on a tour bus?
8. You want to put a ridiculous bumper sticker on your van…or on your food truck or on your tour bus
9. You’re thinking about what would make a good family tattoo
10. You want to have another child. Perhaps conceived on a tour bus. Then you can name him something really clever. Of course, he will be a boy.
11. You want to foster and/or adopt several children. Hope the tour bus passes the home study. I may need to call on a social working friend.
12. You want to go on a road trip to see old college friends. Which could really work out wonderfully. With the whole tour bus plan
13. You want to sell most of your stuff. And your kids’ stuff. And your husband’s stuff, just not the guitars.
14. You want to take a one-way trip to Hawaii. And just not tell your sister that lives there that you could only half-way afford one-way tickets. Will someone adopt our dog? The one that wears diapers, and needs $1200 in dental work? He is soooooo sweet. And will someone water our plants, especially our lime tree? Cinco de Mayo is coming up, and two limes are getting pumped.

Lastly, you want to drink a few beers while watching the Royals, sifting through ALL of these brilliant ideas, in hopes of discovering the ones that float to the top. You know the most important, foamy ones. If none of them float, you can always think of some more, right? Yep. But, please tell me a few of these ideas are amazingly doable and not just the by-product of scattered “advanced maternal age” brain thinking. I mean, it’s not like I want to buy a hot new red sports car or anything. That would just be absurd. And so impractical.