An interesting thing about joining the community center so far is the occasional situation of finding myself in conversation with a naked old lady in the locker room. The first time it happened, I felt a little awkward as a saggy breasted, cellulite and varicose vein-legged grandma was talking to me with no qualms, as if she were fully clothed. But then again, we were talking about Stella, who had just fallen from the bench onto the tile floor, and we were discussing how children spring back fast from falls. The old lady was comforting me, assuring me I wasn't a horrible parent for not catching my daughter before she fell, so it was easy to ignore the fact that she was naked.
But last night, another naked old lady decided to talk to me in the locker room, and this time it was just plain bizarre. Stella and I had just finished showering after our swim. We had our clothes on, and walked over to the water extractor machine to dry our swim suits. The naked old lady was using the extractor. As we waited our turn, she started talking to us like we were already in the middle of a conversation. I love it when people do that. I try to guess what they were talking about and it's pretty funny usually.
She talked and talked and didn't stop talking until we were on the other side of the locker room door. She talked mostly about her own grandkids. It was pretty weirdly adorable. I think maybe she had dementia. The best part by far was when she dropped something and bent over in front of us to pick it up. I can honestly say I had never before seen an old woman's anus and yoni in person. It sure is true what they say about gravity's pull.
She acted so loony, it didn't even upset me when she asked if Stella was my granddaughter. I figured, heck, when you're a naked, demented, elderly woman, perhaps you're not the best judge of another person's age. And technically, I could be Stella's grandmother, if I'd had a kid when I was 17 and my kid had a kid when s/he was 18. Not totally unreasonable. I didn't take offense to her comment. What? She thought my daughter was my granddaughter and it didn't bug me at all. Because you know what? So what if I am old enough to be a grandma.
I love being middle-aged. I feel so free to be who I really am. Pretty soon I'm gonna start wearing tropical print muumuus and hot pink glasses with purple Birkenstocks. I can't wait til I'm that confident in my weirdness. I'm proud of myself for using wise mind and not emotional mind as they say in therapy, or for being reasonable and not wigging out and being a cry baby in layman's terms, when I was mistaken for Stella's grandma. I'm using my skills and opening my mind.
Seeing all these different body types, and the people who seem so comfortable in them, makes me much less embarrassed by what age, hormones, gravity, and a voracious appetite is doing to my own body. They say exercise improves your self-esteem, but I say hanging out in the locker room with naked ladies, unashamed, realizing no one cares what my body looks like ups it even more.
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