Do you remember your 19 year old self? For some of you that may be a recent incarnation, but for me, it’s a half a lifetime ago. I’ve been thinking a lot the last year about 19 year old me. Maybe it’s approaching 40 in a year. I don’t think I’m that hung up on age, but who knows. Maybe it’s that this year was 20 years since my Dad died, so it’s been a half a life without him around. I’m not sure that’s all of it, either.

Whatever the reason, 19 year old me has been hanging around a lot. 19 year old me was fearless. Never met a challenge that couldn’t be faced. Never met a person or a situation that intimidated her. Took on projects and adventures without blinking.

Now I blink a lot. Is this wisdom? Have I simply grown beyond youthful delusions of grandeur? Over the last 20 years I’ve taken up smaller dreams and lived a life simultaneously more full and more diminished than 19 year old me could imagine.

Eight is much larger than the family of one (me) or perhaps two (a husband) that 19 year old me pictured. I’ve grown more humble, more patient, more slow to react to situations. All changes for the good. And, yet, wistfully I think of meeting each day with drive and determination, eager to bend its events to my plans- characteristics I’ve sacrificed to become all of those things mentioned above.

I’m hoping the next 20 years will be a time of balancing the first 20 years of my life and the second 20 years. I’d like to bring back some of the dreams and drive without sacrificing the calm and peace that I’ve gained. I’m revisiting plans from a long time ago and seeing how they can fit in with the new, improved version of my life. I’m deciding how who I was and who I am can coexist.

Maybe this is what a “midlife” crisis looks like. Hey, at least I haven’t bought any cars or run away from home to work in Vegas.