Birthday Blues

It's become a tradition between my mother and me (as well as between my mother and my siblings, and between her and her grown grandchildren) to take me out to eat and then shopping for my birthday. This way we get to spend some quality time with each other, and she doesn't have to worry about what to get me ahead of time. She's on a fixed income, though, so this is never a huge splurge. Last year, she took me to Ulta and we loaded up on sale-priced makeup, and then she bought me a cute but inexpensive suit jacket at Ross. The year before that, it was the clearance sections at Old Navy and Target. The point is, I can either pick one nice thing, or find a good sale and get a lot of bang for her set number of bucks. I usually take option number two.

This year, though, I think I've decided to switch it up and go for the one nice thing; that thing being a pair of nice, figure-flattering jeans. For the last several years I've been buying the cheap discount chain store stretch versions of Levi's and Lee Jeans, refusing to spend more than $20 on a pair that I figured would just be too big by the time I finished losing weight.

Well, you know what? I think I'm finished losing weight. Not that I couldn't stand to lose another ten or twenty pounds, but I've accepted the fact that I'm most probably not going to. I like food too much, and I don't like exercise enough. I maintain enough of a balance between those two things to keep from gaining weight, but not enough so to lose weight without actively trying.

And I'm pretty much done actively trying. Sure, I've got some extra jiggle in my lower regions, but my husband has no problem with that, and tells me I don't need Carson Kressley to tell me how to look good naked. I can swim a mile, I can walk up several flights of stairs without getting winded, and my arms are toned enough that they don't jiggle. I eat healthy, most of the time. I look good in my clothes, I can wear a bathing suit in public without feeling self-conscious or having to hide under a giant tent of a tee-shirt, claiming that it's really just to prevent sunburn. I'm finally, FINALLY comfortable with my body. It only took me 35 years to get there.

I feel pretty. And gosh-darn it, I deserve a pair of nice, bum-flattering bluejeans.

And maybe some shoes, if there's anything left over.