Flashback Friday, Sort of…Well, Maybe Not…Anyhow, It’s All About Helen Mirren

Yesterday, I couldn’t help myself, I plastered this all over social media.

”I think midlife is when the universe gently places her hands upon your shoulders, pulls you close, and whispers in your ear:
I’m not screwing around. It’s time. All of this pretending and performing – these coping mechanisms that you’ve developed to protect yourself from feeling inadequate and getting hurt – has to go.

Your armor is preventing you from growing into your gifts. I understand that you needed these protections when you were small. I understand that you believed your armor could help you secure all of the things you needed to feel worthy of love and belonging, but you’re still searching and you’re more lost than ever.

Time is growing short. There are unexplored adventures ahead of you. You can’t live the rest of your life worried about what other people think. You were born worthy of love and belonging. Courage and daring are coursing through you. You were made to live and love with your whole heart. It’s time to show up and be seen.”

~ Brené Brown

Photo: Helen Mirren, age 70  (70 is the “new” middle age.) 😉

First of all, because I find myself smack-dab in the middle of this mid-life thing —I absolutely love what this says. Secondly, are you farking kidding me Helen Mirren? You are my spirit animal!

And last but not least, I love it because my hubby was just telling me the other day how grateful he was feeling due to the fact that for our age (late fifties, early sixties) we seem to be beating the clock pretty darn well, MEANING… except for a few minor things here and there—we’re not sick (as a matter of fact he puts me to shame doing CrossFit like a beast three mornings a week), and we work at maintaining the gift which decent genetics has bestowed upon us, MEANING…without going under the knife we don’t necessarily look our age (but lets get real, we don’t look like Helen Mirren either.)

Now, since it’s all about  Dame Helen, here is the flashback part from a couple of years ago:

Today I met a couple of girlfriends for a leisurely, late breakfast. I hesitate to use the word brunch because that implies Mimosa’s and Bloody Mary’s, pots of hot coffee and the fact that it’s the weekend.

This was simply an egg, toast and tofu rice bowl breakfast, sans the alcohol.
In other words, a Monday.

We hadn’t seen each other for a couple of weeks, so there were lots of hugs, laughter, stories, and sharing of pictures on our phones.

One of my friends showed us a picture of the cute rainbow-colored, teeny-tiny bikini she’d just had the courage to purchase over the weekend. She is a stunning forty-year-old, who, in my humble opinion should be wearing her bikini to the Post Office and Trader Joes, but this was a big step for her.

No more modest little one piece for HER this summer.
She’s gonna rock a bikini, loud and proud. I applaud her for that.

Here’s what Nora Ephron had to say about bikinis:

Anyhow, my friend had been noticing scores of, for lack of a better word, average women, with their voluminous bellies and boobies, and their jiggly thighs, walking up and down the beach with heads held high, like they’re freakin’ Heidi Klum, and she thought: Hey, why the hell not?

Why not indeed!

I love what she said next. I think I’m going to embroider it on a pillow.

“If people don’t like me in my bikini, they don’t have to buy my calendar.”

Bahahahaha!
After we all got done laughing our asses off, my other friend told us the story of her holiday a few years back, in Italy with her friend Luigi. They were in some steamy southern Italian city and decided to go to the local beach.

Because it was Italy and you can’t be held accountable for anything you say, eat or do there, she was also wearing a bikini. (Italy is where Vegas got their slogan, I think Marcus Aurelius said it first)

Somehow, she and Luigi found themselves together on a raft, (this part of the story gets murky. There must be one hell of a reason behind this because my friend is not a “share a raft” kinda gal). Anyhow, there they were, paddling around in the warm, deep blue, Mediterranean Sea.

Luigi then suggests that they paddle (I’m still wondering about this), over to a small island nearby (what?), to visit a couple of his friends on the beach. As they approach, one of the women, as my friend tells it, slowly unfolds herself from seated to standing on her towel.

“Luigi, Mio Caro!” she exclaims, waving her long, tan arm in the air as she slinks toward the shore to greet Luigi in a warm embrace. (Okay, now I get it.)

So… picture this: Luigi is 5’3″.

She is 6 feet tall and shaped like a ripe pear. Large heaving breasts and curvaceously round hips all the color of mahogany bounce toward the shoreline…oh, and she’s topless.

My friend then recounted how Luigi’s face was buried in this woman’s smoldering Italian bosom for the duration of the endless embrace and no one even flinched. As a matter of fact, there was a lot more of this skin on skin hugging and all of the women were older, voluptuous, tan and topless.
Mama Mia!

Not a body issue to be found. OMG! That’s SO Italian! Actually, that’s SO European. What’s OUR Yankee doodle problem?

My friend admitted that in that moment, she was thrilled she wasn’t all covered up in her chastity inducing, IcantbreathbecausethisisSpanx, one piece swimsuit.

Why is it that if we’re over a certain age, or don’t have the bodies of supermodels, we don’t have the courage to flaunt what God gave us and rock that bikini?

Didn’t the paparazzi capture this picture of Dame Helen Mirren looking fucking awesome in a red bikini a few years back? Isn’t she over sixty? Fuck! I worship this woman.

We don’t have to walk around, with boobs a flyin’ like those gutsy and gorgeous Italians, but some body confidence couldn’t hurt.
I say let’s all get over ourselves, and buy bikini’s, or a least something flattering that plays up our good assets.

Come on, Guys too.
It doesn’t have to be a speedo, but it can be trunks that hit above the calf.
Most guys I’ve met, even if they have a belly, have GREAT legs.
Flaunt um!

When we look back at pictures from twenty years ago, we were HOT and we thought otherwise at the time.

We’re never satisfied, so let’s just love and embrace what we have.

I’m not certain I’ll be able to comply. I can’t be expected to hold in my stomach for more than half-hour increments, and if I eat more than a single grape, it’s impossible altogether.

But….it I do,  I have my new motto:
“If people don’t like me in my bikini, they don’t have to buy my calendar.”

Too much?
Xox