Make the most of now

 

WHEN I AM AN OLD WOMAN I SHALL WEAR PURPLE
With a red hat which doesn’t go, and doesn’t suit me.
And I shall spend my pension on brandy and summer gloves
And satin sandals, and say we’ve no money for butter.
I shall sit down on the pavement when I’m tired
And gobble up samples in shops and press alarm bells
And run my stick along the public railings
And make up for the sobriety of my youth.
I shall go out in my slippers in the rain
And pick the flowers in other people’s gardens
And learn to spit

You can wear terrible shirts and grow more fat
And eat three pounds of sausages at a go
Or only bread and pickle for a week
And hoard pens and pencils and beermats and things in boxes

But now we must have clothes that keep us dry
And pay our rent and not swear in the street
And set a good example for the children.
We must have friends to dinner and read the papers.

But maybe I ought to practice a little now?
So people who know me are not too shocked and surprised
When suddenly I am old, and start to wear purple.

Taken from the book
When I Am An Old Woman I Shall Wear Purple
Editd by Sandra Martz
Papier Mache Press–Watsonville, California 1987

Like many women (if not all) I wrestle with my weight and appearance and have done for as long as I can remember.  Looking back at photos of me in my 20’s I regret I wonder why I was so unhappy about how I looked then.  NOW I would love to have the figure I had then.  In  another twenty years time I don’t want to look back with the same regrets and sense of not having made the most of things.

The following clip helped me realise this.  We need to make the most of what God has given us instead of berating him and ourselves for what we don’t have.  We are His masterpiece (Eph 2:10 NLT) which I find hard to believe at times.  And He is far more interested in what is on the inside than my BMI.

So how do you deal with being a 21st C woman?  Let me know your secret.

Jo x