1 – You want to cut the watermelon, but realize there’s no room in the fridge.
You’ve realized that each fridge, cabinet, and pantry shelf has a space budget. You spend that budget on food, appliances, and whatnot; you can’t have two bottles of wine in the fridge at the same time. You have to make the choice of which to save for later and which to chill.
2 – A three day weekend means you can clean.
You have graduated from seeing a vacation as playing video games. That has become a dream vacation. Your days off now consist of cleaning things you don’t have time to clean on a regular basis, like the closet, the fridge, the oven, or underneath the living room furniture. You no longer can sit and play a video game or read a book or watch TV without noting all the other things you could be doing, things that need to be done: gathering garbage; washing sheets; cleaning out the clothes you don’t wear anymore; hemming those pants you bought on sale; calling to schedule your annual checkup; getting in to see the eye doctor; figuring out how you’re going to pay the taxes; paying the electric bill so you don’ t have to sit in the dark.
3 – Sugar doesn’t make you feel as good as it used to.
Remember sitting and eating the entire pumpkin-bucket of Halloween candy? Kiss those days goodbye. Now, eating a large amount of sugar makes you feel like you’ve swallowed rocks made of acid, adds an inch of bloat to your waist, and makes your joints feel like they’ve turned to crinkly old leather. You can’t eat that piece of birthday cake and then sleep; you’ll be having some crazy sugar dreams.
4 – Your bladder wakes you up.
Remember sleeping through the night? You’d wake up and empty your bladder first thing. Now, you body wakes you up during the night, once, twice, maybe three times. You make the lonely trek through the dark to the bathroom – because you’ve long outgrown the need of a nightlight – then hobble back to bed because your body is half asleep. The half that woke up didn’t bother to wake the other half up.
5 – Something always hurts.
Your back. Your knees. Your shoulder. Something’s always in pain. Those pain pills are in front of the medicine cabinet. You slept on your neck wrong. Your lower back feels like it’s about to spasm. Your knees click when you walk. If you sit for too long, everything pops when you start to move, like you’re bones are made of bubble wrap.
Bonus:
6 – When you go clothes shopping, the first thing you look at is washing instructions, then how comfortable it is.
Beatrice B. Morgan 