24

For the second time in a row I actually felt like I had in fact aged a full year on my birthday. The first time it happened it was my 22nd birthday. I was working at National Geographic at the time, and I remember I went to the bathroom a little after lunch, and after washing my hands I just stared at myself in the mirror. And thought: “I no longer feel like I am constantly trying to catch my feelings up with my actual age.

I did not have a mirror this year it is more or less a feeling. It would be easy to say that I felt older because I was living in Africa, but I don’t think that is it entirely. The last couple days, having finished reading The Pilgrimage by Paulo Coelho and Eat, Pray, Love by Elizabeth Gilbert, along with the New Year I find myself edging towards a new way of thinking.

Maybe it started with my New Year’s Resolution—wear sunscreen on my face. I have been in Africa for almost six months and prior to Christmas I had applied sunscreen once, I think. I admit I could see the irony and amusement if later in life I developed skin cancer and that it was linked to trying to save the world in Africa.

I made this resolution out of vanity. Although I have been told many times before that too much sun makes ones face resemble a leather bag some sort of aging gene kicked in one day in early December when I was reading an article about being in your 20s and being sure to taking care of your skin as if you were in your 30s or 40s.

I think a lot about the future, always planning. I keep trying to plan for what will happen after my service (I am not even six months in yet), and I just keep changing my mind. I admit now that part of my reason for joining the Peace Corps was this desire to search for something I was passionate about.

And maybe it’s thinking about the future so much that makes me feel older, because I realize a changing set of priorities. For example, there was a time in my life when I said with conviction that I would not have kids and wasn’t going to get married. I thought I was so progressive with this thinking. But then something changed and now I have been quoted as wanting five children, adding the more kids you have the better chances you have that at least one of them will take care of you in your old age—I plan on living a long time.

I think feeling older has a little something to do with my actual physical state. I love Africa, but I can see it taking a toll on my body: My hair has been falling out more, I am told a combination of stress and the malaria medication I am on; I spent my Sunday morning scrubbing the cement floors of my house on my knees, I felt like Cinderella, and I know tomorrow I will be aching way more than I already do; I have lost some weight since being here, it has been gradually. I am by no means unhealthy, and after all these years of complaints my boobs finally have agreed to shrink first in the weight loss. My face is also thinner. I haven’t had my menstrual cycle in a few months, which I don’t want to complain to much about, and yes I am sure, very sure, I am not pregnant.

Birthdays aren’t a spectacle to me, but they do hold a special place. I admit I think I was more depressed on my birthday than on Christmas—narcissistic I know. This year I didn’t do anything special. I am not going to throw a full-out pity party for myself, because I could have done something more for my birthday. I chose not to. I woke up at a normal time, swept my house, dressed for school. I taught my two classes, and didn’t even tell the first one it was my birthday. I told my second one, and they all lit up. They lit up even more when I let them say hello to my mother on the phone. I put her on speaker phone, and I could see how proud they were to be able to talk to her in English, even if it was just “Good morning, how are you?”

After classes I went to the market and bought a bunch of new cooking dishes, which were much needed. I always feel so content and full of joy when I buy things that I know are going to make things more “American” feeling here. I worry what might happen if I run out of things to buy and ways to improve my house.

I had a meeting in the evening, no one showed up, so I took two hours to lesson plan. I of course received phone calls from my family and friends—and I didn’t mind that a few of them required me to wake up at 2:30.

On Friday I did bake myself a chocolate cake with the help of my sister. After dinner we put in the 24 candles my mom sent from the States, and they sang happy birthday to me, in French of course. I actually blew out the candles twice, because my brother really wanted to get the picture of me blowing the candles out—he missed the first time around. The funny thing is even blowing the candles out twice I forgot to make a birthday wish.

Tomorrow, as I have told myself for the last few days, I am going to get up early and start practicing yoga. I did yoga in high school, because my mom told me to, and I didn’t really get it. I told my mom I want to try it again—it is too hot here and the air is to dry for me to realistically keep up with running. I told her I think maybe wanting to do yoga is a sign my spirit is calming down or something—another sure sign that I am getting older, perhaps maybe even wiser.