Happy (almost) May, love.
It’s a slow, gentle morning over here. I’m tucked in with a pot of jasmine, peach, and rose tea, a pink throw on my lap, windows open, and writing to you as sunlight spills across my desk and a robin bounces through the patio garden outside.
I wanted to pop in to share something that’s so easy to forget: we’re still becoming. Midlife (or any stage of life, really) isn’t a closing chapter. It’s an unfolding—a deepening.
It’s not about “getting back” to who we used to be. It’s about growing into who we were always meant to become! Every experience, every shift, every tender, messy moment is shaping us into something even more luminous (glowy? I’m calling it a word!).
The other afternoon, I found myself standing at the kitchen counter, cradling a cup of tea that had long since gone cold. The house was still, except for my pug’s soft snore and birdsong from outside. I felt tired—not just in my body, but deep-down tired. The kind of tired that asks for more than another checklist.
And right there, in that tiny, unremarkable moment, it hit me: this too is part of becoming. Not the shiny, polished becoming we sometimes imagine. The quiet, slow kind—the real kind—that happens when no one’s watching.
My word of the year is healing. It feels less like a goal and more like an unmarked path. I find myself being pulled gently toward new dreams, new ways of living. I’m even letting myself imagine a part-time Parisian life—more beauty, more adventure, a little more daring. Did I really just write that?!
Meanwhile, a closet renovation has turned my tiny space into a sea of belongings—stacked and sorted, waiting for a new home. And, yes, there will definitely be before and after pics. Oh, and yes, the closets will be pink! It feels like a living metaphor: making space, letting go, choosing what deserves a place in this next chapter.
Maybe that’s what midlife asks us too. To sift through old beliefs and outdated expectations, and keep only what feels true.
Earlier this month, someone said to me,
"I'll bet you were pretty when you were young." I wrote about it
here. Although it stung, it also cracked something open inside:
I'm not a used-to-be. I'm still becoming. My appearance—like my life—isn’t behind me. It’s right here, unfolding season by season. And, dare I say, richer and deeper than before.
Last week, as I was writing about it being ten years since I lost my first pug, Louis (aka Le Pug and Sir Louis), a bright bluejay landed in the garden. It felt like a soft, sacred hello to soothe the grief. Divine timing? I'm a believer!
You'll find a photo of it here.
A reminder that we’re not alone in our becoming. That love, loss, and hope are all part of who we are.
So if you need the reminder today too:
You are not behind.
You are not broken.
You are right on time.
As Marianne Williamson said, "The second half of life is about daring to be more of who you really are."
What if this next season isn’t about striving or fixing? What if it’s about softening? Allowing? Trusting that you’re already blooming into your truest, fiercest, most beautiful self?
You don’t have to rush. You’re already in the process. And I’m right here, becoming alongside you!
