40 Something going on 17 Again

Last night as I was walking home in my trainers and puffer jacket, eating sweets and looking forward to watching The Walking Dead on TV, it occurred to me that I don’t really feel as though I’m 40 something; even though it was my *cough cough* birthday the week before last, I still feel as though I’m – well, younger. OK, maybe not exactly 17 again, but I don’t really feel like a grown-up. Sure I have a grown-up job and grown-up responsibilities, I act like an adult most of the time, and I am of course a mum, but even though I see ‘laughter lines’ when I look in the mirror inside I just feel the same as I always have done.

Tomorrow night, for example, I’m going to a big awards bash and I’ll be getting dressed up and having a blow-dry; but even though I’ll look like a grown-up lady and spend all night in high heels, inside there will still be a part of me that feels as though I’ve raided my mum’s dressing-up box. And I’ll probably throw up the following morning from having too much to drink, just as I threw up when I was 16 from having too much Cinzano and lemonade.

I still get crushes; some on real life boys *cough* but also, in addition to Jamie Dornan, I’m currently crushing big time on Justin Theroux from The Leftovers. (Jennifer Aniston is SO lucky). I’m stopping short of putting a poster of him on my bedroom wall, but honestly, look.

And if I have a row with No 1 Son, I tend to be the one that stomps up the stairs to my bedroom and slams the door. I also still stamp my foot.

Sometimes I feel like Jennifer Garner in 13 Going on 30, or Tom Hanks in Big. It’s not that I’m not proud of how old I am; it’s just that if I look at my date of birth on my passport I get a genuine shock. As though I’ve time-travelled to the future. How on earth did I get here? And where’s my DeLorean? (joke for other 40 somethings there).

Maybe it’s a kind of regression, feeling as though you’re still a teenager when you’re so far past the line of adulthood the line is a dot to you. Maybe I’m going through juvanescence, which is the latest buzz word for people who can’t seem to grow up, although I’m stopping short of wearing a onesie and bouncing around to One Direction or reading The Hunger Games. Promise.