Dad Never Saw My New Version

Dad never saw my new version.

Perhaps that is one of the quietest aches of losing a parent. We think we grieve the person who is gone. But there is another grief hiding underneath—the grief of all the things they will never witness.

Dad knew me as his daughter in so many stages of my life. The little girl who believed her father could fix almost anything. The young woman finding her way. The doctor who built a life around work, family and responsibility. He knew the woman who could manage things, solve things, keep going. 

But he didn't get to meet the woman I am becoming now.

He wasn't there when I finally closed the centre I had built and nurtured for years. He didn't see me understand that beginning again isn't necessarily about starting from zero.

Sometimes, it is about finally allowing yourself to become someone you had postponed becoming. And somewhere along the way, grief changed me too.

Dad was my safe place. I didn't have to explain everything to him. His presence itself was reassuring. There was something deeply comforting about knowing that, whatever happened, there was still a father somewhere in the background of my life.

Now I have to create that safety within myself. I am learning. I am softer in some places, stronger in others. I question things I once accepted. I am learning to say no without writing an essay to justify it. I am learning that I don't have to keep everyone happy to prove that I am a good person. And perhaps I am finally allowing myself to live a little more honestly.

I often wonder what Dad would have said if he could see me now. Probably nothing dramatic.He might have looked at me for a moment and simply said, “You've changed.”

I would have smiled.“Yes, Dad. Life changed me.” Then perhaps came that familiar look—the one that didn't need many words. The look that said, I see you. That is what I miss.

Not just his voice. Not just his presence. Being seen by someone who had known me long before I became all the things the world now calls me.

Sometimes, when something good happens, I still have the instinct to tell him. For a fleeting second, I forget.Then I remember. And that little space between forgetting and remembering is where grief lives. Dad didn't get to see this chapter. But perhaps he doesn't need to. Because so much of what he gave me travelled forward.

It lives in the courage with which I begin again, in the softness I am learning to protect, and in the stubborn little voice inside me that keeps saying— Go on. You can do this.

So yes, Dad. I have changed. I am still changing. But beneath every new version of me is the same daughter who once felt safest simply because her father was there.

And perhaps that girl will always be a little bit yours. I'm still your girl, Dad. Just a little more of my own now.

Yours Chaand.

And Then, There Was a New Morning

 And Then, There Was a New Morning

Today, I closed my second ultrasound centre. And for a moment, I just stood there. Looking around. Twenty-seven years of my life seemed to be stitched into those walls.Twenty-seven years of patients, scans, reports, laughter, exhaustion, cups of tea, celebrations, disappointments—and a younger me who had once believed that this was how life would always be. But life, I have learnt, has its own way of turning pages.

Last September, I closed my first centre. And then, something rather beautiful happened. I joined a medical college as Faculty in Radiology. Not because I had no choice. Not because life had cornered me. But because I had always wanted to teach in a medical college. Twenty-seven years ago, when I was beginning my journey, there was no medical college in my city. Today, there are…

And suddenly, a dream I had carried quietly for almost three decades was standing right in front of me. So I chose it. Consciously. Happily. Perhaps that is what makes this journey so strange. While I was busy building my practice, raising a family, writing books, living a thousand lives within one life—and later saying goodbye to my Momsie 11 years ago and my Popsie 10 months ago—I had forgotten that some dreams don't disappear. They simply wait.

And life has been so busy that I haven't really had the luxury to grieve properly. Momsie left, Popsie left. I kept going. I closed my first centre.  I kept going. A new professional chapter began. I kept going. And today, I closed my second centre too. And somewhere amidst all these endings, I realise I have been learning something I never consciously set out to learn—detachment. Not the cold kind. Not the I don't care anymore kind. The kind that says: I loved this deeply. It mattered enormously. And I can still let it go.

Because letting go does not erase what we lived. The machines may stop humming. The familiar rooms may no longer be mine. The keys may change hands. But the woman who stood behind those machines for 27 years?

She comes with me. Her experience comes with her. Her stories come with her. Her patients' blessings come with her. Her laughter, her mistakes, her exhaustion, her courage—all of it. Nothing is really lost. It has simply become part of who I am.

And perhaps that is what Popsie's departure began teaching me.

Life is not about holding everything forever. It is about loving what comes, living it fully, and when its time comes, having the courage to release it.

Today, I am sad. But I am also strangely excited. Because this is not the end of my story. It feels more like a morning. A new morning. A new classroom. New students. New conversations. New dreams. And perhaps, finally, a little more time to discover the woman behind all the roles I have played. 

I spent 27 years building a professional life. Now, I think I am learning to build a life around myself. And the most beautiful part? I am not walking into an unknown future. I am walking into a dream I had once thought might never happen. A medical college. Teaching. Mentoring. Living the dream I carried for 27 years.

So yes, today I closed a door. But perhaps every once in a while, a closed door is simply life's way of saying— "Look up, Juju. The morning has already begun." And I think I am ready.

Love Juju. 

The Weight Nobody Can Weigh

 

The Weight Nobody Can Weigh

There are some weights that a weighing scale cannot measure.

The weight of stress.
The weight of expectations.
The weight of constantly being there for everyone.
The weight of life quietly changing you.

For six or seven years, my body has been collecting some of that weight.

Once, I was fit. Healthy. Comfortable in my own skin.

Then life happened. Menopause happened. There were personal losses and change in few relationship and professional dynamics. 

And somewhere between surviving, adapting, caring, losing, rebuilding and simply putting one foot before the other, my body changed.

Now, sometimes, someone calls me fat.

My spouse.

My siblings.

Perhaps they say it casually. Perhaps they don't realise how deeply the word travels.

But it does.

It lands somewhere much deeper than the body.

I know I have gained weight.

I know I need to take better care of myself.

But I also know that motivation isn't always waiting around the corner.

Sometimes a woman isn't lacking discipline.

Sometimes she is exhausted.

Sometimes she doesn't need another lecture about calories.

Sometimes she needs a little kindness.

Because the woman you see today is not merely the body that became heavier.

She is the girl who once dreamed.

The woman who worked.

The daughter who cared.

The wife who gave.

The mother who nurtured.

The doctor who healed.

The writer who created worlds.

The human being who survived chapters nobody else completely read.

So yes, perhaps one day I will lose this weight.

But until then, please don't lose sight of me.

Because my body may have changed with the seasons of my life.

My soul is still mine.

And I am still so much more than the number on a weighing scale.

Love Juju ❤️ 

 

From Tom & Jerry to Pippa & Pogo

Perhaps every long marriage has its own cartoon phase.

Ours began somewhere between Tom & Jerry.

One chased.
The other escaped.
One got irritated.
The other irritated back.
There were arguments, misunderstandings, dramatic exits—and, somehow, the next morning, breakfast still happened.

That is marriage.

Not always romance.

Sometimes it is two people occupying the same kitchen while silently negotiating who is going to surrender first.

Over the years, though, something changes.

The fights may not disappear, but their meaning does.

You begin to realise that the person irritating you today is also the person who has witnessed your worst days, your strangest moods, your unfinished dreams and your ridiculous habits.

You have accumulated history.

And history has a strange way of turning irritation into familiarity.

Perhaps that is when Tom & Jerry slowly become Pippa & Pogo.

Pippa and Pogo are two slightly eccentric creatures who have stopped trying to win every argument.

They still annoy each other.

They still have different operating systems.

They still occasionally wonder, “How on earth did I end up living with this person?”

But there is affection underneath the irritation.

There is space for imperfection.

There is a quiet understanding that not every disagreement needs a winner.

After decades together, perhaps marriage is less about finding someone who never irritates you and more about finding a way to remain kind while being irritated.

The early years ask:

“Do you love me?”

The middle years ask:

“Can you please stop doing that?”

And the later years perhaps ask:

“Okay… this is who we are. Shall we have tea?”

Maybe that is growing old together.

From Tom & Jerry—

to Pippa & Pogo.

Still chasing.

Still teasing.

Still occasionally driving each other crazy.

But somehow…

still sitting on the same sofa.

May all marital relationships find their inspiration from cartoon world, like we did. 

Love Juju ❤️ 

“Small Holes in My Marital Ship”

 

The Small Holes in my Marital Ship

Living with your spouse for decades can sometimes feel like playing a video game.

Just when you think you have understood the rules, Level 7 suddenly appears.

And you realise—you never received the manual.

For years, I have lived with unpredictability.

Not necessarily the dramatic kind that makes for a movie. Something much quieter.

Meal timings that are never quite predictable.
A simple need that suddenly becomes an urgent need.
A small thing missed—a salad, perhaps—and an unexpectedly large reaction.

To someone watching from outside, these may sound ridiculously small.

“So what if the salad wasn't there?”

Exactly.

The salad isn't the problem.

The problem is the hundred little adjustments surrounding the salad.

Waiting because someone else's timing is more important.

Putting your own plans on hold.

Remembering things that perhaps shouldn't require remembering.

Learning to read moods.

Trying to prevent the next irritation.

And slowly, without realising it, becoming a person who is always on standby.

For years, I wondered whether I was making too much of these things.

After all, there was no single catastrophic event.

Just little things.

But recently I found a metaphor that made sense to me:

They are small holes in my marital ship.

One small hole doesn't sink a ship.

But keep making small holes for years, and the person inside the ship eventually gets tired of bailing out water.

Perhaps this is what many women experience but don't know how to articulate.

It isn't always about cruelty.
It isn't always about a “bad marriage.”
Sometimes it is simply about an unequal distribution of emotional adjustment.

One person's timetable becomes the household timetable.

One person's mood becomes everyone's weather.

One person's preferences quietly become everybody else's responsibility.

And the other person keeps saying:

“It's okay. It's a small thing.”

Until one day she realises that her life has been made up of thousands of small things.

I am learning something rather late in life:

Small does not mean insignificant.

And accommodating does not have to mean disappearing.

Perhaps the answer isn't to abandon the ship.

Perhaps it is to stop pretending that the holes aren't there.

Some need repairing.

Some need boundaries.

Some need a conversation.

And some simply need us to stop taking responsibility for every leak ourselves.

Because marriage should not require one person to spend her entire life standing with a bucket.

She deserves to sit on the deck too.

And perhaps, after all these years, I am learning to do exactly that.

Love Juju. 

Mumbai Times article

Article in Mumbai Times 

Do click on link, read and share. 

https://mumbaitimes.online/dreamboat-publishings-national-bestselling-author-dr-reemanshu-bansal-radiologist-by-day-author-by-night-storyteller-always/

VIBE MATCHING !

 This write up stems from our today JRC Juju's Reader Club monthly meet on September 2, 2026.

VIBE MATCHING !

The essence of like-minded people or “vibe matching” is not that two people think exactly alike. It is that their inner worlds feel compatible.

In simple terms: Like-mindedness is shared perspective.
Vibe matching is shared emotional frequency.

In simpler terms: Like-minded people think similarly.
Vibe-matched people feel similarly.

What does “vibe matching” actually mean? It is that effortless feeling of “You get me.” You don't have to explain every reaction, defend every emotion, or translate your sense of humour. There is a natural ease in being together. It can mean:

• Similar values — what matters to you both, feels important.
• Similar emotional wavelength — you respond to situations in ways that feel familiar.
• Compatible energy — one person's presence doesn't constantly drain the other.
• Shared curiosity — you enjoy talking about similar ideas, dreams and possibilities.
• Mutual respect for differences — you don't have to agree on everything to feel understood.
• Similar pace of life — one isn't constantly rushing while the other wants to pause.
• Emotional safety — you can be yourself without performing.
• Reciprocity — the interest, effort and affection don't feel one-sided.

And perhaps the most important distinction: Vibe matching is not sameness.

Two people can have completely different professions, personalities, backgrounds and opinions—and still have extraordinary chemistry. Because what matches may not be their lives. It may be their way of looking at life.

One may be quiet, the other expressive. One may be practical, the other dreamy. One may love crowds, the other solitude. Yet both may value kindness, freedom, honesty, humour and meaningful conversation. That's a match.

Some people enter your life and you have to explain yourself. With others, you simply exhale. You don't know them for years before feeling connected. Sometimes, within a few conversations, something inside you says: “Ah… my kind of people.” That is vibe.

Not necessarily agreement. Not necessarily similarity. Recognition. The feeling that your frequencies don't compete—they complement. And perhaps that is why we should stop asking only, “Do we have things in common?” and start asking, “How do I feel when I am around you?” Because sometimes the best relationships aren't with people who think like us. They are with people who make it safe for us to think, feel, laugh, dream and be completely ourselves.

That is vibe matching. Not finding your mirror. Finding your rhythm.

Find your tribe.
But don't let your tribe become your ceiling.-  Juju’s Pearls

Comfort gives you belonging. Challenge gives you growth. The right people give you both.

THE ALMIRAH REMEMBERS

 THE ALMIRAH REMEMBERS

There comes a strange day in a woman’s life when she opens her almirah not to choose what to wear… but to decide what to let go.

And suddenly, decluttering becomes an unexpected journey through time.

A saree you haven't worn in years. A blouse that belongs to a younger body.

A dupatta from a festival you barely remember. And then—the bangles. Red. Green. Pink.

Purple. Yellow. Blue. Every possible colour. Stacked together, still carrying the faint sound of the woman who once wore them. Then come the bindis. Bright little circles of colour that once sat proudly on your forehead. Hair clips. Ribbons. Scrunchies. Decorative pins. Tiny accessories you bought because they were pretty…because you were pretty…because you once had the time and inclination to fuss over yourself.

You hold them in your hand. And wonder—When did I stop wearing these? There was no announcement. No particular morning when you decided, “I am done with colours.” Life simply happened. Responsibilities happened. Children happened. Work happened. Age happened.

Somewhere along the way, bright bangles were replaced by a watch. Bindis became occasional.

Hair accessories became unnecessary. And the woman who once stood before the mirror deciding which colour matched her mood…began dressing according to what the day demanded.

So you make three piles: Keep. Donate. Discard.

But how do you put memories into piles? How do you throw away the little red bangles you wore on that special day? How do you discard a hair clip that has held your hair together through countless mornings? How do you donate a version of yourself? Perhaps that is why decluttering an almirah can make you unexpectedly emotional. You aren't really cleaning a cupboard.

You are clearing the shelves of your former selves.

The girl. The bride. The young mother. The working woman. The woman who tried so hard to be everything to everyone. And now… perhaps there is another woman standing quietly in front of the mirror. Older. Softer. Wiser. Less interested in matching everything. More interested in belonging to herself. 

So maybe I won't throw away every bangle. Maybe I'll keep a few colours.

Not because I will necessarily wear them again…but because I want to remember the woman who did. 

Because growing older shouldn't mean erasing who we were. It should mean making peace with every woman I have been. 

And perhaps one day, when I open that almirah again, I won't see things that have “gone.” I'll see evidence. Evidence that I laughed. Celebrated. Loved.

Dressed up. Dreamed. Raised children. Built a life. And became someone new.

The colours may have faded from my almirah. The bindis may have disappeared from my forehead. The bangles may no longer circle my wrists. But somewhere beneath all those layers of life…that colourful woman is still here. 

She was never lost.

She was simply waiting for me to find her again.

"Sometimes, decluttering isn't about throwing things away.
Sometimes, it's about discovering what—and who—you still want to keep."

                                   — Juju’s Pearls.

 

THE OPEN DOOR THEORY

 THE OPEN DOOR THEORY

What if the strongest relationships are the ones where the door is open—not just to leave, but to come home?

What if I told you that the secret to a lasting relationship is not holding on tighter…

but knowing that the door is open?

Sounds dangerous, doesn't it?

We have been taught that love means permanence. Stay no matter what. Adjust. Compromise. Forgive. Think of the family.

And somewhere between all these noble words, we sometimes forget to ask: “Am I still choosing this?”

The Open Door Theory is simple.

Imagine a relationship where the door is open. You can leave. So can I. No chains. No threats. No guilt. No “After everything I've done for you…”

And yet… we both choose to stay.

Now THAT is love.

Because there is a world of difference between: “I can't leave you.” And “I could leave you—but I don't want to.” One is dependence. The other is choice. One is fear. The other is love.

But perhaps there is another, softer meaning to an open door.

The door isn't only open for leaving. It is open for coming home.

Because even people who love each other deeply will fight. There will be misunderstandings. Words will sometimes be spoken in anger. Silences will stretch longer than they should.

Two tired people may hurt each other without intending to. And sometimes one person needs to walk away for a while—not from the relationship, but from the heat of the moment. The beauty of an open door is knowing:

You can take your time. You can breathe. You can calm down. You can find your words. And when you're ready… you can come home.

Not to a courtroom where the arguments are waiting. Not to a scoreboard counting who was right. But to an open heart. Because perhaps home is not the place where we never fight.

Home is the place where, after the fight, we still find our way back to each other.

An open door says:

“I may be angry with you, but I haven't stopped loving you.”

“I may not understand you today, but I am willing to try again tomorrow.”

“We may have broken the conversation, but we don't have to break the connection.”

And sometimes the most profound apology isn't a dramatic speech. It is simply: “Are you coming home?” And the most beautiful answer is: “Yes.”

An open door also means I don't have to disappear to keep you. I can have my own friends. My own dreams. My own opinions. My own silence. I can disagree with you without becoming your enemy. I can grow without making you feel threatened.

Love should give you roots without taking away your wings.

And perhaps this is where many  relationships quietly go wrong. The door closes—one small lock at a time.

Where were you? Who were you talking to? Why do you need this? Why can't you just be happy with what you have?

Eventually, control starts masquerading as concern. Possession starts masquerading as love.

And the relationship that once felt like home begins to feel like a room with no windows.

A relationship should be a safe place to stay—not a prison you are afraid to leave.

The Open Door Theory isn't an invitation to walk away. It is an invitation to look honestly at why you are staying and what kind of home you are creating for each other.  If fear disappeared… If guilt disappeared…If social expectations disappeared…

If the fear of being alone disappeared… Would you still choose the person beside you? And perhaps an even more beautiful question is:

After everything we've said and done to each other, can we still find our way home? Because real commitment isn't: “You have nowhere else to go.” Real commitment is: “You are free to leave. You are free to be yourself. You are free to disagree. And when life gets messy, you are still welcome home.”

So keep the door open. And keep the heart open too. Not because you are preparing to leave.

But because love needs both: the freedom to walk away…and the courage to come back.

Because at the end of the day, 

love is not about closing the door so someone cannot leave.

Love is about leaving the door open… and making home worth returning to— Juju’s Pearls

Some doors are meant to be opened. Some hearts are meant to remain open.

 

Some People Leave Twice

 Some People Leave Twice

Some people leave twice.

The first time, death takes them.

The second time, acceptance takes them.

And I don't think we talk enough about the second goodbye.

When my parents died, I thought the worst part would be the moment they were gone.

It wasn't.

The worst part was everything that came after.

The first death is loud.

There are people around you. Phones ringing. Relatives arriving. Rituals to perform. Condolences to receive. Food to organize. Documents to sign. A thousand things that keep your hands busy while your heart is quietly collapsing.

You survive the first few days because you have no choice.

Then everybody goes home.

And life has the audacity to continue.

The milkman still comes.

The sun still rises.

People still complain about traffic.

Someone sends a funny WhatsApp message.

Your children need dinner.

And you suddenly realize—

the world has not stopped just because yours has.

That is when grief really begins.

You reach for the phone before remembering.

You see something and think, I must tell Mom.

You accomplish something and instinctively think, Dad would have been so proud.

And then comes that horrible little pause.

Oh.

They are not there.

Not anymore.

You think you are grieving their death.

But actually, you are grieving a thousand tiny deaths.

The death of being someone's child.

The death of having a place where you could still be small.

The death of hearing, Have you eaten?

The death of knowing that somewhere in this world, two people existed who were emotionally programmed to care about whether you were okay.

And then there comes the second leaving.

It happens much later.

Quietly.

Almost cruelly.

One day, you realize you are beginning to live without them.

You don't cry every morning.

You stop expecting their phone call.

You make decisions without imagining their opinion.

You laugh—and don't immediately feel guilty for laughing.

You celebrate something without that sharp ache in your chest.

And that is when acceptance walks into the room.

And acceptance is not peaceful.

Not initially.

Because accepting that they are gone feels, strangely, like losing them again.

As if by accepting their absence, you are agreeing to their death.

As if moving forward means leaving them behind.

So you resist.

You keep the photographs.

The clothes.

The little objects nobody else would understand.

You keep their voice recordings.

Their handwriting.

Their recipes.

Their favourite chair.

You keep anything that makes the sentence they are gone feel slightly less final.

But eventually, you learn something heartbreaking and beautiful.

Acceptance does not mean forgetting.

It means you stop negotiating with reality.

You stop asking, Why did this happen?

You stop waiting for the impossible.

You stop wishing for one more conversation.

And instead, you begin carrying them.

Not in your hands.

In your habits.

In your language.

In your temper.

In your kindness.

In the way you worry about your children.

In the things you say exactly like them without even realizing it.

You discover that your parents have left fingerprints all over your personality.

They are in the food you cook.

The values you defend.

The stories you tell.

The way you love.

The way you survive.

Maybe that is the cruelest joke of death.

We spend our lives thinking our parents are the people we go back to.

And then one day, there is nowhere to go back to.

So we become the place they live.

Some people leave twice.

The first time, they leave the world.

The second time, we finally stop waiting for them to return.

And perhaps that second goodbye is not really goodbye.

Perhaps it is the moment grief finally changes shape.

From I want you back

to

I am grateful you were here.

From How will I live without you?

to

Let me live in a way that makes your life matter.

That is the only kind of acceptance I understand now.

Not forgetting.

Not moving on.

Moving forward—with them.

Because parents may leave our hands.

They may leave our homes.

They may even leave our photographs one day.

But if we have loved them deeply enough,

they never really leave us.

They become the quietest, most permanent part of who we are.

And perhaps that is the final pearl:

Some people leave twice.

But the ones who gave us life—

leave pieces of themselves behind,

so that they never have to leave completely.

 

”Sometimes the woman you are searching for is the woman you abandoned while trying to keep everybody else happy “.Juju’s Pearls

 

Midlife Crisis or Awakening?

Midlife Crisis or Awakening?

Perhaps the most dangerous thing a woman can do in midlife is to become honest with herself.

Because once you begin asking the questions you have spent decades avoiding, there is no easy way back.

I know.

I have started asking them.

Not the polite questions.

Not the ones that make everyone comfortable.

The uncomfortable ones.

Is this the life I chose—or the life I slowly settled into?

When did I become so good at being needed that I forgot what it felt like to be wanted?

How much of me did I give away in the name of love, responsibility, duty, motherhood, marriage, success… and being “the strong one”?

For years, I wore my identities like medals.

Doctor.
Mother.
Wife.
Daughter.
Teacher.
Caregiver.
Achiever.

I showed up.

Again and again.

Even when I was exhausted.

Even when I was hurting.

Even when a small, rebellious voice inside me whispered, What about you?

I silenced that voice.

There was always something more important.

Someone who needed me.

A responsibility waiting.

A deadline.

A family.

A profession.

A life.

And then, somewhere in the middle of all that living, something inside me changed.

Not dramatically.

There was no thunderclap.

No cinematic moment.

Just a quiet realization that arrived one morning and refused to leave:

I cannot spend the rest of my life being a version of myself that keeps everyone else comfortable.

That realization frightened me.

Because awakening doesn't always feel like freedom.

Sometimes it feels like grief.

You grieve the years you cannot retrieve.

The dreams you postponed.

The woman you once were.

The woman you might have become.

You grieve people.

Places.

Versions of home.

Versions of yourself.

And sometimes, inexplicably, you grieve even while sitting inside a life that looks perfectly fine from the outside.

Perhaps that is what people call a midlife crisis.

The sudden restlessness.

The questioning.

The desire to change things.

The inexplicable urge to begin again.

But what if it isn't a crisis?

What if it is simply clarity arriving late?

What if the discomfort isn't because your life is falling apart?

What if it is because the life you built can no longer contain the woman you have become?

I don't have neat answers.

I still have days when I feel lost.

Days when I am angry.

Days when I am tired of being brave.

Days when I want to disappear—not from life, but from expectations.

And then there are other days.

Days when I write.

When I laugh.

When an idea excites me.

When I say no without writing an apology in my head.

When I catch a glimpse of that girl I once was—the one who believed life could be bigger, wilder, more meaningful.

And I realize she never really disappeared.

She was waiting.

Waiting for me to stop being so busy surviving everyone else's expectations that I could finally hear her.

Maybe that is what midlife gives us.

Not a crisis.

A reckoning.

A chance to look at the life we have lived and ask, with tenderness rather than regret:

What do I want the remaining chapters to feel like?

I don't want to spend the rest of my life proving that I can endure.

I want to experience.

To create.

To teach.

To write.

To love without losing myself.

To give without emptying myself.

To grow older without becoming smaller.

I want fewer performances and more presence.

Less approval.

More truth.

Less should.

More want.

And perhaps, after decades of becoming who I needed to be for everyone else, I am finally learning the most difficult role of all:

becoming myself.

So, is this a midlife crisis?

Maybe.

But I prefer another word.

Awakening.

Because a crisis makes you believe something is ending.

An awakening makes you wonder what might finally begin.

And perhaps that is where I am standing today—

somewhere between everything I have been and everything I am still becoming.

Older, yes.

Wiser, I hope.

A little bruised.

A little rebellious.

A lot more honest.

And wonderfully, gloriously—

not done yet.

Because fifties isn't the epilogue.

It is not the quiet settling down after the interesting parts are over.

It is not a full stop.

It is a comma.

A breath.

A pause before the next sentence.

I’m not done yet.

I’ve just begun.

— Juju’s Pearls
From the pages of Momsie Popsie Diary 5.0

 

Maybe you are not falling apart. Maybe you are finally waking up to yourself.

- Juju’s Pearls