This morning, I heard myself tell someone that I’m “41″.

The words just rolled off my tongue - as if I were not saying, “Hello, I’m now 41, and I don’t know how I got to be in my 40’s when I feel like I should just be beginning my 20’s most days….”

Of course, there are many other days when I feel the passage of time like feathers on the wind that I can’t retrieve fast enough…and it would be pointless to try.

It’s hard being a woman in your 40’s - but, it’s made somewhat easier since the road to becoming a woman in her 40’s is quite trying - requiring the acquisition of a tough mind….and even tougher skin.  I guess I should say, it’s a hard journey to get there…and then once you arrive, you are rarely complimented for enduring the joys and trials that, most often, show up like a road map on your face.

For a man that’s called character. The world is not so kind to us women.  But, all of these things make us better, I suppose…preparing us for the days to come.

All of these things didn’t go through my head in that moment when I first spoke the words “41″ this morning, in relation to how long I’ve now been alive.  But, the thoughts are there, nonetheless.

Or, better still, they’re there…..in the “road map” on my face.

As I walked away and went to get on stage to sing with some very talented…..teens & twenty-somethings, I thought about which I’d rather be….

…a butterfly or a moth.

Of course, the butterfly is so beautiful to look at, so often photographed and even captured and placed in a frame to show off its colors.  The moth, not so much…..it just plugs along - doing what it does.

I guess I’ve kind of always been pulled between these polar ends:  the beautiful and the practical - one so often overlooked, and one so often mishandled and desired as a trophy….

Both paths are hard.  Both have their downsides.

I guess that’s why I took both of these pictures in the mountains on a morning after the rain had past.  They were both so beautiful in their own way.  They both caught my eye.  And it was as if nature was reminding me:  Don’t worry about which you are, just be……just fly and forget about the rest.

So, I walked into the theater to sing 4 sets (feeling more like a moth than ever), and I just decided to just “be” - to fly….and forget about the rest.

I am 41, after all.  So I can fly displaying whatever colors I want!

…….and just forget about the rest.

Peace.