Growing up in our middle years

It is fashionable to lament about not wanting to grow up. I find that the best moments of growing up are reclaiming one’s childishness. Childlike-ness, if you will.

The middle years of one’s life feel like a wide, expansive plateau. We are the parents of young children and the children of elderly parents. Months rush by leaving barely a memory of what we did with them, yet some sun-streaked evenings stay with us like bookmarks. Mornings stretch to accommodate solitude and unexpected conversations. Words linger, like shadows that stretch with the fading light.

“What if I have misunderstood myself my entire life,” I wrote on a page in my diary a few years ago. It was a time when I was beginning to identify how much I was …

Author

Natasha Badhwar

Natasha is a writer, filmmaker and communications coach. She is the author of the popular memoirs My Daughters’ Mum and Immortal for a Moment. Her columns have appeared in publications such as Mint Lounge, The Hindu, Outlook, The Globe and Mail, The Indian Express, the Hindustan Times and Quint.

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