That I got to write this page is both exciting and a bit anxiety producing for me....

Exciting because since I was nine years old writing has been a treasured release and pleasure for me. Sharing my writing with others has held the bit of anxiety, since when I write, its for me, at me....it is completely self-indulgent.... So my hope and prayer is that perhaps some things that I offer of my musing through writing would be of value to whoever reads my "page".... that it may strike a chord, light a fire, comfort a heart.....these are the kind of influences I'd be honored to accomplish.
So, here it goes.....

I've been taken, distracted for years by the "off the mark" obsession in our present culture with youthful images: youth = beauty. I am only forty-six and am stymied by how many of my peers (and those even younger) are uncomfortable with, depressed by and even ashamed of their age.

I was blessed with an image of the beauty of age through my great-grandmom Oster. She was a petite (4'11") Hungarian woman with arm skin "a flapping" as she rolled out homemade strudel dough on her porcelain table.... the softness and wonder of her quilt-like wrinkled face leaned up to mine as she whispered love into my ear.... her ferocious love, pride of her family and her neighborhood... the enjoyment she had in her comfy keds even though her girlfriends found them ridiculous for a women of her age (late 80's).

These and more are the attributes and images that have embedded themselves into my heart and psyche, as abiding delights of age.... the beauty, strength, comfort and freedom that I caught a taste of being near my great-grandmom. She was a woman who was settled and enjoying who she had become in her eighth decade of living. I share this inkling now, since it is her countenance and energy that I believe planted within me this desire to both live, and encourage other women to live, in an acceptance and enjoyment of gaining and growing through the real gift of the years of our lives. From this notion, I recently wrote this; a call for us all:

Authentic Beauty ... beauty of the ages.....
...... standing strong for the developing beauty, inside and out; not masking the real evidence of the loveliness of growing and enduring with age.

As women of this time, we are exposed to a youth culture of prescribed beauty that asks us to deny and destroy many of the aspects, signs and expression of age.....characteristics of depth- kindness, patience, wrinkles, steadfastness, generosity, loosening skin, gentleness, acceptance, changing hair color and body forms...these are the attributes of those who have lived, persevered and grown through years of trials, challenges and victories.....the results and proclamations of a life fully lived!

What standard are we offering our daughters if we ourselves are not enjoying the changes and realities of our lives and bodies as we grow? In our heart of hearts, we yearn to be loved and honored exactly as we are, we long to be enjoyed for precisely who we are; not for the cover up or pretense of beauty that is manufactured. Yet ....it seems that in our desire we sometimes fold to a sense of pressure, and engage in mindsets and behaviors that alter our hearts true responses and our bodies appearances. We acquiesce to a notion of beauty that encourages the whitewashing of qualities that are in fact our foundation of the authentic beauty within us. The stress and isolation of this dynamic is so sad to me. I am looking to find a way to foster a revolution that dispels and crushes the subscription to an idolization of the standards of a youth oriented culture that minimalizes the richness of beauty that I find daily in the women around me.

....well, that is my offering for now...be assured that I thrive on feedback...write me back or stop by to chat...I love both. May you grow in your confidence and awareness of Gods favor and blessings towards you ...and if that notion is hard to accept, feel free to talk with me about that, too.

-Jona