I celebrated my 45th birthday last week. It was quite pleasant. My husband, my kids and I went to see the final installation of The Hobbit in a lovely historic cinema and enjoyed dinner at the Irish restaurant where we almost always celebrate me-related milestones. Being Irish is a big part of my identification of self. Since I haven’t crossed an ocean since I became a part of this family, I guess we all figure a couple of hours someplace that reminds me of, you know, Ye Olde Country will make me happy. We’re not wrong.

I reckon it’s a bit of a delayed reaction, but it occurred to me last night that, at 45, I have most certainly reached the point where I have already lived more years than I have left to live. I’ve reached mid-life. I’m on the other side of halfway there. Over the hill, as it were. Let’s be honest – in my particular case, I probably reached that point a while ago. I mean, I nearly cashed out last year when I had that Widowmaker heart attack and it’s not like I’m materially healthier now than I was then.

This realization isn’t as traumatizing as one might imagine. Maybe it will be later, but for now it’s kind of like Quantum Entanglement. Einstein’s “spooky action at a distance” is something I find truly fascinating and notable, but that I can’t quite get my head around as a this is important to my daily life kind of thing.

I don’t feel a panicked compulsion to hurry out and do all the things I have never done – at least no more of one than I have felt every day of my adult life. For as long as I can remember, I have been driven by a need to feel I have done something meaningful with my life. I have always felt the long shadow of death growing nearer and nearer. In fact, it has been such a constant in my life, I’ve given it a name: my mortality malady. I’ve suffered this condition since childhood, when I would lie awake at night worrying about the sun going nova. Yes, I’ve always been weird and had a predisposition toward big, unnecessarily heavy thoughts.

I seem to be avoiding the crisis wrought from the realization of midlife-ness because I’ve been in this crisis mode for always. On the plus side, it has resulted in many fulfilling, amazing experiences and contact with talented, courageous, resourceful people. On the down side, it never feels like I’m doing enough. I am sincerely grateful that the privileges I have enjoyed in my life have positioned me to be able to help some folks. But wasn’t I supposed to be President or something? Not to just assist some individuals in need, but to affect systemic change that would benefit entire segments of society? Maybe even change the world?

I’m sorry, is my megalomania showing?

Undermining the desire for my brief moment on earth to really mean something is my failure to feel the liberating urgency one gets from knowing each day may be your last. Even after having a massive heart attack, I’m still hemmed in by ego, fear of failure or embarrassment, lack of confidence and a personal mandate not to offend. I know how short life is. I’ve suffered my mortality malady since I could conceive of the finite nature of my life. I’ve been having a midlife crisis since the day I was born. I just call it life. Perhaps that is why I am not being served the extra helping of dread and alarm now, when the count of my years itself is a harbinger of doom. Perhaps that is why I am no more compelled than usual to procure a sports car, a yacht, and a trophy wife with whom to sail away.

I’m probably also being spared because I am in what most people would consider the enviable position of having achieved a lifelong dream. From my earliest memories, I ached to travel around the world. Lying in bed as a child, I would imagine what was happening all over the world at that very moment. Babies were being born; people were dying; couples were getting married; children were taking their first steps; families were rising for the day; others were retiring for the night; farmers were plowing fields; astronauts were conducting experiments; a kid was falling off the monkey bars and breaking her arm; a grown-up was receiving an unexpected bonus at work and bringing home a treat for his family.

I was enthralled by the notion that millions of people were having lives completely different from my own right now. Thinking about the billions of everyday activities and major life events that would occur in the hours I would be sleeping was dizzyingly delightful. The world was enormous. Experiences, bountiful. I wanted to see it all! I wanted to learn about things I didn’t even know existed. I wanted to uncover the mysteries of the familiar. Like how does rice happen? It doesn’t come from nature in a bag. Is it a plant? A seed? A byproduct of something else? Is it like pasta, just cut into small pieces? If so, what is the pasta made of? Who is making it? How is it getting into the bags? Who is bringing the bags to the market?

Driving cross-country on family vacations was as much fun for me as spending time at our destination. I loved looking out the window and imagining the lives of the people who lived in the places we were passing. I would wonder what my life would be like if I was growing up on that farm with the big silo we just passed instead of in a suburb of Washington DC. I bet I would have to get up really early to feed cows and pigs and maybe gather eggs from chickens, however you manage that. Or what if I lived in this Wild West-looking ghost town? I haven’t seen a school or a playground for hours. If I lived in this industrial town, would all my relatives work at the factory? What if the factory closed? If I lived in the mountains, would I know how to ski? If I lived on a reservation, would I know how to ride a horse like in that Brady Bunch episode?

In 2005-2006, I traveled around the world. With no timetable or itinerary, I was free to spend days or months in places I enjoyed. Japan, Vietnam, Bali. Ireland, France, Slovenia. Egypt. You get the idea. And it was exactly as amazing as you’d think. I had experiences I’d never known were possible; met fascinating, charming people; and saw places more breathtakingly beautiful than I’d ever imagined existing. I really may be the luckiest girl ever.

There is a down side to having fulfilled a lifelong dream at age 35, though. I know, I know. First World problems. But seriously, say your greatest dream is to see the Pyramids at Giza. So you do. Then what? Coming home and getting a mortgage, a 9 to 5 job, and staying in the same town for years on end can feel a bit… confining?

Don’t get me wrong. I’m a volunteer in this situation. I am where I am on purpose and my life is swell. If I had to choose between my kids and traveling, the kids win hands down. Duh. I have a great husband and I love living close to my family. I’ve reacclimated to all the comforts of a developed nation so fully that it’s hard to imagine sleeping on straw on the floor of an Iban longhouse with headhunters-comma-former in Borneo. Again.

Nonetheless, I am who I have always been. I still want to change the world. I want to make a difference. For my life to count. I had to give up the heart attack-inducing practice of law, so now I don’t even help some people for a living. It’s pretty clear by now that I’m not going to be President. I still have wanderlust and a strong craving for adventure. But it’s not a crisis brought on by middle age. None of this is because I am 45. It’s simply because I am me.

The Iban keep the skulls of vanquished foes in the rafters of the longhouse. They honor them and the spirits, in turn, provide protection.

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