FROM THE EDITOR

Next month I will turn 39. Technically that means I’m almost exactly halfway through my life. And when you’re halfway through your life, you start doing things like reading back through old diaries (mine are mainly about fancying American wrestlers† – assume your own position on this), as well as cyberstalking old school friends and all the men who ever rejected me to see how their lives turned out. You also start thinking about what you would tell your younger self – you at 10, you at 15, you at the hysterical age of 21 when absolutely nothing seems to be going your way. But what about the things an older, wiser me would tell me now? What would me at 59 say? 69 even? Hell, even 79 if I make it that far? They say hindsight is a wonderful thing, but I reckon foresight is even more useful. So here, in no particular order, is what I hope me, reclining on a rocking chair somewhere hot, would tell me now. 1 Your body is going to change BIG TIME. Your waist will depart around 2020, so buy (and wear) as many of those nipped-in dresses as you can. 2 And cellulite? You’ll be OK with it. In fact, at some point (can’t tell you when, sorry, depends on how quickly you can grasp the fact that nobody has actually ever been looking), you will give it a possessive pronoun. You will start to lovingly refer to it as ‘my cellulite’ in the same way you used to refer to your Chanel handbag. 3 Oh yes, and your current obsession with clothes will be replaced by an obsession with your garden. It will ultimately end up being a far more costly pursuit. 4 Your husband will change, too. He will start getting ever more eccentric. Remember, this is why you married him. He was always going to end up in Crocs and jogging pants on a Sunday afternoon. 5 Your career will be something you look back on with fondness. Hopefully you can say you were fair. And that you passed on what you learned to as many people as possible. 6 Meditate. Start early. You’ll get past that ‘falling asleep in the middle of it’ business. It will rescue you. 7 As for surgery, just so you know, they never quite figured out what they were doing, even in 2030. Wrinkles will be terribly chic in 2050, mainly because no one will have the ability to produce them any more. They will become rare, like pink diamonds. Make sure you have a whacking great set of them around your eyes. 8 And no, you will never have kids. But you won’t die alone. You’ll die happy, surrounded by dog crap (yup, you opened that dog sanctuary after all) in a pair of Crocs and jogging pants. And people will say, ‘You know she used to work in magazines..?’ And, trust me, you will love everything you became.

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