I've made it to Cambridge and maybe back to badassery

My hometown is Georgetown, Ky. There are about 36,000 people in the whole county and probably and equal number of cows and acres of tobacco. If I would venture a guess, I'd say there is a Ford Ram Truck for every 1.7 people, although that estimate might be low.

Sometimes on the way to work I get stuck behind farm equipment and have to go 2 miles an hour.

My fellowship was a complete moon shot. I stumbled forward through the application fueled by frustration. The newspaper business I love was dying from decades of self-inflicted wounds. I loved my job but it hurt my heart to go into that office everyday without a path to making things better.

Oh, and I turned 50. No further explanation needed there, right?

And much, much to my surprise I got it. There was a moment in the interview when they asked me what I would bring to the fellowship. I said I'd been told Kentucky was pretty much fly over country. That for folks at Harvard it was the same as Kansas or Mississippi or Tennessee.

I said I hoped I would show the other fellows that someone from Kentucky could be insightful, progressive, passionate, intelligent....the list went on for a bit. No one was more surprised than me to hear those words  come out of my mouth. But I felt in that moment something I haven't felt in a long time....I was once kind of a bad ass. I looked at possibilities and believed I could make them realities. I told my fellow Menopausal Mom I was ready to get back some of that badassery.

When I finished my list of attributes I made a joke like "wow, I just said an awful lot of nice things about myself."

And everybody laughed. Me too. But, for once, I believed those nice things I said about myself. I also instantly felt the need to hug everybody but, mostly, I restrained myself.


So now I yearn to make the most of this once in a lifetime opportunity....I feel like I should be thinking big thoughts but so far have noticed that Cambridge seems filled with that carefully messy hair trend that is the...Man Bun

Shout out to Serbia, Bosnia & Herzegovina and Croatia. Menopausal Moms has been read in 45 countries and counting. Menopause is Universal.