Kat Williams is tying up loose ends
For my father’s 40th, my mother topped a beautiful three-layer cake with trick candles. Everyone was in on the joke and we held our breath as Bob, always a smoker, challenged himself to blow out all of the candles in one take. With room aglow, he made his wish and extinguished every one, flashing a smug grin to the room until a few seconds later the candles flickered and relit themselves. The look on his face was priceless. He couldn’t quite understand what had happened and blew them out again, as if the first attempt was imagined. It’s strange to have such a brilliant memory of the oldest person I knew turning 40 and then to do it myself.
My own birthday did not have trick candles or even 40 candles at that. My friends were cautious to create a youthful atmosphere, especially given my penchant for lying about my age, a habit started fresh out of college. As the Company Manager aboard the S/S Norway, and essentially the Boss of the theater department, (mostly ex-Dallas Cowboy Cheerleaders hastily schooled in tap and put into a 90-minute version of “42nd Street”), I found it worked to my advantage to be a teeny bit older; and really, there was something glamorous about fibbing the years.
What’s funny about this white lie is that I’m finally ready to accept the four decades in my history. I preface sentences with “… well, now that I’m 40” peaking sideways at people’s reactions knowing full well that I don’t look my age. It must be because at 25, rationalizing it was never to late to start early, I made my way to the Lancôme counter at Macy’s 34th Street and armed myself with over $250 worth of products guaranteed to shield me against the aging process. Of course, that didn’t deter me from smoking and drinking throughout my 20s and 30s, but I thought eye cream would give me an advantage. I wasn’t ready for wrinkles, already feeling too old as the date approached.
With the belief that one must fete momentous occasions with a plenty of champagne and a party dress, people crowded into my East 19th Street apartment that March of ‘92. If you were there, you’ll remember David LeBarron singing a medley of highlights from “Evita”, the neighbors across the air shaft hurling cans of Comet at the windows, cops arriving to break up the Saturday night soiree and charming our way out of a “Disturbing the Peace” ticket and around the corner to the Irish bar on 2nd Avenue until the wee small hours. I had everything to live for and somehow it wasn’t enough. The sweetness I felt pretending to be a quarter century while ship bound was replaced by a compulsory pressure to measure up to the achievements of other 25 year olds like Hemmingway and Fitzgerald, Orson Welles, Hal Prince, Dorothy Parker, and even Cameron Crowe.
In retrospect, it’s laughable. Maybe that is the folly of youth, because even though I made enormous demands on myself, it was the same year I left for Paris to work at the Theatre du Chatelet, fulfilling a lifelong dream and memorializing it by getting a tattoo on my right thigh lest I forget the importance of this occasion, which clearly I had.
By this point in my short life, I had graduated with honors from a college I had helped to pay for, spent a semester abroad in Austria, signed the lease for my Manhattan apartment, knew what a carnet was and could fill one out, toured a group of Africans from five different countries, produced a 16mm black and white short, and had fallen head over heels in love three times and accepted my first marriage proposal.
Cut to fifteen years later. With the rings around my trunk becoming a little more visible, this is the moment I’ve finally come of age, as if my past wish for being older and my older wish of being young have finally met. “By 50 I hope I’ll be on an Ashram somewhere inhaling the spirit of life and wisdom.” I say to the party guests during a little impromptu speech. Christine comments as she lights the candles; “Sister, I hope not!” And then the Elvis impersonator jokes that I don’t look 40. “I know!” I exclaim.
And the good news is that thanks to either good living or Lancôme, I don’t feel 40. I find myself liberally tossing around my license as if I might be carded, accepting dates from 31 year olds while trying to negotiate exactly what age-appropriate dress is because by this time, I thought I’d surely be donning Chanel suits like Jackie O instead of my Lucky’s and a tank top.
As I was driving home from Vegas, thinking about the party LeeAnn had thrown me, the friends and family that had flown in from around the country, a vision that wafted in with the soft desert air. If 30 is passing the torch of wild nights and career maneuverings to a 19 year-old, 40 is reflecting on your accomplishments, both in work and spirit.
I thought about the dream jobs and world travels I’ve had, the cache of catchy stories most of you have heard more than a dozen times, the string of ex-boyfriends who make for good fodder when I need something to write about. Every major decision, I’ve made by my own consul, whether it was the college I attended, buying a car from the dealership, or the purchase of the house I live in. I’ve learned to navigate Manhattan, Minneapolis and the Paris Metro. I’ve bought and sold hundreds of items in yard sales, (for example the seven sofas I amassed until I found the perfect one), hosted a slew of fabulous Silver Lake parties that reached epic status in the ‘90s, and I make a ceviche that garners Lupe’s praise.
But most importantly, to spend a milestone event with people that have been there for you, believe in you, and love you no matter what. Well. The fabulous gown and the Vegas icon in his light blue jumpsuit are just gravy.
Looking around room, in the presence of so many with whom I have a strong history, a feeling of invincibility overtook me and new dreams sprouted out of nowhere – I want to sell my house, move to Spain, have an affair with a bull fighter like Lady Brett, start an artist retreat, build my own house, plant a winter garden, perfect my French, master the Salsa Dance, learn to fly. With nothing to tether me, the sky is my limit.
Thoreau said, “I went to the woods because I wished to live deliberately. I want to live deep and suck the marrow out of life, to put to rout all that is not life and not, when I came to die, realize that I had not lived.”
Somehow, thanks to your belief in me, I had lived into this devotion.
During the long ride home, I let everything fall away and thought about my new life goals. If at this point, the most important is my quest for purposeful work and a meaningful relationship, well, that’s pretty lucky.
And until further notice, I’m 40.
