What is it with Meryl Streep these days? Every time I open a paper, a magazine or scan an online news site, there she is. These sightings are not just ads for her new flicks but she is reigning on the front page of Vogue!
All of a sudden she is the cover girl for what a woman can be at 62, talented, vibrant, intelligent, saucy and stunning. Well, all I have to say to Meryl is, “you go girl!”

We are thrilled to have you holding the banner and marching out front. What better representative for the post menopausal years than the woman we have all admired for decades.
Out of Africa is still, without a doubt, my all time favorite film. I watch it once a year just to enjoy the opportunity to cry alone on the couch with my glass of wine and popcorn (For the record- a nice grassy white Sauvignon Blanc is a perfect pairing with buttered corn).

As much as I believe that Ms Streep deserves the recognition she is receiving I do think there is something else going on. The media has turned its focus on older women, finally wiping the Vaseline from the camera lens and clicking unabashedly at the faces and bodies we grew up into.
The women that Meryl represents are, how shall I put it without making us sound like good cheese or wine, matured in form but bodacious non the less…think Annette Bening, Susan Sarandon, Helen Mirren, all are fitting Vogue cover models.

In this case however, beauty is not paper deep for there is more to these women. The mature woman is also ripened in experience. She is in full bloom with talent and skill. She wears an elegance that is earned by time and passion. Our mature entertainment mentors and we, their humble fans, are bold and stepping out into roles and onto stages that our younger selves would not have attempted.
We are fully formed from the journey of living with joy and success and also from surviving the agony and fear. Each wrinkle represents the path of a tear or a smile, a frown or a question we contorted to ponder along the way. All this has brought us to where we are today.

Some days I am amazed at the gifts this time in my life has given me. I think how uniquely fortunate I am and then I see Meryl on the cover and I realize I am not unique; my sisters are here in this time with me.
Thank you Meryl, you have given us a lifetime of your thespian talent and a timely reminder that beauty does indeed thrive with age inside and out.