Story for the Week
Today is my birthday 😊, and from the outside, this might look like a boring birthday. From the inside, I’m not complaining.
When my husband was alive, I had two rules on my birthday (the same held true for Mother’s Day). I’m not cooking, and I’m not cleaning. Since I typically did all the cooking, we always ordered out for my birthday. I stand by those same two rules today, but this year is a little new and unusual.
My first order of business today will be sleeping in…because it’s a Sunday, and I like to sleep in on the weekends. Corinne and I have massages scheduled this morning. 90 minutes (really 80) with hot stones and CBD oil. 😔
But then she has to work. It’s her first job, and she already had a week off for vacation right after she started, so I told her she couldn’t really ask for another day off this soon. I joked with her that I might come by Denny’s for my free birthday Slam, which she informed me is not the Grand Slam that it used to be. Unbeknownst to her, one of her friends messaged me a few days ago and asked when we were going to Denny’s. I suggested Sunday, and then I invited another friend and my dad to join us as well.
Would I prefer to actually eat with my kid on my birthday? Sure…but it’s not really an option this year. So the next best thing is to at least make her take my order and let her serve me. 🤣
After Denny’s, I don’t have a plan. Relax, read, hang out with the puppies. Maybe I’ll watch a soccer game or two with my brother-in-law. Sounds like the perfect day. And when Corinne comes home, chatterbox that she is, we’ll talk about her day and the amazing tip she got from a woman who came in for her birthday about an hour after Corinne’s shift started. 😉
Know what I won’t be doing? Having a midlife crisis like Olivia Strauss. I already do the things that bring me joy. I’m an introvert. Relaxing at home and reading a book brings me joy. Watching soccer or movies with my brother-in-law and hanging out with the puppies brings me joy.
At the end of the day, I try not to take life so seriously. I already know the future is promised to no one because this is my fourth birthday without my someone. A low-key, boring birthday it is. And cheers to that.
Book Review
⭐⭐⭐
3 Stars for Olivia Strauss is Running Out of Time by Angela Brown
363 pages
Publisher: Little A
Publication Date: January 1, 2024
This title was an Amazon First Reads selection.
Publisher’s Description
A woman has no choice left but to enjoy the adventure of life―and its surprises―in a funny and emotionally moving comedy of errors about the gifts of growing older.
Olivia Strauss is turning thirty-nine. No major milestone. She still considers herself young. At least young enough to assume she has decades (emphasis on the plural) to check the unchecked boxes of her life’s to-do list.
Ballerina? Too late. But not too late for poet. Or for reigniting the romantic spark in her marriage, spending more quality time with her son, switching careers, learning to cook, or even dyeing her hair a bright bohemian pink. She’ll get to that one. There’s time―until Olivia’s best friend, Marian, gives her a birthday present she could have lived without.
It’s a visit to a trendy wellness clinic with a state-of-the-art genetic test that can predict the exact date of one’s death. It’s just what Olivia’s always wanted: an expiration date. As for her aspirations, who knew they were limited-time offers? One thing’s for sure. Olivia’s got a lot of living to do. At this point, what could go wrong?
************
Main Characters:
- Olivia (Liv) – 39-year-old school teacher at a private academy, loves poetry, met her best friend in college at a poetry reading their freshman year at NYU and bonded over the fact that they share the same birthday
- Andrew – Olivia’s husband, who she and Marian met a few weeks after the poetry reading, and the three became inseparable
- Marian – 39-year-old food writer, still lives in the city in the same apartment she’s had since college
- Suzanne, Allison, Courtney – women in Olivia’s neighborhood, they get together every couple of weeks at one of their homes under the premise of having dinner but really for a sales party for their latest anti-aging discovery
- Sunshine – a vendor at the local farmer’s market who also teaches at a nearby yoga studio
- Poppy – a new employee at Nettle Center, the wellness clinic that Marian and Olivia go to
Olivia Strauss is Running Out of Time sounded like a cute, funny look at a midlife crisis. It was definitely more crisis than cute. And while the publisher’s description calls it “a funny and emotionally moving comedy of errors,” it started strong but became increasingly depressing with a tiny uplift at the end.
Told in the first person from Olivia’s point of view, Chapter 1 begins with a section called “Death” on the eve of Olivia’s 39th birthday. She’s attending a regular girls’ night dinner/sales pitch with the women in the neighborhood. Turns out, they’re celebrating her birthday but also pitching the latest anti-aging serum.
On her birthday the next day, Liv’s best friend Marian takes her to a trendy wellness clinic that she had researched for an article. Nettle Center’s claim is that they can draw some blood and run a genetic test that will give you the exact date of your death, when your cells are genetically scheduled to expire.
So begins Liv’s obsession with the age-old question of would you want to know the exact date of your death. The visit to the clinic ends up riddled with mistakes and results in return visits, missing test results, and all sorts of unexpected situations. To add to the insanity, Poppy turns up in the oddest places and never seems to be willing to answer any questions that Liv and Marian pose to her. While Liv hasn’t received a real answer about her results, she is suddenly faced with the idea that she might never accomplish all the things she had planned for her life when she and Marian first met. Cue Olivia’s midlife crisis.
Up until this point, the story was lighthearted, a little bit funny. Marian is the single, quirky best friend, always dragging Liv on crazy outings, reliving their youth. But in the second section of the book, call “Life,” the mood takes a turn. Liv and Marian seem disconnected, they start keeping secrets from one another. In fact, Liv doesn’t confide in her husband either, who she’s been with for 20+ years. Couples have secrets. I know that. But Liv and Andrew’s relationship seems solid enough that Liv would confide in him sooner rather than later, and it feels like it takes a really long time.
The Life section of the book really starts to drag. Liv’s “friends” are obsessed with aging and talk incessantly about what it’s like to get old. They’re 40, for crying out loud! I got married at 36 and had my daughter at 39. I don’t have any friends who were complaining about how old they were at that age. We were on bowling leagues, volleyball leagues, and going out to the bar in our 30s. We definitely were not focused on how old we felt at 40.
No one wants a slow, sad, depressing life, and that’s exactly what this turned into. Liv’s voice becomes more than a little preachy, and what’s worse is that the whole book only spanned a year in Liv’s life. It felt so much longer than that, and I don’t think the lift at the end (“Birth”) made for a good enough recovery.
The message here obviously is to live life to the fullest because none of us really know how much time we have left. The reason I gave 3 stars is because the beginning of the book and the overall message were solid. It was ok, but this was a tough one to get through.
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