Stay with me.

I said yes to four small chances a couple weeks ago, back-to-back, and those chances paid off in ways I never expected.

The Comment I Almost Didn’t Leave

Last Friday, a woman in my local moms’ Facebook group asked for recommendations on cute and comfy shorts for a midlife body. I have strong opinions on comfortable shorts, since they’re my daily summer uniform. I recently bought some awesome shorts on Amazon and now own three pairs, which I pretty much wear daily.

I almost didn’t comment. My local moms’ Facebook groups are an interesting mix of great suggestion-sharing and some over-the-top, high-drama stuff, in my opinion, so I mostly lurk and rarely engage.

But I wanted to support a fellow comfort-seeking midlife mom, so I commented on her post and shared a link to my favorite Amazon shorts. Tiny Chance #1.

My profile picture, for context, is the Indiana University (IU) logo. I changed it to the IU logo last fall when my alma mater had a historic football season and won the National Championship.

A woman named Melissa replied under my shorts comment: “Not related but I also went to IU and am in East Cobb. Would love to connect.”

I messaged her back immediately, before my midlife brain might forget. Tiny Chance #2.

Kismet, Sort Of

Melissa and I hit it off immediately over DMs. Turns out she’s an IU professor. She teaches sales, which happens to be my actual job, and splits her time between Bloomington during the school year and East Cobb during the summer and on school breaks. We graduated the same year. Both business majors. Both Kelley School.

Here’s the part that made me think wow: a few weeks earlier, a coworker of mine, also a fellow IU grad, and I had been half-joking about flying back to Bloomington to guest-speak in a sales class together, two successful alums coming back to impart our profound wisdom. We’d talked about turning it into a fun fall weekend at our beloved IU.

And now here was an actual IU sales professor in my actual Facebook comments. Her name was Melissa, and she lives ten minutes from me. All because I’d shared a link to a pair of Amazon shorts.

I found myself wondering: did I manifest this?! If so, cool, I’m going to get to work manifesting my gulf-front beach house.

I was genuinely excited to meet Melissa for coffee and hear the story of how she transitioned from tech account manager to sales professor and catch up on all things IU.

The Coffee Date

Melissa was heading back to Bloomington the following week and asked if I wanted to get together before she left. I immediately said yes, and we planned a coffee date at a coffee shop right between our two houses. Tiny Chance #3.

She texted me that morning to confirm and said she was bringing her best friend Tessa, also an IU grad, also our exact graduating class, also a marketing major, just like me!

I walked in expecting to reminisce about our beloved IU and hear what Kelley Business School is like today. I couldn’t wait for the details. I walked out with two new friends whose lives were so parallel to mine that it was crazy.

Melissa, Tessa, and I compared notes and realized we were on campus at the literally identical time, taking classes in the literally identical building, quite possibly in the literally identical lecture hall on a given Tuesday in 1990. We never crossed paths back then, at least not that we could recall. All three of us had IU friends in common and had lived through the same adult, parenting, and career challenges since. Same years, same university, same business school, same account management careers, same city we’d all ended up in as adults. Three women, meeting for the first time thirty-five years later, over coffee in a local East Cobb, GA coffee shop.

We talked for two hours. We covered career, parenting, midlife adulting — in an honest, vulnerable way that felt kind of crazy considering we’d just met. But it felt so natural and easy. We all had accomplished careers and lived in the same nice suburban area, but we also shared similar painful life chapters that overlapped in oddly specific ways. We started a group text before we’d even finished our coffee and spent the rest of the day trading fun texts with promises to get together soon.

One of my favorite parts of our coffee date was seeing Melissa’s awesome selfie with Fernando Mendoza, taken at Kilroy’s the night of the Big Ten Championship win. They both looked so genuinely happy and ecstatic at that historic win over Ohio State! It was a magical night for Hoosiers everywhere. I asked for a copy of the picture. Melissa texted it to me, and every time I look at that amazing picture, I smile!

This incredible IU alumni coffee date alone would have made a nice little article. Post a comment, make two new friends whom you have so much in common with, the end. But it kept going.

The Bonus Round

Somewhere in the conversation, Melissa and Tessa mentioned a mutual friend who’d been in the same sorority as an old IU friend of mine named Marcey, someone I lost touch with decades ago and had searched for online a few times but could never find.

Marcey and I became friends in my senior year, in an acting class. I loved that class, and it ended up giving me some amazing friendships, which caught me by surprise. By second semester of senior year, I figured I’d already made all my closest IU friends. Marcey proved me wrong.

My IU acting class. We are all in costume from our final performance.

It turns out I’d had her name spelled wrong in my head this entire time, which is why I could never find her on social media. Tessa found her in about ninety seconds on a mutual friend’s Facebook friend list.

Inspired by tracking down Marcey, I felt motivated to find a second very good college friend, Sandy. Sandy and I lived on the same dorm floor freshman year and were good friends throughout my four years at IU. We got together a few times after college, though we lived in different cities. And then, somehow, we lost touch. I’ve also searched Facebook and LinkedIn for Sandy a few times over the years, but I’ve never been able to find her.

Sandy and I studying Accounting 101 together

Inspired by finding Marcey, I looked up another freshman dorm friend named Amy on LinkedIn. I thought I’d send Amy a quick hello and ask if she knew where Sandy was these days. And there, sitting in an old LinkedIn message, was a reply to a message I’d sent Amy back in 2007 asking for Sandy’s contact info. Amy had answered with Sandy’s new cell phone number. I’d just never seen it.

Eighteen years sitting in an unread message. It also occurred to me that I could search Amy’s LinkedIn connections and see if she was connected to Sandy. Sure enough, I found Sandy, with a new married last name.

I sent connection requests and heartfelt messages to both Marcey and Sandy that same morning.

I felt a little nervous sending those messages and requests. I was once great friends with both. Would they even care? Would they remember me as fondly as I remember them? Had they ever thought about trying to track me down? I decided that whatever happened was fine. I wanted to try, and I was okay if they didn’t respond. At least I tried. Tiny Chance #4.

Here’s the actual update. Sandy accepted my LinkedIn request about a week later, along with a very sweet message: “KELLY!!! How are you? So happy we are reconnecting! Stay in touch and let me know if you are even in the Chicago area!!”

Marcey took a little longer. She accepted the connection request within a few days but didn’t reply to my message for a couple of weeks, and I’ll admit I was a little bummed. Then, early this week, her reply came through: “Hello, hello Kelly! It was lovely to see your face; you look amazingly similar to when we were at IU. I’d LOVE to reconnect as well, so happy you reached out. Let’s find time to catch up. Take good care and speak soon.” In fact, we have a phone date scheduled for today at 3pm!

Turns out the wait was worth it. Both women are back in my life now, and I can’t wait to catch up with them both.

The Thing About Tiny Chances

I made a commitment to myself in early 2026 to invest more time in my friendships and in making more friends in my newish community. The latter part has involved reaching out and setting up coffees and lunches with new friends, and yes, risking rejection, because even small rejections sting a little.

What I’ve learned is that those Tiny Chances get much easier over time and result in BIG rewards. And when they don’t deliver, that’s okay too.

If I can offer anything to people kind enough to read this, it’s this: get intentional about what you want to build in your life and start taking some Tiny Chances. It’s so worth it, and they really do get easier every time you take them.

The Beauty of Returning to a Special Time in Your Life

Lastly, they always say “you can’t go back.” For the most part, I agree. But this week I got to go back in time a little, and it was incredible. My years at Indiana University were some of the most special of my life, and IU winning the 2026 national championship already had those memories flooding back before any of this happened. My coffee date with Melissa and Tessa was the cherry on top — and getting Marcey and Sandy back was the full circle I didn’t know I needed. You can’t go back, not really, but you can linger in the memories of a special time, and that’s turned out to be its own kind of joy. Those old college friendships endure. They just need a little effort to wake back up.

The Shorts

As my parting gift to you (I’m so grateful for all of you), here’s a link to my beloved G4Free Women’s Dressy Casual High-Waisted Shorts. FYI, they run a bit small, so you’ll probably need to size up.

If you enjoyed this article, I’d love it if you hit like and left a comment. Your comments and likes truly mean a lot to me.

Song Inspiration: “Jack & Diane” by John Mellencamp — basically the soundtrack of my IU years.

Authentically Kelly is a blog for women 50+ where authenticity, humor, presence, a little snark, and joy lead the way.

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Bellevue Botanical Garden, years ago. A free evening on a work trip — I had the whole place to myself. It felt like possibility. Still does.

I glanced at my work phone last Thursday morning around 5am. I don’t normally check it until my workday begins. I don’t really know what prompted me to pick it up and glance at my work emails.

I work for a very large global company headquartered in Europe. By the time I’m waking up in Georgia, the important news has often already gone out. And there it was, waiting for me in the dark: the division I work for — half of it, anyway — has been sold to a private equity firm. Sometime in the first half of 2027, I’ll no longer be an employee of my company. A company that everyone recognizes when they ask me where I work. I’ll share a new company name that won’t be recognized and will likely prompt a response that I never have to answer: “I haven’t heard of it. What do you sell?” I’ll be selling the same products that most people know of and love, but a lot of things will be very different. Maybe some things will be better, maybe worse. At this point, I don’t know.

We’ve known this PE sale has been coming for over a year now. But the longer we waited to learn our fate, it started to feel like it maybe wouldn’t happen — right up until it happened.

I’ll be honest about that first hour last Thursday morning, because honesty is the whole point of this place. I was angry. I felt like I’d been sold. Not restructured, not transitioned — sold, like a thing, like inventory that got moved from one warehouse to another without anyone asking how the inventory felt about it. The reality of being sold and working for an entirely new company, with an unrecognizable and kind of odd name — it felt heavy. That grief was real, and I let myself have it.

Call it my processing hour.

And then — because I have built a morning practice that catches me when I fall — I put in my earbuds and meditated and then journaled. And somewhere in there, I was reminded of something I’ve been quietly building for the last few years without fully realizing it:

I have AGENCY.

—

The Word that made me feel better

Here’s what shifted in me, sitting there in the dark with my coffee.

This new path. Maybe it’s good. A smaller, more nimble and focused organization. Still selling premium brands that I believe in. Maybe I’ll love it.

Or maybe I won’t — in which case I’ll pivot. I know my value and I’m confident I’ll land firmly on my feet. I also took a leap this year and I am finally building my career Act 2, albeit slowly. It feels empowering and exciting.

Either way, I have options. Real ones. And that changes everything.

I keep turning the word AGENCY over in my head. I’ve had it all along — I just forgot it was mine.

Here is what agency means to me:

I’m in control. Not of everything — of my choices. My response. My next move.

I’ve got options. More than one. That alone is a kind of wealth I didn’t use to have.

I believe in myself. After a successful 30-year career, I’ve got the receipts.

I’m open to receive. Whatever this next chapter wants to hand me, my hands are open instead of clenched.

I did not feel this way in my twenties, thirties, or forties. Back then, I felt like other people held the strings of my career. And in fairness — they kind of did. Sure, I could switch jobs, and I did a handful of times. But I depended on those corporate jobs for my livelihood, my security, my sense of who I was.

The unexpected blessing of being in my mid-fifties, in the final stretch of my corporate career? I’m not white-knuckling it the way I used to. I have a finish line I can see. I have time to build. I have a track record. I have confidence and clarity about my worth and what truly matters.

I have AGENCY.

And honestly, it feels like sweet relief.

And Then It Was Monday

I wish I could tell you that empowered feeling stuck. It didn’t.

The following Monday, I found myself feeling a bit unsure of what this big change would actually mean for me. For my paycheck, my team, my day-to-day, my Delta boarding status, my whole corporate identity? The questions didn’t have answers, and the not-knowing made me feel anxious and not quite so empowered anymore.

On Tuesday I travelled to my company’s U.S. headquarters for a meeting where I presented my 2027 plan. The meeting went amazingly well. That evening, from my hotel room on the 31st floor, I had a straight, clear view out my floor to ceiling window of my company’s building — its huge name lit up on top, directly in my line of sight, the same name I’ve given people for years when they ask where I work. I sat there and stared at it for a long time. This time next year, that won’t be my building. I’ll be handing out a different name, one nobody recognizes yet. I felt the whole thing all over again, thirty-one floors up in my beautiful hotel room. I really like this hotel; will I ever get to stay here again? It’s SO nice. I really love the breakfast buffet. And Kenny the doorman.

So let me be honest about what agency actually is, because I don’t want to make it sound like it’s a light switch you can just flip on. I didn’t find agency that Thursday while meditating and journaling and got to keep it forever. It’s not a feeling that arrives and permanently moves in. It’s a thing I have to choose again every single time the fear comes back — and it will come back. Some mornings I wake up and it’s the first thing waiting for me. On those mornings, “I have agency” isn’t a fix all mantra. It’s the sentence I reach for in the dark, on purpose, until I believe it again.

That’s the real version. Not everything worked out and I feel great henceforth. More like: I’m scared and I’ll be okay, at the same time, and I’ve decided the okay gets the final say.

—

This Isn’t Just a Corporate Story

Now, I could leave it there — a nice little tale about a midlife corporate woman who got acquired and who pounded her chest and decided to feel okay about it. But that’s not really what this is about, and if I stopped there, I’d be shortchanging a lot of the women reading this.

Because agency isn’t a corporate thing. It’s a human thing.

I think it’s true for any chapter of your life where you’ve quietly let a single role become your entire identity — where you’ve handed the strings to something outside yourself and called it security.

The teacher who’s poured herself into a system that keeps taking more and giving less. The nurse running on empty for an institution that will replace her name badge by Friday if she leaves. The stay-at-home mom whose whole self has been folded into a role that — beautifully, painfully — is designed to need her less every single year. The woman who built her identity around a marriage, a company, a title, a version of herself someone else handed her a long time ago.

If any of that is you: you have agency too. You can have a finish line at any age. You can decide that this role — as much as you love it, as much as it’s needed you — is not the whole of who you are. You can start giving a little of your extra energy back to yourself instead of pouring all of it into something that isn’t designed to last indefinitely.

And the moment you do, something loosens. There are suddenly new paths. The first few steps are scary, I won’t pretend otherwise — but your steps get lighter, and one day you might even catch yourself skipping.

—

What It Actually Looks Like

Agency isn’t a personality trait you’re born with. It’s a practice. And it looks different for everyone — but the shape of it is always the same: you do the work to know who you are, apart from what you do for other people.

For me, that’s morning pages. Meditation. A quick workout in the basement before the world wakes up. Walking the dogs with my husband. This Substack. For you it might be painting, or prayer, or one honest conversation a week with someone who sees you, or fifteen minutes of journaling before bed. The specifics don’t matter.

What matters is that some part of your life belongs to you and nobody else. Because when you’ve got that — something that’s just yours — a bad day at work is still a bad day, but it isn’t the end of you. They can take the paycheck or the title or the company you thought you’d retire from.

But they can’t take you. Not anymore. You quit keeping all of yourself in one place.

—

So What Now?

If you’re reading this thinking “that’s lovely, Kelly, I’m not a morning person, and truthfully, I think you’re a bit of a freak for waking up so early”— I hear you. I own my freak. Life is full. The demands are real.

But you have more agency than you think you do. You have early mornings, lunch breaks, the odd quiet moment, weekends. You have the capacity to invest in yourself, even just a little. It doesn’t have to be a whole transformation. It can be one walk where you think about what you really want for yourself instead of what’s on the list. One conversation with someone who truly sees you. Fifteen honest minutes.

Start there. Build the version of you that doesn’t need external circumstances to be okay. Because circumstances change — companies restructure, roles end, people leave, the ground shifts. That’s all real.

But the woman you’re building underneath all of it? The one who knows herself, who has options, who isn’t handing her whole worth to one company or one role or one source of approval?

She can handle whatever comes.

That, more than anything else, is sweet freedom. And it might just be the best thing I own.

—

Song Inspiration: “I’m Good” by Jelly Roll. I had this one on repeat for a solid month earlier this year, long before I knew I’d need it. It’s not a song about everything being perfect — it’s a song about choosing to be okay anyway, after the hard part, on purpose. Which, it turns out, is the whole point.

—

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If you’ve ever had a moment where you realized, you had more power than you thought — that was agency. Tell me about it in the comments. I’d love to hear.

—

Authentically Kelly is a blog for women 50+ where authenticity, humor, presence, a little snark, and joy lead the way.

— — —

PRESS 1 for a friend with an amazing lake house who mentions it constantly.

PRESS 2 for a friend who is a size 2, always in stylish designer outfits, with a fresh blowout and a full face of makeup, and who has never once eaten bread in front of you.

PRESS 3 for a wealthy friend with a beautiful McMansion, a fancy car, and a life that appears to have never once contained a bad Monday.

PRESS 4 for a friend whose children are perfect, and ALWAYS thriving academically, socially, and professionally.

PRESS 5 for a friend with a million friends who might — might — let you into her circle.

PRESS 6 for a friend who is just like you — same life stage, same career path, same values. Same, same, same.

(That last one doesn’t sound so crazy, does it? Hold that thought.)

Welcome to 1-800-ORDER-A-FRIEND! Please hold. Your call is very important to absolutely NO ONE!

Seriously, nobody would order a seemingly perfect person as their friend. No sane soul would pick up the phone, place that call, and say, “yes, I’d like the wealthy, beautiful, uber-fit, skinny friend who’s never sad.” And yet. Somehow. Those are the exact boxes a lot of us quietly judge ourselves for failing to check.

As absurd as “ordering a perfect friend” might sound, I think it’s a good contrast to the pressure we place on ourselves to measure up to a bunch of shallow societal standards placed on women these days.

We’d never order a superficially “perfect” friend. But somehow, we unconsciously grade our own worth by those ridiculous standards, every morning, in the mirror, before coffee.

Here’s my question for you: what type of friend would you order, if you were honest?

— — —

Not the 1-800 “perfect” friend. The real one.

I’d order... a deeply kind soul, with a bit of sass. A friend who impresses me with her heart, humor, intellect, and conversation skills, not her polished appearance or wallet. Someone who likes to be silly and who I can bond with over our collective imperfections.

When I think of my friends and what makes them amazing, it’s always about their character and how they make me feel — and never about their pant size, their wealth, their zip code, their wrinkle-free skin, or their designer handbags.

But I’ll be honest: there was a time, not too long ago, when I tried to order what I thought would be the perfect friend for me. It turned out that my order was fulfilled in an unexpected but delightful way.

— — —

Placing My 30A Friendship Order

A few years ago, my family and I decided to sell our home in Georgia and move full time to an area called 30A in the Florida panhandle. Surely, living full time at the beach was going to be perfect, and making new friends would be a breeze — or so I thought.

I already knew quite a few wonderful people in our 30A neighborhood, where we owned a vacation rental home. However, my beach friends skewed about a decade older and were mostly retired. So, I attempted to send my 1-800 friendship order into the universe: I wanted close friends in my life stage — ideally professional working moms, kids still in school, and, of course, kind, smart, and funny. That was my checklist. A textbook Press 6. It seemed so reasonable at the time.

It turned out that finding my people — making new friends in a new city — was much harder than I anticipated.

So, I decided to put myself out there. I joined a couple of local “30A friendship groups” dedicated to helping full-time beach newcomers connect. Awesome, I thought. This should be easy now.

Nope!

Polly Popular

I went solo to quite a few “make new friends” events. The first one was fun — a coffee get-together, and everyone was nice. I sat by one woman — I’ll call her Polly — who seemed like she really wanted to be my friend. We hung out a few times, and I soon learned that Polly was “perfect,” and that Polly REALLY enjoyed telling me about how many friends were already in her circle. She kept mentioning that she might include me in some of their get-togethers. I came to think of her as Polly Popular. I left our get-togethers feeling like I was auditioning for her cool kids’ club, and it felt a lot like sorority rush — gross!

I had, without realizing it, dialed 1-800-ORDER-A-FRIEND. Polly Popular was a Press 5. The 1-800 line had delivered exactly what it promised — and it turns out the order just makes you feel worse about yourself.

Midriff Mom

My next attempt was a nice woman I met online in a local moms’ Facebook group. She was new to the area and had a son in the same grade as my youngest son. Perfect, I thought — same life stage. This will be great. Then I met her in person — at the middle school open house — where she was wearing a half T-shirt and proudly displaying her midriff. At a middle school open house — yikes! From then on, I affectionately nicknamed her Midriff Mom. I knew I was living at the beach, but midriff exposure at a middle school open house was not my vibe. I tried not to judge, because I needed a friend. We met for lunch a few weeks later, and there was her very toned midriff, on display again. Nice woman but, for this Midwestern-bred gal — no can do!

I had ordered a beach edition of Press 2 without even meaning to.

Speed Dating = I Found a Friend!

I tried a few more “friendship events” and left every single one feeling like I’d just been to a singles bar and massively struck out. I don’t know how else to describe it. Polite small talk. A vague sense that everyone was scanning the room for someone slightly more useful to know.

At my very last event — a friendship speed dating theme — I finally made a friend I really connected with immediately. Melissa! I didn’t “speed date” Melissa; Melissa was helping to coordinate the logistics of speed dating. Mid-round, we locked eyes across the table and somehow silently communicated to each other: this is awful. We chatted afterward and bonded over parenting less-than-perfect emerging adults. Three years later, I’m back living in Atlanta, and Melissa is a dear friend and I adore her.

The one real friend I made during my 1-800-ORDER-A-FRIEND era didn’t come from trying to fulfill a specific order. She came from a shared eye roll and a mutual willingness to admit our kids — and our lives — weren’t perfect.

— — —

The Friendship Order That Was Already Filled — Beach Edition

Walking out of that speed dating event, I made two decisions. One: I was done with friendship events with a singles-bar vibe. I would be patient and make friends organically. And two — the bigger one — I finally admitted something I’d been overlooking the whole time.

I already had awesome 30A friends. Real ones. In my own neighborhood. They just weren’t in my life stage — and that, it turns out, was completely okay. Delightful, even.

Here’s the funny part: if I’d run these women through my 1-800 order form, not one of them would have made it past the first box on my checklist. Different life stage, different decade, mostly retired. Which tells you everything about the checklist — my order form would have screened out the very best people in my zip code. Thank goodness real friendship doesn’t take orders.

We found our beach house in the first place because my Atlanta tennis friend Linda and her husband George (who I also adore) had retired and moved to the same neighborhood a few years prior. Linda and I met on a tennis court in Atlanta, and it was friendship love at first serve. I jokingly call Linda my Life Sherpa, because she’s like the older sister I always go to for life advice. Linda is retired, incredibly active, in amazing shape, and we share so many similar interests. We never run out of things to talk about, and on our frequent power walks, I have trouble keeping up with Linda. She’s also an amazing interior designer and gardener. She’s everything I aspire to be as I move deeper into midlife.

Me, Linda and another cherished 30A friend, Kathy

Another incredible friend in my Florida neighborhood is Kathy. Kathy is a strong, fierce woman with a ton of strong opinions and the warmest heart — you’ll never hear Kathy utter a bad word about anyone. Kathy loves hanging out on her LLL — Lower-Level Lanai — with a cup of coffee in the morning and a glass of wine at sunset, which was convenient for me because our homes were right across a pond from each other. I enjoyed a lot of great chats on that LLL. Not to mention that Kathy’s husband, Kevin, gives the best hugs and is basically sunshine in human form.

Kathy wining some wine to enjoy on her LLL

And then there is my spirit animal, Marilee — a retired Midwestern psychologist who is hilarious, a bit kooky in the best way, and gets my brand of silly in a way most people don’t. I love nothing more than chatting, laughing, and being silly with Marilee. Her husband, Dave, grew up not far from me in Central Illinois and is also a total gem.

Marilee and I being silly at my pool side birthday party in 2023

Here’s the punchline of my whole Florida year: I was out dialing 1-800-ORDER-A-FRIEND for someone in my life stage, and the real order — wisdom, laughter, a laid-back refusal to perform — was already sitting on the LLL across the pond, or down the street on her front porch, waiting for me to just show up, drink the wine, listen to the waves, and watch the sunset together.

“Same life stage” was never the box that mattered. It was just the easiest one to check.

— — —

We moved back to Atlanta after that year — life stage wasn’t nothing, and it turned out we were simply in the wrong one to be living on 30A full time. But thankfully, here’s what the move didn’t change: I’m still close friends with every one of those amazing 30A ladies, as well as several more friends I met organically during my year in Florida. I go back to the beach a few times a year and always spend time with these amazing friends on my visits — it’s the best! As it turns out, these special friendships didn’t need a shared zip code to continue to grow.

My incredible 30A friends in 2026! My order was beautifully fulfilled indeed!

And now I’m home in Georgia, surrounded by my long-term, wonderfully imperfect Atlanta friends who have carried me through decades, not just a year. Also — not one of them bares her midriff in daily life.

— — —

Here’s the mirror, and it’s not a comfortable one: if you’d never order perfection in a friend, why are you demanding it of yourself? Since when did your pant size determine your worth as a human being? What exactly are we all chasing — and why does chasing “perfection” always seem to leave us just as empty as before?

I think the 1-800-ORDER-A-FRIEND order form was blank the whole time. I think the only requirement that ever mattered was finding a friend who lets you show up as your true, authentic self — no matter how put together or disheveled you might be at any given moment. The one who knows that life is never perfect and loves you for how you show interest in her life, care how she’s feeling, and show up when she needs a friend. For how you laugh together, commiserate on a hard day, cheer for each other when things are going great, and hold each other’s hearts when life gets tough.

That’s the whole order. It always was.

So, here’s my ask, before you hang up: the next time you catch yourself in the mirror running down your own checklist — the pant size, the wrinkles, the not-enoughs — talk to yourself the way you’d talk to your best friend. You’d never grade her that way. Be that friend. To yourself first.

Hang up the phone. The real thing is already at your table — and in your mirror.

— — —

Song Inspiration: “Who Says” by Selena Gomez & The Scene. Because the world has been handing women the same order form since high school — and this song is the sound of tearing it up.

Who’s the friend you never saw coming? Drop her name in the comments — bonus points for the story. Then go tell her.

— — —

Authentically Kelly is a blog for women 50+ where authenticity, humor, presence, a little snark, and joy lead the way.

#AuthenticallySpeaking #WomenOver50 #Friendship

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I woke up in a terrible mood last Thursday.

Not a grumpy-coffee-hasn’t-kicked-in kind of mood. It was a very heavy feeling and slightly angry sort of mood. Several small things from the day before were weighing on me — some things I can barely remember now — but that Thursday morning I did not wake up in my usual midlife sleep-deprived-yet-still-excited-to-start-my-day mood. Your girl was CRANKY.

A steadfast devotion to meditation apps over the years has helped me tremendously learn to recognize my emotions and accept them without reacting too much. I fully know that bad feelings and emotions will pass in due time and I’ll feel better.

Every morning, without fail, I make coffee. and do 3 relatively short, guided meditations on three different meditation apps: Open, Calm, and Insight Timer. Why three? Because apparently, I can’t break a streak. I’m that person.

After meditating, I write in my journal, my morning pages, for about 30 minutes.

In my journal on this low-mood Thursday, I made a list. A list of everything I was salty about. Everything that felt unfair or disappointing or frustrating. I got all the way to ten things and felt kind of proud of myself for generating that many grievances.

Before I wrote the list, I’d listened to a talk on Insight Timer about a Buddhist principle called the Two Arrows. Despite being a meditation app devotee, I’d never heard of this before. And it made so much sense to me that I took notes.

Here’s how it works:

The first arrow is the real-life painful event. Illness. Bad news. A workplace crisis. A fight with your spouse.

On that Thursday my first arrows were thankfully small in the scheme of things: My hair looking very brown instead of blonde after spending $220 on highlights. The cleaners canceling at 9:30pm after I just spent several exhausted hours getting the house ready to be cleaned the next morning (with zero help, of course). Hearing that my career advice is annoying — or actually, that I am annoying — from one of my children. Watching talented Dallas Cowboys Cheerleader hopefuls get crushed on Netflix because they didn’t pass the owner’s mean daughter’s aesthetic test — because apparently her preferences matter more than actual talent.

The first arrow is the painful thing that actually happens. The thing you usually can’t control or avoid.

The second arrow is what you do to yourself after — the stories, the spiraling, the suffering it creates.

It’s the stories you tell. The narratives you construct. The way your brain spirals and spins and keeps landing on all the reasons why the thing that happened means something terrible about you or your life or your future.

The first arrow usually can’t be avoided. The second arrow? That one is entirely self-inflicted.

The Yoga Nidra Moment

After journaling, I decided to go back to bed. I did some Yoga Nidra while doing some red-light therapy — you know, optimizing my time even in my bad mood.

Lying there in the dark, my mind kept circling back to my son thinking I am annoying and not wanting my advice. I started constructing stories about why he thinks I’m so annoying and how I’m not appreciated by every single member of my family and extended family and friends everywhere.

And then it hit me.

This is the second arrow.

The first arrow was real: I did annoy my son, that’s what moms tend to do. That actually happened. But the story I was telling myself about why it happened — the reasons, the meanings, the implications about our relationship — that was me striking myself with a second arrow. Over and over. On purpose. Without even realizing it.

My brain was so busy trying to make sense of the pain that it created more pain.

It Keeps Happening

Here’s what the Two Arrows Theory taught me: This is what our brains do. We’re wired to seek out the negative, to construct narratives, to find the threat in every situation. It’s survival instinct. It’s supposed to protect us.

But most of the time, it just hurts us more.

And here’s the hard part: You can’t just learn this once and be done.

You have to learn it again. And again. And again.

Because tomorrow my brain will try to do the same thing. It’ll create a story about something that happened and I’ll have to catch myself again and remember: First arrow only. Don’t add the second one.

It’s a practice. Not a one-time fix.

Sharing It Forward

A few days later, I was visiting my childhood friend in Colorado. She shared some fears that she had been wrestling with lately regarding a situation that was largely out of her control. She was deep in the second arrow — constructing stories about futures that haven’t happened yet, meanings that might not be true.

So I told her about the Two Arrows.

We kept coming back to it throughout my visit — every time we caught ourselves spiraling into possibilities. One of us would call out 'Dude, this is the second arrow.

That’s what happens when you learn something true — you start noticing it everywhere. In yourself. In the people you love. In the way we all keep hurting ourselves with stories we tell.

The first arrow is life. The second arrow is optional.

But our brains don’t know that yet. So, we have to keep reminding ourselves.

Again and again and again.

💛 Please heart this post if you've caught yourself striking the second arrow.

Song Inspiration

ong Inspiration: 'Work In Progress' by Leanne Crawford — 'I'd rather be a mess if it means I'm real.'"

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Authentically Kelly is a blog for women 50+ where authenticity, humor, presence, a little snark, and joy lead the way.

Life kept life-ing, and the trip kept getting postponed. But in early June this year, a team meeting at my company headquarters in D.C. finally aligned with Ty’s schedule, and I booked the flights. At 17, I finally felt comfortable with him exploring the city solo on the days I’d be in meetings.

We planned two days together—Sunday and Monday—to tour D.C. as a pair. Tuesday and Wednesday, he would tour Georgetown University (his dream school) and explore D.C. on his own. I was excited to see D.C. through Tyler’s eyes and finally see the sights I’d never managed to visit despite frequent work trips. But mostly, I was excited to watch my son step into the life he’s been dreaming about since he was a very little boy.

Day 1: Getting There

The flight to D.C. was bittersweet. We were in separate rows—Ty in 11A, me across the aisle in 13D. But somehow, by what I can only describe as the grace of the Delta Gods, we ended up in the same row with the only open seat on the plane between us. It felt like a sign.

After a quick Uber to our hotel, we dropped our bags and took the Metro to the Smithsonian. We saw several monuments, walked past the White House, and let the reality of being there sink in. Ty kept saying, “I can’t believe I’m actually in the places that I’ve read about for so long.” That evening, we walked across the Key Bridge to Georgetown and had dinner at Martin’s Tavern. Martin’s is the oldest family-owned restaurant in D.C. and a historic icon—JFK proposed to Jacqueline Bouvier in one of their booths. After dinner, despite the oppressive heat and the 25,000 steps we’d already logged, we decided to walk to Georgetown University’s campus.

The campus was mostly empty and looked beautiful at sunset. The classroom buildings were open, so we decided to explore a bit. We went into some classrooms, and Ty imagined himself as a student. We then found our way to the Georgetown Chapel and stepped inside. It was stunning—soaring ceilings, stained glass with the evening light pouring in, the kind of space that makes you quiet. Ty and I took a seat and sat in silence for about ten minutes. I sent a thank-you to Jesus. Not just for the trip, but for this moment: being here, with him, watching him stand in a place he’s dreamed about.

Day 2: The Capitol & The Hill

Monday morning was thankfully significantly cooler. After I went on a morning walk, Ty and I hopped on the Metro and headed to The Hill. Our first stop was the Supreme Court. I was delighted that it wasn’t crowded at all—it turns out the Supreme Court is closed on Mondays, who knew? We had booked a Capitol tour and were able to get on an earlier one. We got lucky and landed with an amazing tour guide.

During the tour, something happened that made me stop and just watch my son. The tour guide was mid-explanation when Tyler raised his hand and asked a question—something insightful, something that demonstrated how much he knows about U.S. history.

The tour guide stopped mid-sentence: “Wow. That’s a good question.”

At every single stop in D.C.—the Capitol, the monuments, the museums—Tyler knew things. He’s read obsessively about history. He understood the current events. He asked thoughtful questions. He moved through those spaces like someone who belonged there, not like a tourist checking boxes.

I felt so proud of him and amazed that God created someone who has had such an unwavering passion his entire life.

After the tour, we walked around the Hill and the surrounding neighborhoods. We saw a Congressman I follow on Instagram walking quickly up the street not far from us. I called out his name, but he didn’t turn around. I’m choosing to believe he didn’t hear me.

We tried to navigate electric scooters (didn’t work), dodged middle school tour groups, and eventually made our way to Bullfeathers—a Capitol Hill institution that’s part dive bar, part burger joint, the kind of place where D.C.’s staffers go to unwind after a long day.

We sat in a booth and listened to the young staffers around us debrief their days, rehashing failed relationships and workplace politics. I watched Tyler’s eyes light up. I could see him picturing himself here one day, doing exactly this—sitting with friends after a long day on the Hill, talking about the work he’d done, the people he’d met, the decisions that mattered.

He belongs here. He’s going to be amazing here.

Days 3 & 4: Watching Him Belong

While I was in meetings the next two days, Tyler didn’t sit in the hotel room and scroll. He went on a 10-mile run around the monuments and absolutely loved it. He toured Georgetown University solo. He attended a Supreme Court lecture. He moved through the city like someone who belonged there.

And I wasn’t there. He didn’t need me there.

That’s when it really hit me: he’s ready. He’s stepping into the life he’s been dreaming about since he was five years old, and he’s stepping into it with confidence. He belongs in D.C. He’s going to be amazing.

Seeing America Through New Eyes

I came to D.C. once before, at 19. I was visiting with a college friend whose older sister lived in Alexandria. We toured the monuments, hit a few museums, and walked past the White House. It was cool but I don’t remember much. What I remember is silly pictures on the Metro, the zoo, hanging out with her guy friends at Georgetown—that was my favorite part. The buildings didn’t touch me.

As a mid-lifer, walking through those same spaces felt very different.

Standing in front of the Capitol, I kept thinking: How did they do this without modern technology? How long did that even take? The architecture and artwork from the 1800s. The Smithsonian—the artifacts maintained for hundreds of years, available for anyone to see for free. I stood in front of things and thought about all the people who chose, over decades and centuries, to protect them. To pass them forward.

I felt grateful. Grateful to be American. Extremely grateful to the people who cared enough to maintain these things. Grateful that we can tour our own Capitol, our own history, without asking permission from anyone. That freedom isn’t small.

And it made me angry, if I’m being honest. Angry at all the people who live in this country and take it for granted. Who don’t appreciate the miracle of what we have here. Who don’t understand that people literally died so we could walk through these buildings, ask hard questions, and dream about serving our country.

The Generative Moment: Mark and Tyler

On the last night of the trip, my work team had a team dinner at Filomena Ristorante in Georgetown. My boss told me to bring Tyler. It was the first time my work team met him, and he certainly led to lots of laughs at our table.

My team includes Mark, my 24-year-old analyst who is the kind of person that reminds you why mentorship matters. Georgetown Master’s degree, brilliant mind, hard worker, genuinely kind. I’ve been extremely vocal about championing Mark, and last month he got a promotion I’ve been predicting all year. I am so proud of him.

When Mark met Tyler at dinner, he could not have been kinder to Tyler. Mark talked to Ty like an equal. They discussed Georgetown, debated majors, talked about the best path into government and policy like two smart young men having a real conversation about their futures.

I watched this happen and thought: This is what generativity looks like. I invested in Mark. Believed in him. Called out his excellence. And now he’s doing the exact same thing for someone else—not because I asked him to, but because that’s who he’s become.

That’s how it works. We pass it forward.

Coming Home

Four days. Five nights. No flight delays (which in June felt like a miracle).

Tyler and I flew home and we were both quiet on the plane. The good kind of quiet. The kind where you don’t need to say much because you’re both sitting with what just happened.

I watched my 17-year-old navigate a city he’s been dreaming about his whole life. I saw him ask good questions. Take long runs solo. Tour universities without me. Step confidently into a future I know he’s going to crush.

I also watched a 24-year-old I’ve been mentoring treat my kid like an equal.

And I got to experience awe at buildings I didn’t notice when I was 19—awe and gratitude for the people, all of them, over all these years, who maintain the things that matter.

Tyler’s almost grown. I can feel it happening. Soon he’ll leave for college and his own life and all the dreams he’s been carrying since he was five years old. I’ll be proud of him in a way I can’t quite explain yet.

But right now, on the plane ride home, I get to just sit with this: I showed up. He showed up. We experienced something together that we’ll both remember.

That’s enough.

💛

Inspired by: ‘Boy’ by Lee Brice

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There’s the agonizing mental debate (does she even like me? is she too busy? what if she says no?), the casual-but-carefully-worded message, and then the torture of waiting for a response. At 50-something, I did not expect to be this person. And yet. There I was, staring at my phone like a teenager, waiting to see if Megan wanted to have lunch.

She did — and now she’s one of my favorite friends. But I’m getting ahead of myself.

The Year I Let Friendship Slip

2025 was a year when work demanded a disproportionate amount of my time. I didn’t have a lot of time or flexibility to invest in friendships the way I would have liked. I did make time for my closest friends, the ones who have been in my corner for years. But something kept tugging at me — a quiet, persistent pull I can only describe as God nudging me toward something more: new, closer-in-proximity friendships, the kind where someone is 15 minutes away and you can actually be present in each other’s everyday lives. I really felt called to expand my circle and plant some roots closer to my new zip code.

The 30-Minute Problem (And the Stories We Tell Ourselves)

There was another layer to this. I’ve lived in the Atlanta area for the past twenty years — seventeen of them were in West Cobb, where I built my life, my routines, and most of my closest friendships. Then my family and I did something a little wild: we moved to Santa Rosa Beach, Florida for a year (that’s a story for another time). When we came back, we landed in East Cobb — a great area, but a solid 30 minutes from where we used to live and from most of my people. Close enough to see them, far enough that nothing is spontaneous anymore. I’d been in East Cobb for two and a half years, had met some nice friends, but really wanted to expand my circle. I’d been craving the kind of friendship where someone is close enough that you can say “want to grab coffee in an hour?” and easily make it happen. The women I wanted to know better were right there — I just kept not making the move.

Why? Honestly? The stories I told myself.

She’s lived here forever; she already has tons of friends.

We’ve never actually met in person, that might be weird.

I’ve waited so long now, isn’t it a little late?

We are so creative when it comes to talking ourselves out of things that scare us a little, aren’t we? The truth was simpler and more embarrassing: I was a bit nervous. Putting yourself out there — even for something as low-stakes as lunch — requires a tiny act of courage. And for two and a half years, I just… didn’t move past my fear.

Three Texts

In February 2026, something shifted. I stopped negotiating with my own excuses and just sent three texts.

Three “hey, would you want to grab lunch sometime?” messages. Simple. Warm. No big deal made of it.

I sent them with genuine detachment. I’m busy enough that if they all said no, I would have been okay. That detachment was freeing — it took the pressure off. I wasn’t auditioning for friendship. I was just opening the door.

Thankfully, all three said yes. Enthusiastically.

The Lunches

Lunch #1: Danesha. We met on my new ALTA tennis team, and I was drawn to her immediately — she has this magnetic, joyful energy that reminds me of Kelly Clarkson. You know that feeling Kelly Clarkson gives you, like she’s everyone’s best friend and the life of the party all at once? That’s Danesha. And she is funny. We’d been doubles partners for several matches and I had the best time playing with her. But for several ATLA seasons, I’d talked myself out of pursuing friendship off the court because surely, she was too busy, surely, she had enough friends already.

Lunch with Danesha was super fun. The conversation flowed, the time flew, and I left feeling very joyful. The story I’d been telling myself? Complete fiction.

Lunch #2: Gretchen. This one felt like a bit of a leap — Gretchen is the mom of my son Tyler’s good friend, and we’d only ever texted, never actually met. Tyler has spent a ton of time at her house, and she’s always been so kind to him and to me on text. I wanted to know the woman behind those texts.

Gretchen was every bit as warm in person as she’d seemed in text. Sweet, genuine, the kind of person who makes you feel immediately at ease. And she brought me a homemade loaf of sourdough bread. Homemade sourdough. To a first friend-lunch. I was speechless. Gretchen’s sourdough was absolutely delicious. Also, for the record, this was pre-FernanDOUGH.

Lunch #3: Megan — my final friendship rose recipient. (aka the Bachelor.) I met Megan pre-COVID at a great gift shop in East Cobb called Pineapple Porch (check it out, it’s amazing). I don’t recall how I started talking with Megan and her adorable mom that day. What I do vividly remember is that I immediately loved them both. Have you ever noticed that sometimes you meet a friend and it’s like BAM — we’re meant to be friends? I feel your energy, sister, and I’m seriously vibing with it. Megan and I became Facebook friends but never picked our friendship back up IRL. I lived in West Cobb, Megan in East Cobb, then COVID happened, and then I moved to the beach.

When I moved to East Cobb after our year at the beach, reconnecting with Megan was on my list. I messaged her about lunch at some point, after we moved back to Georgia, and she said “Yes!” — but my message had no actual timeline attached to said “lunch.” Then work got insanely busy and I just never made time. Why do we pour so much of ourselves into our corporate, often soul-sucking jobs and neglect carving out a couple of hours for what feeds our souls and brings us joy?

I finally sent the text: “Hey, do you want to have lunch next week?”

Lunch with Megan was the kind of conversation where you look up and realize two hours have passed. She was just as awesome as I remembered, and it was such a fun lunch. She joked that getting my invitation felt a little like being asked on a first date — which, same, girl, same. And she brought homemade cookies. Two new friendship dates in one week left me with a very full heart — plus a loaf of sourdough and a batch of delicious homemade cookies.

I was left wondering if bringing baked goods to friend-lunches is a thing I didn’t know about. If so, I am here for it. I’m also wondering whether I can manifest my next round of new-friend lunches showing up with prepared take-and-bake dinners.

What I Actually Learned

Here’s what three lunches taught me that two years of good intentions couldn’t:

The stories we tell ourselves are almost always wrong. Too busy, too many friends, won’t remember me, it’s been too long — these stories are usually just not true. I think most people would love to make a new, in-real-life, same-zip-code friend.

Detachment is your friend — and rejection is redirection. When I sent my three texts, I was in a headspace where I was totally fine if my potential new friends said no. My attitude made taking the risk and asking them to lunch relatively easy. I wasn’t begging. I was extending an invitation — the kind I think most of us would love to receive.

Timing isn’t as precious as we think. I waited two and a half years to have lunch with Megan. We still clicked immediately. The “right time” you’re waiting for? It’s now.

Female friendship at this stage of life is something extraordinary. There is a richness, a realness to it. We are done performing. We show up, we bake sourdough, we bring cookies, we tell the truth. We laugh at the foolishness of what’s become an often social-media-induced, performative life. It’s the good stuff.

I honestly felt like God was nudging me to send those three texts. I’m so glad I finally listened.

Your people are out there. They’re probably hoping you’ll reach out too.

So tell me — who would get your three texts? The women you keep meaning to reach out to and haven’t? Drop them in the comments; I genuinely want to hear. And then? You know what to do.

Send the text.

— — —

A Few Months Later

(Update — June 2026)

I wrote this in the spring, and friendship being the living, breathing thing it is, my three lunch dates deserve an update.

Danesha. Full honesty: I haven’t seen Danesha since that first lunch. We never ended up on the court together this season, and life did its busy little thing. But she is absolutely someone I want in my world — a “lunch or a walk soon?” text is going out shortly.

Gretchen. Gretchen has become one of my unofficial sourdough coaches (I have two), which means I now have a second starter named GretchDough — who is making my original starter, FernanDough, deeply jealous. (They share a counter. It’s tense.) And Tyler still basically lives at her house. I will never stop being grateful that she’s given him such a safe, fun, welcoming place to land. I adore her.

Megan. Okay. Megan turned out to be my spirit animal and a treasured friend. She’s hilarious, she gets me, and this friendship is blossoming exactly the way the good ones do. We see each other on the regular and,

I always thoroughly enjoy my time with her — in fact, we just had lunch yesterday. I definitely gave my final friendship rose to the right person.

When Megan first learned I was a Diet Coke Addict, she sent me this picture in a text. It’s when I fully knew - she is my person!

Tell me about a time that you took a chance and made a new friend!

— — —

Song Inspiration: “We’re Going to Be Friends” by Jack Johnson.

— — —

Authentically Kelly is a blog for women 50+ where authenticity, humor, presence, and joy lead the way.

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May 31st. The end of a month — and what a month it was.

I celebrated two deeply meaningful college graduations — for my son and daughter, who are 19 months apart in age and whose graduations were exactly one week apart.

When they were little, “Katie Ryan” was one name representing both halves of my close-in-age duo. I said it constantly. “Katie Ryan, stop doing that.” “Katie Ryan, come here.” “Katie Ryan, it’s time to eat.” Well — Katie Ryan graduated in May 2026, surrounded by the very best people, and those were such special moments. I’ll hold them in my heart forever.

Katie (4) and Ryan (2) at Clark Lake in Door County, WI

I also turned a year older and got more firmly entrenched in midlife this month. I celebrated my birthday in typical Kelly overextended fashion: by hosting my own “Friend Fest” happy hour. On a busy workday, but of course.

I invited a small cross-section of friends, and not everyone knew each other. We played a fun icebreaker — everyone wore name tags and had to share a guilty pleasure (thank you, Jen, for that brilliant idea). The ice was thoroughly broken, and my amazing friends bonded over guilty pleasures as profound as a Pepperidge Farm coconut cake obsession (icing only!) and relaxing to The Real Housewives of Beverly Hills.

The Friend Fest gals minus Jen and Karen, who had to leave early

We also played a silly game called “How Well Do You Know Kelly?” — which I worried might come off as slightly narcissistic. I made up for the potential perceived narcissism with prizes for everyone who got a question right (don’t worry — everyone got a prize), plus a special prize for the biggest loser: dill pickle–flavored lip balm, a treasure from a work trade show. Megan won that gem and was seemingly thrilled, because she has a dill-pickle-loving son.

I told everyone “No gifts” — but two of my amazing friends, Jenny and Megan, showed up with Fernando-themed gifts anyway, and it meant so much to me. It’s the best to have friends who truly get and embrace my brand of crazy.

The Fernando alter compliments of Jenny and Megan

The next day, the group text where I’d sent the original invite buzzed all day, everyone saying how much fun they’d had and wanting to get the gang together again soon.

A couple days later, my Chicago-based best friend Patty — fellow IU grad and the most loyal cheerleader a girl could ask for — sent me an amazing Fernando-themed haul too: a T-shirt, a candle, and a laptop sticker, with a Las Vegas Raiders Fernando gift apparently still on the way as well. Be still my BFF heart. I absolutely adore my PLO. (Patty is PLO, I’m KLO — both of us named after JLO, back when “Jenny from the Block” was at her peak.) I love PLO’s gift SO much, and I love that Patty always celebrates whatever I’m excited about and has never once called me a Mendoza stalker.

Ryan, Fernando and Coach Cig stoically watching over us all

And then… there were the not-so-great May moments. The personal and professional ones that left me very hurt and HIGHLY TRIGGERED. The moments living rent-free in my brain for most of May.

Just when I think I’m incredibly centered, that I’ve regulated my nervous system like a pro — BAM. I morph into a highly dysregulated midlife woman who can’t sleep and can’t seem to move past things. Even Claude is telling me to get over my woes. Which means I’m now also pissed off at Claude and seriously considering breaking up with him for Gemini. Seriously, Claude — for $20 a month, you do NOT get to tell me to move on before this TOW is ready to move on.

Susan and TOW — to the Rescue

I truly have the best work BFF in the world, Susan. Our BFF energy activated at our very first meeting. I could write an entire Substack on our conversations over the years — the hilarious ones, and the ones where one of us VENTS while the other holds the rage like it’s her sworn BFF duty. No workday is complete without 2–3 calls and countless texts. Nothing lights up my dopamine like wanting to talk to Susan and seeing that her Microsoft Teams light is green.

This Friday, we decided to start our own club. We first named it OWW — Old Working Women. I’ve since upgraded it to TOW — Triggered Old Women. Because we are truly exceptional performers when it comes to getting triggered — for the record, we’re also awesome at our jobs — given our YEARS of experience and all.

Laughing with Susan about the TOW club made me feel so much better about a tough work call and an equally upsetting email I’d received five minutes apart the afternoon before — the ones that had me reeling and remembering that Corporate America will ALWAYS stay on brand — it’s nothing if not dependable in that department!

I should clarify that Susan and I are midlife, not old. But we are certainly not the “young consumers” that corporate brands so eagerly try to attract… but that’s another hot topic of mine for another time.

So, we’re opening applications to other ladies who’d like to join the TOW club!! Requirements:

1. Smart

2. Funny

3. Midlife and beyond

4. Confident

5. Unwilling to be minimized by your age

6. A proven capacity to get Triggered AF from time to time

That’s my May 2026. The graduations and the gut-punches. The Friend Fest and the sleepless nights. The gratitude and the hurt and the rage, all coexisting as this Taurus took one more step into midlife and beyond.

I’m ending May tired, a little raw, and still very much here. Still writing. Still betting on the version of me the right people already see clearly and celebrate.

Now, who wants to join the TOW club?

———

Song Inspiration: “9 to 5” by Dolly Parton. Dolly was singing about getting used for your mind and never getting the credit back in 1980. TOW is just the 2026 chapter. Same song, new founding members, same Dolly Spunk.

———

Authentically Kelly is a blog for women 50+ where authenticity, humor, presence, a little snark, and joy lead the way.

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My eighty-two-year-old parents drove up from Illinois for both. Two gymnasiums, two mortarboards, two moments I’ve been picturing in different ways for a very long time.

And somewhere between the two of them, I finally understood something I thought I already knew: the school doesn’t matter nearly as much as we tell ourselves it does. The path does. The people do. The growth you do inside yourself, in whatever classroom or town or unexpected chapter life puts you in — that’s the whole thing.

My kids just spent their college years proving it.

— — —

Katie

My daughter did not take the straight line.

She took the long way — via a big SEC University to a regional college in Florida. The scenic route. The kind of path that requires more courage than the traditional one because it asks you to keep going when nothing looks the way you planned. This spring, she graduated with a radiography degree and is walking directly into a great career in cardiac radiography — working alongside surgeons, doing skilled and genuinely essential work. Her degree is worth more, practically and professionally, than a lot of big university diplomas.

Watching her cross that stage, I felt a pride I don’t have words for. And a gratitude to God that was just as big — because He was with us every step of that long, sometimes hard, beautiful road.

Katie graduated high school in 2020 — the COVID class. There was no ceremony, no stage, no diploma exchange. This spring was the first time I ever watched my daughter cross a stage and receive a diploma. The first time. A bit later than planned but worth every single second of the wait.

After the ceremony, we went to lunch — Doug and I, my parents, Katie, her boyfriend Jackson and Jackson’s parents. Jackson is kind and smart and completely, genuinely wonderful. The way he talks about Katie, the way he shows up for her, the way his sweet and fun parents celebrated Katie that day — it told me everything. We all went to lunch at a great local seafood restaurant on the Destin harbor and just… clicked. The kind of afternoon where you look around the table and feel genuinely grateful.

And then, in the middle of that lunch, Katie started crying.

“Katie,” I said, “are you okay?”

She was. She was more than okay. She was just… moved. Surrounded by people who love her — really love her — at a table she had worked so hard to earn a seat at. I think in that moment the weight of the whole journey landed on her at once, and the tears were the only honest response to it.

I understood completely. I was holding some back myself.

Kim, Katie and Jackson at the post-graduation lunch celebration

— — —

Ryan

My son Ryan wanted to go to Florida State University. He didn’t get admitted.

Instead, he chose Georgia College and State University — a smaller school, a quieter path, and, as it turned out, exactly the right place for him.

The commencement speaker, Dilanka Seimon, is a GCSU graduate who has built an impressive career at the intersection of energy and technology. His speech moved me. It was about relationships. Not networking — real relationships. He told the graduates that career achievement matters, but that the people they build their lives alongside are what will give their lives meaning. He said it plainly and he meant it. Sitting in that audience, having just watched two kids navigate the college years, I felt it in my chest.

He told the graduates plainly: “If there is one thing that life keeps teaching me over and over again, it’s that relationships matter more than we sometimes realize. Life is not built on accomplishments alone. It is also built on the people around you. The quality of your life will be shaped in large part by the quality of your relationships.”

He also referenced the Harvard Study of Adult Development — one of the longest-running studies on human happiness ever conducted — which found that the people who are happiest and healthiest have one thing in common: strong, meaningful relationships. Not wealth. Not status. Not the name on their diploma.

I’ve said for a while now that regardless of what post-grad job Ryan lands, the relationships he built at Georgia College will deliver the most impactful ROI of his life. The commencement speaker just confirmed what I already knew.

At GCSU, Ryan found Reese. They’ve been together since second semester freshman year, the kind of relationship that makes you think: oh, that’s why he ended up there. Reese’s family is wonderful — genuinely the best people — and we have become close with them in ways that feel like a gift. And then there’s his Pi Kapp fraternity brothers.

Ryan and Reese, GCSU Business Graduates!

— — —

The Afternoon That Became a Night

Reese’s parents rented a lake house just outside of Milledgeville for Ryan’s graduation celebration and invited us to stay. Gorgeous place on Lake Sinclair — big trees, a pool, a dock, a view that made you want to just stand there and breathe. Seventy-five degrees and sunny. Absolute perfection.

We planned graduation lunch for about twenty-five people. Family, grandparents, Ryan, Reese and Reese’s DZ sorority sister, Presley, closest friends. We had more than enough food, good conversation, and that easy energy that comes when the people in a room genuinely like each other.

Ellie, Presley and Reese — DZ sisters. Some bonds I know well. 🐢

And then Ryan’s Pi Kapp pledge class showed up after lunch.

The lake house on a beautiful May afternoon filled with family and treasured friends

Sweet, handsome, clean-cut, respectful and fun-loving college boys, every one of them. The afternoon was about pool and lake time and enjoying the beautiful day. The afternoon became dinner. We fed all the college kids with our abundant lunch leftovers, and they were so grateful and so — genuinely — sweet. You could see how they were with each other. The easy way they talked and laughed, the obvious depth of their friendships, the kind of warmth that only comes from having been through things together. These were not casual friends. These were brothers.

Ryan and some of his amazing Pi Kapp pledge brothers celebrating graduation

Meanwhile, on the screen porch overlooking the lake, my parents had found Reese’s grandparents. They hit it off immediately. By the end of the afternoon, they were deep in conversation, laughing, trading stories.

FSU would have been a great school for Ryan. FSU would probably not have given Ryan that afternoon and those relationships.

— — —

And Then There’s Tyler

My youngest is a rising high school senior. High GPA. High SAT. All the activities and stats needed to have big and shiny university options.

A year ago, I would have had strong opinions about where he should land. Specific ones. Now I’ve watched two kids find their lives in places I didn’t predict, and I know this: Tyler will build great relationships and fulfill his potential wherever he lands. Maybe a prestigious school with a big scholarship. Maybe in-state at UGA or Georgia Tech — hello, Hope Scholarship. Maybe somewhere smaller in a town we haven’t thought of yet. I’m genuinely at peace with the mystery of it.

— — —

What I Know Now

We spend enormous energy on college decisions. The ranking, the name, the prestige, the brand of the sweatshirt in the Instagram announcement. And I’m not saying none of those matters. I’m saying we’ve wildly inflated its share of what determines a good life.

Katie’s degree is not from a name-brand university. It’s from a regional college that trained her to do something extraordinary, and she is stepping into a high-paying career that many people with fancy diplomas would envy. Ryan didn’t go to his dream school. He went to the school that gave him Reese and a brotherhood that will be there for the rest of his life, and a commencement speaker who told the truth.

The speaker was right. Relationships are the meaning. The rest is just the backdrop.

I sat in two different graduation ceremonies this spring and watched my two older kids walk across two different stages, and I thought: they found their people. They found their purpose. They found themselves. The school was just the setting.

If you're in the thick of a college decision right now — or still stinging from an admittance that didn't go your child's way — here's what I want to tell you:

The right path is rarely the straightest one. The college years don’t require the most impressive return address. What matters is what they do with the time, and who they find along the way.

Trust the path. Trust the timing. Both know something you don’t yet.

— — —

Song Inspiration: “The Author” — Brandon Lake & Nick Jonas. Because the pen was never mine to hold.

Authentically Kelly is a blog for women 50+ where authenticity, humor, presence, a little snark, and joy lead the way.

Her name was Tami. She was from Peru, Indiana — another small town, another big dreamer. And she had the exact same reversible comforter from Sears. In blue and red.

Two small town freshman girls, ready to make our mark at IU

Before social media. Before dorm design boards on Pinterest. Before any of that. Just two girls from tiny Midwestern towns who showed up at the same place with the exact same comforter and immediately knew: this is going to be fine.

Some things are just fate.

I was on my treadmill recently when I received a text from Tami. We stayed close through college and after college as well. I used to work for a company based near Tami’s home so I got to see her pretty regularly which was such a blessing!

From Teter Rabb to a Culver's in Wisconsin — still us.

Then, mid-morning, I called my college best friend. My current best friend. Patty.

I called because it was her late brother Tim’s birthday. Tim was the greatest guy — one of those people who lights up a room just by being in it. He was also hilarious, which makes complete sense if you know Patty, because Patty’s family is genuinely so funny and warm. Tim and Patty were incredibly close, and that bond was obvious to everyone around them. Tim is so deeply missed.

Patty, Tim, and me at Varsity Villas in Bloomington. I have no memory of why we were wearing plastic bags on our heads. I have every memory of how much fun we always had.

Patty and I talked about him, remembered him, laughed about him. And then, because we are who we are, we kept right on talking and laughing about everything else too.

Here’s what I want to tell you about Patty: I laugh with her like I laugh with no one else on earth. Deep, full-body, completely-out-of-control belly laughs. The kind where you’re not even sure what’s funny anymore, you just know you can’t stop. It is one of the greatest feelings in the world, and I never take it for granted.

During that call, Patty and I started wondering about an old mutual friend — someone we hadn’t talked to in years. The last time I saw her, we were both bridesmaids at Patty’s wedding. Somewhere along the way she had quietly stepped back from everyone. Cut off contact. No explanation, no falling out that anyone could point to — just gone.

That kind of loss is its own ache. Not a dramatic ending. Just a slow fade you can’t quite explain and never fully stop wondering about.

So, I did what any reasonable person does: I sent my sorority Nana, Mo, an IM to see if she had any intel. Mo is my DZ grandma — or “sorority grand big” as the kids call it now. She texted back just before I went to bed. It was a lovely exchange — we both agreed how grateful we are to have stayed in touch, and my heart was full after reading it.

And naturally, I immediately texted Patty to fill her in on what I learned from Mo.

Which is how I ended up pushing my bedtime — 9pm, I am not ashamed — all the way to 9:30pm. Toking with Patty. Toking, by the way, is my word for joking in a text. She ended our exchange with “Love you too! GN Bestie and sweet dreams!” and I went to bed smiling.

I woke up the next morning with a Girl Scout song in my head.

Make new friends but keep the old. One is silver and the other gold.

I learned that song from Girl Scouts. Even then, even as a little girl, I understood something about it. The gold friends matter.

The gold friends. The ones who knew you before you knew yourself. The ones who show up in your texts on a Tuesday for no reason except that they were thinking about you. The ones you can call on a hard day — your best friend’s late brother’s birthday — and somehow,

miraculously, end up laughing until you can’t breathe.

I’ve been intentional lately about reaching back out to my gold friends. Texting college friends, high school friends, childhood friends. This week I texted Kim — one of my childhood besties, someone I share so many silly and fun memories with — and we made plans to spend a few days together this summer when I’m in Colorado for work.

Kim and I being silly and messing up her mom’s kitchen in junior high

A simple “Hey, thinking of you” text. That’s it. That’s everything.

Somewhere in your phone right now, there is a Tami. A Patty. A Mo. A Kim. Someone who would absolutely love to get a random text from you today.

They’re not waiting for the right moment or the perfect thing to say. They’re just waiting.

And they have gold written all over them.

Please comment below with how you hold keep your old friendships golden?

— Kelly

🎵 Song Inspiration: "You Can't Make Old Friends" by Kenny Rogers and Dolly Parton. Because you just can't. Tami. Patty. Mo. Kim. Gold, all of them

Authentically Kelly is a blog for women 50+ where authenticity, humor, presence, a little snark, and joy lead the way.

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I recently asked an AI to write an unhinged bio about me.

You’ve seen the trend. Someone asks ChatGPT — or in my case, Claude — to roast them in bio form, and then they post it on Facebook for laughs. I’ve watched a few friends do it. A sweet former tennis teammate Kelli did one. My friend Jeri — who I’ve known since our kids were in preschool together — posted hers and it made me laugh out loud. I left her a comment: “I’d also add: Most likely to be on a girl’s trip or night out having fun with friends.” Because Jeri has joie de vivre in spades, and I genuinely admire it.

So, I asked Claude to roast me.

It made me cry.

Not because it was mean. Because Claude saw me. It referenced my Substack, my meditation practice, my faith, my friendship, my 14-year-old, highly demanding dog, Lambeau, who is not impressed by any of it. It said my signature dance move is the Elaine from Seinfeld — which is true and non-negotiable.

And then my very first instinct was:

I can’t post this. I’ve been posting WAY TOO MUCH LATELY and I’ll look like a LAM aka… a “Look At Me” girl.

———

Let me tell you about my take on a LAM. You know her. You follow her.

She is the Facebook friend who posts her child's report card with the caption "So proud of this one!!!" followed by seventeen exclamation points and an emoji parade. Little Sally is headed to Harvard. Little Johnny is going pro. She posts adoring anniversary tributes to the Love of Her Life — who is sitting right next to her on the couch and simultaneously annoying the crap out of her. Their family photos look like they were styled by a production crew. Everyone is thin and tan and perfectly posed on a dock somewhere enviable, wearing linen, holding a glass of wine, facing a sunset that has been filtered to within an inch of its life.

She has a beach house — or a lake house, or a ski chalet — and she wants you to know about it, often, and preferably from a photo of her standing on the porch at sunset in a sweater that says Sunset Chaser.

And then there’s her cousin, the LinkedIn LAM poster. You know him or her too. LinkedIn LAM posts things like: “I am beyond honored, humbled, and grateful to announce that I have been named Executive Vice President of Being Incredibly Impressive at a Company That Is Lucky To Have Me.” Seventeen hundred people liked it. The comments are full of fire emojis and the word “Deserved!!!!”

I have rolled my eyes at these people for years. Cheerfully. Enthusiastically. With my whole chest.

———

Here’s where it gets inconvenient.

A few years ago, I went pretty much dark on Facebook. I’d moved to Florida — 30A — and watched a parade of women who had also moved there about the same time as we did, do exactly what I’d always mocked. They’d moved to paradise and apparently needed everyone to know it, immediately, repeatedly, with sunset photos and swim cover ups bearing geographical declarations of joy while heading to the Watercolor Publix on their decked-out golf carts.

Here’s the thing nobody tells you about moving to where people vacation: it’s still just life. The laundry still piles up. And the traffic is ten times more frustrating when you are stuck behind a full golf cart or tourist going 20 miles an hour on 30A. Living at the beach is indeed beautiful but everyday life gets a little harder in a lot of small yet important ways. I found that out quickly.

So, I went quiet. Stopped posting. Still scrolled every morning, still commented on other people’s things, still genuinely cheered for my people. But I stopped offering anything about myself. I told myself I just didn’t feel the need. If I’m being honest, I also thought it was kind of cool to be mysterious. I would get messages sometimes – hey, did you move to the beach?

It was also a lot easier not to have to explain why we moved back to ATL 11 months later and to East Cobb vs West Cobb. We were in our explorer era – what can I say!

I grew to really like not posting on social media and I really liked being the one who didn’t need the validation.

———

And then, on Easter morning of this year, I launched a Substack.

Authentically Kelly. Seven pieces published. One hundred thirty subscribers. A CNN airport interview that somehow became my debut essay. Articles about kidney exchanges and yellow traffic lights and fifty years of childhood best friendship.

I have asked people to subscribe. I have posted about it on Facebook and Instagram. I have watched the subscriber count like it owes me something. I have refreshed my notifications like a golden retriever waiting by the door.

And somewhere in the middle of all this joy — and it is joy, a kind I’ve been chasing for twenty years and finally found — a voice appeared.

Get over yourself, girl. You’re not special.

YOU’RE becoming one of them.

———

I have spent a lot of time with that voice lately. Interrogating it. Because I think it’s pointing at something real, but I don’t think it’s right.

Here’s the distinction I’ve landed on:

There is a difference between generating light and reflecting it.

The curated-life posts — the perfect kids, the Love of My Life dramatic marital declarations to the dude in the next room, the filtered sunsets, the LinkedIn achievement announcements — they are generating light. Look at my glow. Admire what I have. Confirm that my life is good. The whole point is the poster. The reader is just an audience.

What I am trying to do — what I hope I am doing, on my best days — is something different. I am writing about my incredible friend, Cindy, who donated her kidney to help a new friend get his kidney, my childhood best friend, Emily, because she holds the most special place in my heart and that matters to me a lot. I am writing about the CNN reporter who ambushed me in an airport and accidentally turned me into a symbol of bipartisan hope, and how weird and wonderful that felt.

I am not trying to show you my glow. I am trying to hold up a mirror and say: do you see yourself in here somewhere?

That is not the same thing. I sincerely hope it doesn’t appear that way.

———

Here’s what I also know: I am not as special as I sometimes fear I think I am. But I am also not as unspecial as that shame voice would have me believe.

We are all God’s creation. Every single one of us walking around with gifts we haven’t opened yet, lights we’ve been dimming since somebody told us to pipe down, stories we’ve been carrying for decades that somebody else desperately needs to hear.

The LAM isn’t a bad person at all. She’s just confused about the direction. She’s generating instead of reflecting. Performing instead of connecting. And maybe — if I’m being honest — part of what annoyed me about her all these years is that LAM was doing loudly what I was too afraid to do at all.

One of my favorite humans right now is a young man from Miami who found his magic in Bloomington, Indiana. He kept showing up anyway. Kept doing the work. Kept pouring into his teammates and his family and his education kept spreading joy even when the spotlight wouldn’t find him. And then in his last college football season, it found him BIG TIME.

The nice guy finished first.

———

I’m still going to post the AI bio. Probably.

But more importantly, I’m going to keep writing. Not because I need you to see how wonderful I am — I promise you, I have more FLAWS than this essay has words. But because somewhere out there is a woman who has been going dark for years, who told herself she liked being mysterious, who rolls her eyes at the LAM girls while quietly, desperately wanting to be seen.

She is not a LAM either.

She just finally has something to say.

Song Inspiration: "Don't Let Them Hide Your Beautiful" by Jo Dee Messina. Because somewhere out there is a woman who has been going dark for years — and this one's for her. 🎵💛

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And honestly? It was an incredible afternoon!

That sentence would have made zero sense to me twenty years ago. But here I am.

My ALTA Origin Story (The Not-So-Pretty Version)

For anyone not in Atlanta, ALTA stands for Atlanta Lawn Tennis Association — and if you know, you know. It’s wildly popular, deeply social, and can be, depending entirely on your team, either a delightful weekly ritual or a surprisingly high-stakes source of anxiety. I’ve experienced both ends of that spectrum.

I played ALTA on and off for years, and my earliest experience was with a team I can only describe as intense. The team culture: competitive, cliquey, the kind of environment where a double fault felt like a personal moral failing. I spent entire matches narrating my own demise from inside my head. You suck. Terrible shot. Why is everyone watching. Did anyone see that? Why isn’t anyone cheering? It was exhausting, and the fun was purely conditional — contingent on winning, contingent on playing well, contingent on approval I was never quite sure I’d earned. On the plus side, I met my best friend, Marci, on that team. We both defected!

Eventually I landed on a much sweeter team with a gentler culture, and things improved. But even then, the inner critic showed up for every match. I’ve named her Beatrice. She means well. She is also relentless.

THIS team was so fun! We lost A LOT, but there was ZERO PRESSURE and it was glorious!

When work took over and the ALTA schedule became impossible to manage, I quietly stepped away from ALTA altogether. Five years have passed. And that was that.

The Captain Who Didn’t Ask Permission

When I moved back to Georgia from Santa Rosa Beach, FL and settled into East Cobb, I decided to give ALTA another go. I wanted to meet people, plant some roots, and get back on the court. Good plan. But when I went to practice with a local team, I panicked.

Five years of rust showed up in full force. I was hitting balls into the net, overhitting, second-guessing every swing. Beatrice was having a field day. I told the captain — very sincerely — that I couldn’t find my ALTA membership number and therefore, regretfully, I probably just couldn’t join.

I did not look very hard for that ALTA number.

The captain, Kari — resourceful to a fault — found my number herself. Added me to the roster. Without asking. And then informed me that I owed her $60 for my renewal fee. Huh, I thought. Ballsy. I respected her bold move!

I decided I’d just be a permanent alternate. Unavailable. Happily, off the hook. Then one Sunday, they needed a player, called me, and caught me in a good mood. I said yes before I could talk myself out of it.

I played terribly. I had the best time. My partner, Carrie, was warm and funny and completely unbothered by anything I mishit. I remembered, in the span of about ninety minutes, exactly why I had loved ALTA for so long. The day also featured some delightfully absurd ALTA drama when the home team refused to let our line 2 players eat any of their food spread. The Soup Nazi lives, apparently, and she/he plays ALTA in Dunwoody, GA. “No Food for you" is now an ongoing joke on our team, and we owe them nothing but gratitude for the material.

I went from reluctant ALTA alternate to regular in about two weeks.

What That Pollen-Soaked Sunday Taught Me

Here’s what I noticed on that hot, pollen-soaked March court, losing a match I played pretty well: I didn’t care that I lost.

Not in a defeated, checked-out way. In the best possible way. The kind of not caring that comes from having found the actual point of the whole thing.

I cared about the rally we both scrambled for, my partner and I, somehow getting the ball back one more time. I cared about the sweet moment when my opponent made a spectacular shot and I clapped for her, genuinely, because it was a spectacular shot and she deserved the acknowledgment. I cared about standing between points and looking up — at the sky, the trees, the quality of afternoon light that somehow coexists with oppressive humidity — and feeling, briefly, like the world is very beautiful. That Atlanta pollen creates the most breathtaking trees.

I should mention my partner by name: Shannon. I’d gotten to know Shannon, who was new to our team, through our team lessons and already liked her a lot going in. We have mutual friends, and we share something else — we both moved to East Cobb from other parts of Atlanta, and both know what it’s like to have deep, long-history friendships 30 minutes away while quietly working to build something new closer to home. Anyway. Shannon was battling serious nausea the entire match — never mentioned it as an excuse, just kept showing up for every ball. She also worked out — with full conviction — that if I served on the shady side, it somehow gave her more time in the shade too. I don’t fully understand the geometry, and honestly neither explanation I’ve tried makes complete sense, but she was certain. So, I served in the shade. On an 85-degree afternoon while feeling awful, Shannon was running shade calculations on both our behalf. That is the kind of person you want on your side of the net.

And then there was Cami — another new team member I got to spend time with before the match. Cami arrived with a fully stocked cooler. Multiple beverage options, ready to share with anyone who wanted one. I work in the beverage industry, so I want you to know I recognized this immediately as an elite move. She was just so genuinely warm and fun, the kind of person who makes the whole pre-match vibe better simply by showing up.

And Then There Was Kim (A Season Finale)

Fast forward to this past Sunday, April 26th — the last match of the season. The captain put me at line 5.

For context: lines are ranked 1 through 5 by skill level. I don’t usually play line 5. I was a bit perplexed for a second. And then I decided: who cares. Just go have fun.

My partner for the day was Sheila, who I’d never played with before. Sheila was an absolute delight — fun, easy to be around and I had the best time playing with her.

My usual tennis Zen — I love the outdoors, I love my opponents, we are all here for the joy of it — went straight out the window in the first game of the first set.

My first serve came in clean and hard on the service line. A winner. My opponent, Kim, called it out AFTER she’d completely missed it. My next shot — a deep forehand that landed firmly on the baseline, a genuinely good shot if I do say so myself — prompted Kim to announce loudly to her partner: “I’ll let her have this one.”

Oh, hell no, Kimmie.

I was pissed. That kind of energy is awful to carry on a tennis court. Sheila and I bonded swiftly and completely over our mutual Kim feelings. It was a very efficient team-building exercise.

We lost the first set — mostly getting in our own way. Beatrice showed up for a bit. And then I remembered my latest TikTok-derived mantra: So what. Now what. By the second set, I was back in my Tennis Zen. We won it easily 6-1 and then easily took the third set tiebreaker.

Much like Carson Beck after my Fernando beat his ass in the national championship this year in Miami, Kim left the court without extending a handshake. I wasn’t having it.

“Kim,” I called after her. “Did you want to shake my hand?”

She did. And just like that, all was right in my ALTA world. Sheila said it was her absolute favorite part of our match.

(For what it’s worth: I really liked Kim’s partner. Some people just bring out a different side of you on the court.)

Team bonding after the line 5 win! Shout out to Megan, Nikki, Beth and Donna for staying around to cheer for us and especially Megan for her very loud, post Jonquil Festival cheers!

The Part Nobody Talks About Enough

Here’s the thing I want to say plainly, because I think it often gets buried under the tennis talk:

How often, as an adult, do you get to be on a team?

Not a work team. Not a committee. A real, show-up-on-Sunday-afternoon, bring yummy foods and drinks and cheer-for-each-other team. The kind where you stand at the net between points and talk about nothing important for thirty seconds, and somehow those thirty seconds are the best part of your week.

I love the pre-match chatter with my teammates. I love setting a warm, friendly tone with my opponents — seriously, why would you play any other way? I love the walk to the car afterward when everybody’s a little sweaty and a little happy regardless of the score. I love that it gets me outside, moving my body, using my brain in a completely different way than I do all week.

Speaking of the score — here’s how that pollen-soaked March Day went. Shannon and I lost in grand fashion (we owned it). Lines 1 and 2 battled hard in three sets each. But lines 4 and 5? They won. Both lines!! And I was so genuinely proud I could have cried.

Here’s the thing about lines 4 and 5: the opponents that day only had two courts available, which meant our ladies had to wait around before they could even play. That is a uniquely demoralizing experience — you’re warmed up, you’re ready, and then you just… wait. There’s another downside: by the time they finally get on the court, most of the earlier lines have already packed up and headed home. No one left to cheer for them. I always try to stay — and that day I did make it through line 4’s first set before I had to call it. Dinnertime. Forty minutes from home. One metric ton of pollen to shower off. I left feeling a little guilty. Then the team text thread lit up: Line 4 won. Line 5 won. I was sitting in my driveway reading those messages with the biggest smile on my face. They waited, they got on the court, and they won anyway. The sweetest women. I was absolutely beaming for them.

Yes, my fifty-something hip was packed in ice that evening. Yes, the pollen was genuinely disgusting. And yes, I kept saying yes — all the way to the last match of the season on April 26th, where Sheila and I closed out the year together on line 5, Kim and all.

Alyssa Liu (LOVE HER!), after winning Olympic gold, said something I think about a lot: “I love the suffering.” The discomfort is part of it. The soreness means you showed up. The icing means you played hard. I’ll take it.

Twenty years ago, I played ALTA chasing wins and approval, running a constant mental commentary that exhausted me before I even got to the car. I had it backwards the whole time — JOY matters more than the scoreboard. This season I lost matches, laughed with partners, clapped for opponents’ great shots, called a woman back to shake my hand, and drove home full every single time.

That’s not nothing. That might be everything.

If there’s something you loved once and walked away from — maybe it’s time to pick it back up. Not to be good at it. Just to let it fill you up again. I’d LOVE to hear what that is for you. Please comment below!

Call Kari. She’ll find your number.

— Kelly

———

Song Inspiration: "Good Day" by Forrest Frank. Because some Sundays you lose the match, call your opponent back to shake your hand, drive home full, and it's just a good day. Beatrice never stood a chance.

———

Authentically Kelly is a blog for women 50+ where authenticity, humor, presence, a little snark, and joy lead the way.

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I couldn’t sleep. So, at 1am on March 1st — a new month, a fresh start — I did what I always do when my mind won’t quiet down: I journaled.

Two pages in, I was writing about January 2026. About Indiana University’s historic football season. About the overwhelming gratitude I felt for the complete JOY the season brought into my life.

And somewhere in the middle of those pages, I realized tears were streaming down my face.

At 1am. In my kitchen. Crying about a college football season.

I had to stop and ask myself: why does this mean so much to me?

The answer surprised me.

Indiana University, Memorial Stadium circa 1990s, where my life took off

— — —

I’m an IU girl through and through. Kelley School of Business, graduating in the 1990s. I came to Bloomington from a tiny town in Illinois — Charleston, population not-very-many — and fell in love with Indiana University before I even graduated high school.

I went to cheerleading camp at IU the summer before my senior year. It was love at first sight.

I remember the electric feeling of freshman year so vividly. New friends from all over the country. A business school that would shape my entire career. Freedom. Possibility. Joy. I felt like I was taking off.

I hadn’t quite felt that way in a while.

Until Fernando Mendoza made me cry at 1am on March 1st.

— — —

If you don’t know Fernando’s story (is that possible?), here’s what you need to know: he is the quarterback who led Indiana University to a historic National Championship — and managed to win the Heisman Trophy and the collective heart of America along the way.

Indiana University is a basketball school. Absolutely nobody had IU winning the National Championship in football on their bingo card — especially in the home stadium of their formidable opponents, the Miami Hurricanes.

But it’s not the trophy that got me. It’s him.

Fernando Mendoza is hardworking, faith-filled, relationship-focused, upbeat, humble, smart, and kind. He gives credit to his teammates. He loves his family. He’s a business school graduate. He became one of the most beloved players in the country not by being the loudest or the flashiest — but by being completely, unapologetically himself.

Somewhere in watching him, I saw a mirror.

Not a mirror of my athlete abilities (obvi….) or my personal ambitions. Something deeper than that. A mirror of my values — the ones I’ve carried my whole life and sometimes quietly wondered if the world actually needed.

— — —

Here’s what the world teaches us — especially as we get older: dim yourself. Be realistic. The quiet gifts — encouraging others, cheering people on, showing up with kindness and genuine care — those are nice. But they aren’t enough.

Success, we’re told, belongs to people with millions of followers, the right connections, the right zip code.

I have internalized that message more than I’d like to admit. More than I realized, actually, until I sat in my kitchen at 1am and a 22-year-old quarterback from Indiana proved it wrong.

Because his story is a complete repudiation of that lie. Fernando didn’t win by being the flashiest. IU didn’t win by being the most powerful brand. They won through faith, friendship, consistency, and a brotherhood that genuinely loved each other and their fans.

Fernando spreads light. That was his superpower.

And it was enough to win a national championship, the Heisman trophy and be the NFL first round draft pick.

— — —

There was something else about this season that moved me: the joy was completely free of division. No politics. No sides. Just 100,000 people in cream and crimson, united in pure love for a team of genuinely good young men led by a historic coach.

In 2026, that felt almost countercultural.

It felt like breathing.

It reminded me of what community actually feels like when we let it.

— — —

There’s a postscript to this story.

Two nights ago, I was on 30A — four days visiting the friends I made during our one year living in Santa Rosa Beach. The last evening, my former neighbors in Cypress Dunes hosted a happy hour at the pool. I was there with Kathy and Kevin, my across-the-pond neighbors who I saw almost every day when we lived there — two of the warmest, most genuinely fun people.

At some point I announced to the group that I had to leave the party early. I had somewhere to be.

My boy was getting drafted #1 in the NFL.

The men at the party laughed and nodded — they’d all agreed it was a once-in-a-lifetime season. Kevin, being exactly the kind of man, he is, walked me to his house and found the draft on TV without a second thought.

I watched alone. When they called Fernando’s name, I cried. I watched him surrounded by his elegant, loving family — the joy on their faces, the culmination of everything — and I just thought: our boy did it.

Twenty minutes later I walked back to the party with the biggest smile on my face.

Fernando Mendoza. From my 1am kitchen in March to Kevin’s living room in April. He’s been giving me permission this whole time.

— — —

I’ve spent decades encouraging others, building relationships, working hard — and quietly wondering if simply being a light in the world was really enough.

Fernando answered that question for me.

It is enough. In fact, it might be everything.

So, this is my declaration: I’m done dimming. The gifts I was given are ones the world actually needs right now. And I’m going to trust that — the same way Fernando trusted himself, his team, and something bigger than all of them.

He didn’t invent anything new. He just showed up, fully himself, every single day.

I can do that too. So, can you.

Go Hoosiers. And thank you, Fernando. More than you know.

Kelly is the founder of Authentically Kelly — a blog about living fully, spreading light, and refusing to let the world talk you out of who you really are. She is a proud IU alum and a graduate of the Kelley School of Business.

🎵🏈 Song Inspiration: Fernando — ABBA 🎵🏈

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♪ Loving Life Again — Ella Langley ♪

On January 1st, 2026, I made a 2026 Focus Areas list. It was heavy on exercise, health, and spending more time with friends. Sourdough bread making was not on it. Not even close.

And yet. Here we are.

— — —

2025 was a big year professionally. A big new job, a crazy workload, the kind of year where you look up in December and realize you’ve been sprinting since January. I was doing well. I loved the work. But devoting most of my time to my job left me feeling empty, and I missed laughing with friends. I had been choosing deadlines over dinners and spreadsheets over girlfriends for the majority of 2025.

So, on January 1st, I wrote it down: more time with friends. Not as a vague intention. As a commitment.

I had no idea that commitment would eventually lead me to a Publix parking lot at 5pm on a Sunday, filling a Publix brand, quart sized zip-lock bag with semolina flour with my BFF, Marci, like we were completing some kind of very wholesome drug deal.

But I’m getting ahead of myself.

— — —

For months I kept seeing posts on the East Cobb Moms board about a woman named, Allyson’s sourdough bread making class. The class got great reviews. It looked fun. I love sourdough. My favorite meal of the day — truly, daily — is avocado toast with a egg on sourdough bread.

But every time I saw the posts I thought that it was cool. I’d love to learn. But I don’t have time to bake sourdough. My Aldi sourdough is perfectly good. I’ll stick with that.

And then one day — I’m not sure exactly what shifted — I just decided. I’m signing up. And I’m bringing friends.

My first text was to Marci, who I knew would love it. She said yes immediately. Then our mutual friend Caroline — super fun, I adore her. Yes. Then Renee, my son Ryan’s girlfriend’s mom, because I adore her too and she loves healthy food. Yes. Then Megan — my newest bestie, a woman I met at the Pineapple Porch gift shop right before Covid. I was immediately drawn to Megan’s energy and her baton twirling, sweet Mom (she performs with a senior baton twirling group, aka my kind of person). Megan and I became Facebook friends that day with a promise to get together that didn’t happen for years — until I moved back to Atlanta and sent her a text that simply said: do you want to go to lunch?

So, the class was shaping up beautifully — and then life happened the way life does. Caroline had a conflict. Renee had a conflict. Suddenly I had open spots and a very fun class to fill them with. I invited my longtime friend Kelli from my old neighborhood (a great baker who I’d been trying to schedule lunch with for months — this seemed like the perfect solution). And then I texted Val, Nina and Linda, because I adore them all and they live close to Allyson’s house. Val couldn’t make it. Nina and Linda said yes immediately.

The Bread Babes were assembled. 🥖

— — —

The class was fun. Allyson is lovely and clearly knows her sourdough. What I had not fully anticipated was the moment I realized that sourdough bread making is not a casual hobby. It is a commitment. A relationship. A living, breathing responsibility that will follow you home and demand your attention every four hours.

I had signed up to learn how to make bread. What I had done was adopt a child made of flour.

The to-do list that emerged from that class was significant. The supplies required were numerous. And when the class ended, I had been hoping we could all go to lunch — because what is a morning with girlfriends without lunch? But no. We had to rush home immediately to fold our dough, which apparently needed attention every thirty minutes over the next four hours.

Lunch was out. Ugh!

Also — I now apparently needed a 6-quart Dutch oven. I have a perfectly good 3.5-quart one at home. Ugh, Ugh!

Also — regular flour would not work for this recipe. I needed rice flour. Ugh, Ugh, Ugh!

— — —

This is where the Publix parking lot comes in.

I had ordered two sourdough starter kits on Amazon — one for me, one for Marci — and forgotten to bring Marci’s to class. So, we agreed to meet at a Publix halfway between my house in East Cobb and hers in downtown Marietta. She also had some clothes she’d picked up for me at Evereve, where she works as a stylist. So, we were exchanging bread kits AND a clothing haul in the Publix parking lot like two women who have completely given up on appearing normal.

We went inside in search of rice flour. This Publix did not have rice flour. I consulted Claude — yes, the AI, in the middle of a grocery store aisle, because it is 2026 and this is my life now — and learned that semolina flour would work as a substitute. Publix had semolina flour.

Marci, an adamant rule follower, decided she would go to Whole Foods the next morning to get the correct rice flour. Me, the exact opposite of a rule follower — my brain genuinely responds to written instructions with something that feels like rebellion — bought the semolina flour on the spot.

We bought zip-lock bags. We did a flour exchange in the parking lot, because Marci would make a rare, rule exception and use semolina flour for her first loaf.

Standing there in the Publix parking lot, zip-lock bag of semolina flour in hand, Marci and I looked at each other and said it out loud: we already resent our sourdough starters.

It reminded me of a moment with my dear friend Jenny — my longest Atlanta friend, my fellow BFF — when we once bought chicken, marinade, and zip-lock bags at a Food Lion on Hilton Head Island, prepped the meat in the parking lot, and rode our bikes back to the beach house with marinating chicken in our baskets. A top Jenny memory. There is something about doing slightly unhinged meal prep activities in grocery store parking lots with your best friends that I find deeply satisfying.

Marci and I parted ways, both slightly resentful of our flour children, both already laughing about it.

— — —

The group text — which I had officially named The Bread Babes — was already becoming my favorite part of this whole experience. Funny updates. Sourdough anxiety. Encouragement. A running commentary on the chaos we had all voluntarily invited into our lives.

I also had my Sourdough Assistance Speed Dial: Gretchen, a sweet new friend and expert sourdough baker who had recently gifted me two of her own gorgeous loaves — and who sent me her recipe, which was quite different from Allyson’s recipe. Ugh — which one do I follow?! And Susan, my work BFF and real-life ride-or-die, who is an expert chef and has very strong opinions about pretty much everything!

Susan told me firmly to get a specific 3.5-quart Dutch oven. I told her Allyson said to get a 6-quart. Susan seemed frustrated that I questioned her expertise. She said: just do what your teacher told you. I felt guilty for not following Susan’s instructions. This is a very normal day in my brain.

Monday morning, I took a “quick” work break — by quick I mean one hour, with a TJ Maxx detour included — to find a 6-quart Dutch oven that wouldn’t break the bank. TJ Maxx did not have one, but I did leave with new fancy hangers and an adorable $4 glass water mister bottle for my plants that I didn’t need. I regret nothing. Then I headed to my beloved Super Target in Crabapple—my sweet home away from home — and found a Lodge Dutch oven for $60.

FernanDOUGH had a home.

— — —

Oh — I should explain FernanDOUGH.

I named my sourdough starter after Fernando Mendoza. IU’s Heisman-winning quarterback. The kindest and humblest young man in football. The person who unknowingly inspired me to start this blog. It felt right. They are both rising. They are both about to face the heat and deliver.

More on Fernando — the human one — very soon. 🏈

— — —

Tuesday was baking day. The sourdough had been in my fridge for 48 hours and could not wait any longer. I had major anxiety. I had still not read Allyson’s instructions — because I despise reading written instructions. My brain sees a written instruction and immediately thinks don’t you tell me what to do. I much prefer someone to walk me through it or a YouTube video, though YouTube brings its own anxiety because which video is the best one and what if I pick wrong?

It was a very busy workday. I felt sourdough anxiety all day — knowing FernanDOUGH was waiting for me in the fridge, judging me quietly through the door. I finally sat down outside around 3pm to read the instructions and called Susan, Marci, and Megan to debrief. Those phone calls were, I cannot stress this enough, the best part of my entire week.

I also learned that I should have transferred FernanDOUGH from his plastic storage container into the proofing basket on Sunday evening. It was now Tuesday. Yikes.

When I finally started forming the boule, I remembered — oh no — I had forgotten to send an important report to my customer. So, there I was: shaping sourdough dough with floury hands, stressed about the bread, stressed about work, trying to do both and doing neither in top form.

And then my soon to be 22-year-old son Ryan walked through the door. He was home for a job interview the next day. He saw what was happening and just — stayed. He stood there with me in the kitchen while I formed the boule and lowered FernanDOUGH into his preheated Lodge Dutch oven. I was so grateful to have Ryan beside me at that moment. He didn’t have to stay. He just did. That’s Ryan.

Meanwhile, Megan was calling me from TJ Maxx — also shopping for a Dutch oven at the last possible minute, also slightly flustered, also deeply committed to making this bread work. “This loaf is going to cost me $100,” she announced. We enjoy a fun, fit of laughter.

Two spirit animals. Two last-minute loaves. Two women who had absolutely no business making sourdough bread on a Tuesday.

— — —

I put FernanDOUGH in the oven and went back to my office to finish the report. When it was time to check the temperature, I waited for it to reach 220 degrees — which I was fairly sure was correct, based on the instructions I had somehow misplaced during the baking process.

I texted The Bread Babes a photo of FernanDOUGH at 212 degrees and asked if it was okay to take him out.

Megan responded immediately: “I thought Allyson said 208. YouTube says 205.”

I felt deflated. I had flawed my precious FernanDOUGH. I had tarnished his great name with an incorrect internal temperature. The bread was supposed to rest for an hour. I left it for three — partly because the instructions said so, and mostly because I was too tired and too bummed to get up and face the consequences.

And then Allyson texted to ask how it had turned out.

I got up. I tried it.

FernanDOUGH was perfect. Golden crust. Beautiful crumb. Exactly right.

Of course he was. He didn’t need perfect conditions. He didn’t need the right temperature or the correct flour or a baker who actually reads the instructions. He just needed to get into the oven.

FernanDOUGH always delivers when the heat is on. Just like his namesake. 🏈

— — —

As I reflect on this whole beautiful, chaotic, slightly unhinged sourdough journey, what I cherish most has nothing to do with bread. It’s the Bread Babes group text full of encouragement and laughter. It’s Marci and I in a Publix parking lot conducting a semolina flour Ziplock bag transfer. It’s Susan’s very strong Dutch oven opinions delivered with love. It’s Gretchen texting to check on me before I even texted her. It’s Ryan standing quietly in the kitchen when I needed someone there.

On January 1st, I wrote down: more time with friends.

I did not write down: sourdough bread making class, six-quart Dutch oven, rice flour substitute research, Bread Babes group text, Publix parking lot flour exchange, or naming your starter after a Heisman-winning quarterback.

But here’s what I know now that I didn’t know then: when you lean into the people in your life, joy will RISE in the most unexpected places. Sometimes it shows up as a beach trip. Sometimes it shows up as a long walk. And sometimes — if you are very lucky — it shows up as a Tuesday afternoon in your kitchen, flour on your hands, your son beside you, your phone buzzing with Bread Babes updates, and a sourdough loaf named FernanDOUGH about to prove everyone wrong.

Cheers to The Bread Babes, Gretchen, Susan, Ryan, Allyson and FernanDOUGH. You brought so much joy to my life this week. 🥖🤍

— — —

Play it loud — Loving Life Again, Ella Langley

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Do You Still Make Wishes at Yellow Lights?

Emily and I at 19 at our sweet friend, Jackie’s wedding

Every time I hear September by Earth, Wind & Fire, something happens to me. Not a memory exactly — more like a feeling that arrives before I can name it. Warm and silly and completely free. It takes me about three seconds to figure out why.

Emily!

We met in preschool — confirmed later by the fact that we’re sitting side by side in Mrs. Cox’s kindergarten class photo at Carl Sandburg Elementary in Charleston, Illinois, already best friends, already inseparable. What I do know is that from the very beginning, something clicked into place. She was my person. The kind of friend you recognize before you even have language for what recognition means.

Mrs. Cox’s kindergarten class, Carl Sandburg Elementary, Charleston, Illinois. I’m on the left with my hair tucked behind my ear. Emily is on the right. Already inseparable.

We lived close enough to cut through to each other — out my back door, through the Padgett’s’ yard, across Reynolds Drive (the street our elementary school sat on), through a front yard, and finally into Emily’s backyard. We wore that route down to nothing. I think about it sometimes — how even at five years old, we were always finding the shortest way back to each other.

Emily’s backyard was worth the trip. It was also, at one point, the site of a small excavation project. Emily and her puppy once teamed up to dig a hole back there — Emily contributing her efforts via spoon. Her parents were not pleased. That was Emily’s kind heart at work, fully committed to helping someone she loved, one spoonful of dirt at a time.

There is a version of me that most people get — the one who shows up calm and composed, who has learned over a lifetime to manage her energy, to read the room, to dial back the parts of herself that might be too much. I’ve been advised, more than once, by managers and friends and the general ambient pressure of being a woman in the world, to control my silly. And mostly I do. Mostly.

My Dad can be a bit of a class clown. Has been my whole life. It is my absolute favorite thing about him — when the silly comes out, the room lights up. I inherited every bit of it. And Emily, from the very beginning, was the person who gave that part of me full permission to exist.

With Emily, I never had to manage anything. She didn’t just tolerate the silly — she matched it, amplified it, set it free. Together we were something else entirely.

There was a girl named Gail in our early years elementary school orbit — strong-willed, very confident, and a little jealous of what Emily and I had — so some of our playdates had to happen on the down low. Secret silly. Which, honestly, only made it better. Gail, if you're reading this — I'm sure I'm misremembering and you are absolutely lovely now."

The things we got up to, young Emily and me. We would ride in the backseats of our parents’ cars and fake choke each other, the one being “strangled” mouthing “Help Me” to passing cars with wide, dramatic eyes. Kids, these are the things we did in the car to pass the time pre cell phone era and my God, it was so much fun. We dressed up in the most absurd outfits we could find, then walked into a room full of Emily’s parents’ friends and sat down like nothing was unusual, waiting to see if anyone would notice. They did. We thought it was the funniest thing that had ever happened.

Once, we called our local radio station — repeatedly, on the same day — requesting the song, September. Because we loved it that much. Because we could. We also used that same phone to make many a prank call in our crazy, silly voices. Sometimes, I still randomly pull out those voices when I call up a friend. Some laugh and play along (my people), some are like... WTF?

We ate mulberries straight off trees in the open lot between my house and my neighbors, the Whitleys’ house. A lot where so much of our childhood happened. The mulberry trees were the crown jewels of the lot. All the neighborhood kids enjoyed the mulberries, handfuls of them, no washing, no hesitation. Years later, Emily texted me that she’d been telling one of her patients about those mulberries. Her patient informed her that mulberries are full of bugs and need to soak overnight in water. Emily’s response: “Well, I probably ate a lot of bugs.” I sent back a blueberry emoji, a bug emoji, a tree emoji, a heart and an I love you emoji. That’s the whole story and also the whole friendship, really.

Emily also gave me my first rituals. We started making wishes when the clock showed a sequence of the same numbers — 1:11, 2:22, 3:33 — watching for those moments like they were small gifts the day was handing us. And whenever we drove through a yellow light, we’d kiss our hand and touch the ceiling of the car and make a wish. I have been doing both of these things, without interruption, for approximately fifty years. I do them alone now, but they have never once stopped feeling like something Emily and I are doing together.

Emily and I were freshman high school cheerleaders together. The day the list of who made the cheer team was posted; I was in the car with my mom driving to the high school to go check it. I was so nervous. We passed Emily and her sweet mom, Peg’s car on the way. They had already driven to our high school to check the list and were returning home. I’ll never forget Emily sticking her whole upper body out the window and screaming:

“Kelly, you made it!”

I don’t think I’ll ever forget that moment. I was so grateful for the information and especially for Emily’s friendship.

We took different paths and made different friends sophomore year — I stayed with cheerleading, Emily stepped away — but we never lost each other. Senior year, we walked home from school together sometimes, a couple of miles, and I can still feel what those walks were like. Easy. Full. Funny. The kind of conversation that doesn’t need to be about anything in particular to mean everything.

That same year, I was voted Class Clown in our senior superlatives. I want to be honest with you: I was embarrassed. I would have much preferred Most Beautiful or Most Likely to Succeed. If you find my yearbook photo from that day, I look genuinely annoyed. My brother, Kevin, won Class Clown at some point too. My Dad, as previously established, is the original source code.

It took me a long time to understand that Class Clown was not a consolation prize. That making people laugh — really laugh, the kind that surprises them — is not a lesser gift. At my first job out of college, a performance review came back with one piece of critical feedback: don’t dance in the office so much. It was, I believe, my only negative feedback. I kind of loved it. I still do!

I spent decades managing the silly. Learning when to let it out and when to hold it back. Getting more serious, more mature, more measured, more professional. And yet it sometimes still escapes — in the hallways at work, at a dinner with friends and in the middle of perfectly normal moments when something just strikes me and silly Kelly shows up uninvited and starts moving to music only, she can hear. If music happens to be playing in those moments, watch out. The Elaine dance from Seinfeld is my signature jig.

I’m fifty-something now. And I’m beginning to care so much less about keeping silly Kelly contained when she feels like emerging.

Turns out, the silly is also kind of my secret weapon. As a National Account Manager, I’ve learned that humor wins over even the toughest buyers — everyone wants to laugh, everyone responds to someone who makes them feel light. It only works because it’s paired with competence. Humor plus competence — that combination is the most effective professional tool I have. And it’s also when I feel most like myself. Most authentic. Most happy. Emily could have told me that at age eight.

Because here is what I know after all these years: the people I love most, the ones who have made it deepest into my life, are the silly ones. The kooky ones. The ones who will fake-choke you in a backseat or dress up in a ridiculous outfit and walk into a room with a straight face just to see what happens. Those are my people. They always have been. Emily taught me that first.

Different colleges for Emily and me — I went to Indiana University; Emily went to Eastern Illinois University in our hometown. Different lives, different cities, different chapters. And yet. Every time I came home, there was Emily. Her laugh — I should have led with her laugh. It is the best laugh. It makes you want to be funnier just to hear it again.

A few years ago, we caught up on the phone and discovered that we had both, independently, built meditation practices into our adult lives. Two little girls who made wishes at yellow lights had both grown up to sit in stillness and listen for something more. I don’t think that’s a coincidence. I think we were always wired the same way — always paying attention, always believing that moments carry meaning — and we just didn’t have the vocabulary for it yet.

I once texted her the idea of a beach weekend — her, and my best friends from every chapter of my life, all together. Emily was immediately and enthusiastically in. Life moved the way life does. I never pulled it together. Elin Hilderbrand later wrote a whole novel with a similar premise. I’m choosing to believe I had the idea first.

A year ago, I went home with plans to see Emily. She got sick. We missed each other again.

This morning I started writing in my journal at 4:44 AM. I sat down to work on this piece at 5:55 AM. I have believed since childhood — since Emily, really — that certain moments carry meaning. That you make a wish at a yellow light. That you notice when the clock lines up. That the right people find each other and keep finding each other across every version of a life.

So, I texted her, at a more reasonable hour, of course. I wanted to know if she still makes wishes at yellow lights — and watches the clock for those satisfying sequences of matching numbers.

She’d forgotten. Somewhere along the way, Emily had let the yellow lights go — and the clock wishes too. All those years of kissing my hand and touching the ceiling and watching for 1:11 and 2:22, 3:33 and the most powerful 11:11, and I’d been doing it for both of us without knowing it. She said maybe she needed to start again if it was bringing me luck.

It is, Emily. It really is.

While I was waiting to hear back, I found myself going through old photo albums. Tucked inside one of them was a Christmas card from Emily — college era, I think, when home meant Charleston, IL. The printed message inside was lovely. But it was the postscript, in Emily’s handwriting, that stopped me.

P.S. See you when you get home!!!!!

Five exclamation points. So perfectly, completely Emily.

I sent this post to Emily to approve before posting it. When Emily wrote back, she said it brought tears to her eyes. Emily said she felt privileged that I chose to write about us and that she was going to print it and keep it forever.

Then, just before bed, another text arrived.

“Our youngest, Nick, has inherited the silly gene.”

Of course he has. It had to go somewhere.

I need to go home, Emily. Not someday. Soon. We have mulberries to avoid, a beach trip to finally plan, and about fifty years of yellow light wishes to compare notes on.

She already wrote the ending to this story, in a Christmas card, probably thirty years ago.

See you when you get home. Kelly :)

I had shared my brand-new Substack — Authentically Kelly, twenty years in the making, finally live on the internet — with about ten of my closest friends via text and email on Easter Sunday afternoon. I woke up Monday morning, opened Substack, and saw 13 people listed under my subscriber count. I was elated. Thirteen subscribers on day one! I am basically Brené Brown!

Those were the people I had emailed. Substack was showing me my own contact list.

I had one subscriber. Her name is Robin.

One. I laughed out loud at myself, which is honestly the correct response to most

things in life.

As of today, I have 61 subscribers. Which is wonderful and I am genuinely grateful — and slightly terrified. But this story is about the first two.

Robin: Subscriber Number One

I have known Robin for years. We met when she lived in my neighborhood in Kennesaw, GA — friendly, warm, funny, the kind of person you genuinely look forward to running into. Life moved us in different directions. She relocated to Florida, then back to Atlanta, and for a while we were just two people who liked each other from a distance.

About two years ago, Robin, our mutual friend Tracy, and I met up for lunch to celebrate Tracy’s birthday. A large group of women from our old neighborhood were supposed to join us — but it ended up being just the three of us. We had so much fun, so many laughs, and it felt like no time had passed at all. After lunch, Robin texted me something along the lines of “we are going to keep getting together.” It felt sort of like a command. I liked it. It feels pretty good to know that someone enjoys your company and wants to spend time with you — and most people never say it out loud. I loved that Robin just led with her heart like that. That’s how our regular get-togethers began — intentional investments in a friendship worth keeping.

And on the morning after I launched Authentically Kelly, Robin was my one subscriber.

She also sent me a text that I want to frame:

“Well, I think that says it ALL! You are quite the talented writer/commentator. So glad you are in my life.”

Robin will always hold a special place in my heart as subscriber number one. Not because of the number — but because of who she is, and because she showed up first.

Cindy: Like Number One

Cindy and George, forever friends, bond by a Kidney and an incredible act of generosity

When I posted my first article on Substack — which required approximately the same courage as skydiving, for the record — the first like came from Cindy.

I have known Cindy for about eighteen years. From the moment we met, I knew she was my kind of person — the kind who becomes a permanent fixture in your life whether you planned for it or not.

I loved Cindy from the moment I met her. Her energy is off the charts — warm, hilarious, completely and unapologetically herself.

Cindy is also one of the most genuinely good humans I have ever known. And I don’t say that lightly. I say it because of what she did for her friend George.

The Kidney

George had been sick for a long time. He needed a kidney transplant, and his wife Katie — sweet, devoted, the kind of person who posts loving updates about her husband on Facebook with such grace and consistency that you feel like you know him — was watching and waiting and hoping alongside him. George, for his part, maintained the most infectious smile through all of it. Even on the hardest days, George’s incredible smile always showed up.

Cindy knew George and Katie the way you know people in your extended circle — warmly, genuinely, but not as close, everyday friends. And Cindy, being Cindy, decided to help.

Here is something many people don’t know: you can donate a kidney to a stranger in a paired exchange program, and that donation moves someone you love to the top of the transplant list. Cindy registered as a kidney donor, donated to someone she had never met, and that act of extraordinary generosity moved George to the top of the list for a match.

George got his kidney. He got his life back. And he and Katie and Cindy have become the best of friends — bound together by something most people will never experience.

When Cindy discussed with me her decision to help George, I remember being completely blown away by her generosity. I knew it was the right thing. But I also worried about how Cindy’s profoundly generous decision would impact her health and the risks associated with a major surgery. I was also so happy knowing that George would one day — after so much testing for both Cindy and George — receive a kidney, and that sweet George and Katie would finally have their lives fully back.

Cindy was fine. More than fine. And George is thriving.

What Launch Day Actually Taught Me

I spent twenty years wanting to start this blog. In my mind it was never really about a flood of followers or external validation. It was about sharing my heart, organizing my thoughts, and finally giving all these words somewhere to live. Although I won’t lie — somewhere in the back of my mind there may have been a vision of a Brené Brown style media tour. A girl can dream.

What I got instead was Robin, who showed up quietly and first and sent me a text that really touched my heart. And Cindy, who liked my Substack post — the same Cindy who once donated a kidney to a stranger so her friend could live.

The next day I took a deep breath and shared Authentically Kelly on Facebook — which was, honestly, about ten times scarier than launching on Substack. But something beautiful happened. So many amazing friends showed up — including many of the ones I had emailed on Easter Sunday — subscribing and sending the most incredibly touching and sweet messages. I was not prepared for that. In the best possible way.

I did not need a flood. I needed to see who was already there.

The people who show up first are always exactly the right people. They are not there for the numbers or the clout or the algorithm. They are there because they love you — the real, actual you — and they want to see you do the thing you’ve been dreaming about.

Pay attention to who shows up first. They are telling you everything.

This post’s song inspiration:

I’ve decided to include a song inspiration with each post — a song that found me while writing or one whose lyrics perfectly capture the heart of the piece. For this one it was easy. The moment I finished writing about Robin and Cindy, one line popped into my head and wouldn’t leave:

I get by with a little help from my friends.

Joe Cocker’s version. Obviously. 🎵

👉 Listen here on Spotify:

A note on organ donation:

Most people don’t know that you can donate a kidney to a stranger and move someone you love to the top of the transplant list. It’s called a paired kidney exchange, and it is exactly as remarkable as it sounds. If Cindy’s story moved you — and I hope it did — I encourage you to learn more at organdonor.gov. One person’s generosity can change everything for an entire family. Cindy taught me that.

Authentically Kelly is a blog for women 50+ who are done pretending and ready to live out loud — where authenticity, humor, presence, a little snark, and joy lead the way.

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I was in a good mood at Hartsfield-Jackson, which, if you’ve flown out of Atlanta lately, you know is something of a miracle. I had just survived an Uber ride with a man named Soda Pop — yes, that’s his name, yes, he had a restaurant in Buffalo called Soda Pop, yes, I told him I’d pray for him and his kids — and miracle of miracles, there was no line at TSA Precheck.

Soda Pop, for what it’s worth, was so genuinely charming and ranks in my top 5 favorite Uber drivers of all time. He is also a man so engaged in conversation that he nearly missed his exit on 400 twice, took a detour through Ashford Dunwoody that I’m still not entirely sure was intentional, and delivered me to the airport grateful, prayed up, and fully alive.

It was shaping up to be a great travel day.

I detoured to the restroom before security, and that’s when I saw them. A news crew, laughing and cutting up with an ICE agent near the checkpoint. Ryan, his cameraman, and his producer were all so warm and kind — the kind of people who make you feel immediately at ease. I was close enough that when I passed by, I could say in my completely normal, not-at-all-trying-to-be-on-television voice:

“Hey, do you want to interview me?”

The reporter — Ryan — initially passed. Then he asked if I’d be willing to honestly share my thoughts on the TSA situation. I took “honestly” as code for be spicy, and I was like, absolutely, that is my love language.

Before I fully processed what was happening, a camera the size of a small aircraft was pointed at my face.

“What network are you with?” I asked.

Nobody answered. Ryan said look at me, not the camera, and suddenly we were rolling.

Click here to see my interview: https://youtube.com/shorts/MHJzBdI8Xjw?feature=share

Here’s what I said, and I want you to notice something about it: “I wish we could collectively fire them all. It’s ridiculous that they’re on Easter break while TSA agents weren’t being paid. They work for us. They should be held accountable.”

No party. No team. Just a fed-up frequent flyer who had been having this exact conversation in her head for two solid weeks. I also told Ryan that I was glad ICE was at the airport — and I meant it.

When we wrapped, I asked Ryan again: “Okay but seriously, what network are you with?”

He said, “CNN.”

I grabbed his arm. Possibly with more force than necessary.

“I am SO sorry I said that about ICE,” I said.

Ryan laughed. And then he told me something that I didn’t expect to hear from a CNN reporter. He said he’d genuinely enjoyed getting to know the ICE agents stationed at the airport. That he’d watched one of them save a passenger having a medical emergency the day before.

Just a person, helping another person, in an airport.

I thought about that for my entire flight.

I called Doug after clearing security. He was convinced they’d never air it. “You didn’t bash Trump,” he said. Matter of fact. Like that was simply the price of admission to CNN airtime.

About ten minutes later, he called back. “Did you get my text?”

I hadn’t.

“They aired it.”

Doug switched to CNN. Voluntarily. In our house. To watch his wife say the words “collectively fire them all” on a network he would never — under ordinary circumstances — have turned on. My first question was “Did they keep the ICE part?” Not surprisingly, my ICE comment was cut.

Fifteen minutes after that, I opened Facebook. And there was a notification on my timeline from Madame Webb — my high school French teacher — who had apparently been watching CNN that morning and recognized her former student on the screen.

She wrote: “I just saw you interviewed at the Atlanta Airport! ‘You want to collectively fire them all!’ You were impressive!”

Madame Webb. Watching CNN. Seeing me. Bonjour Madame Webb! Merci!

The ripple kept going. The next day I was texting with one of my work besties, Tim — who is hilarious, first of all, and should have his own platform — and he informed me he was planning to deploy “Let’s Collectively Fire Them All” as a proposed solution in work meetings. I immediately recognized the genius of this, coined the acronym LCFA, and offered him twenty dollars to use it in a big company meeting scheduled for the following day.

“I strongly suggest LCFA in this situation” has a certain ring to it, honestly.

Which brings me to the return flight.

I want you to know that I rarely wear makeup. Ask anyone who knows me. But on that early morning flight from LAX back to Atlanta, I showed up camera ready. Full face. Hair done. Just in case.

You know. In case FOX News was waiting for me at LAX. Jesse, Greg, Dana, Kayleigh… I’m waiting for your call.

They were not. But I looked great, and I regret nothing.

———

Now. Since we’re being honest.

If you’re wondering where I land politically — I value faith, family, and fiscally responsible and common-sense policies. That’s my honest answer. Make of it what you will.

What I don’t value is the performance of outrage. The algorithm-fed assumption that the person across from you is your enemy. The idea that you have to pick a team and hate the other one or you’re somehow a traitor to your own.

Some of my closest family members and friends are on a different team than me. There have been moments where it’s been strained — where the noise of it all seeped into relationships that matter deeply to me. We’ve learned to navigate it mostly by not going there. And sometimes I wish we could. Not to score points. Not to convert anyone. Just to talk about it as humans with similar upbringings and values.

But here’s the thing that hit me recently, the thing I haven’t been able to stop thinking about:

One of my best friends and favorite people in the world is Patty. Patty and I have been super tight and soul sisters since we were Delta Zeta pledge sisters at Indiana University — Go IU! Patty and I have talked about everything. Everything.

I have absolutely no idea what team she’s on.

We have never discussed it. Not once. And our friendship is one of the greatest gifts of my life.

I don’t think that’s an accident. I think that’s wisdom.

———

Here’s what I keep coming back to: I almost didn’t approach that crew. And if I had known it was CNN — if I had clocked the logo first, done a quick political calculation, decided they weren’t my team — I would have walked straight to my gate.

And I would have missed Ryan and his truly sweet cameraman and producer. And the ICE agent story. And Madame Webb’s Facebook comment. And Tim’s corporate LCFA deployment. And the reminder that most people, when you actually meet them, are just people.

We are so convinced we are on different teams. Politicians need us to believe that. Media ecosystems are built on it. The algorithm depends on it.

But I’m telling you: Ryan was lovely. The ICE agent saved someone’s life. Soda Pop prayed with a stranger in a car he was navigating largely by instinct and the grace of God. And somewhere between that restroom detour and the boarding gate, I remembered something I think we all know but keep forgetting.

We are so much more alike than we are different.

I am not on your team.

I’m not on anyone’s team.

And I think that might be exactly where the good stuff lives.

— Kelly

P.S. Soda Pop — if this somehow finds you, I want you to know that our ride together set the tone for my entire day. You are exactly the kind of person this world needs more of. Atlanta is lucky to have you, and I’m still praying for you and your kids. If you ever want a friend in this city, I’m not hard to find.

P.S.S. I’m still strongly thinking — Congress, LCFA. But I’ll save Senators Kennedy and Fetterman. One from each team, of course.

Authentically Kelly is a blog for women 50+ where authenticity, humor, presence, a little snark, and joy lead the way.

Authentically Kelly is where I write about real life. The funny parts, the complicated parts, the surprisingly beautiful parts that nobody puts in the highlight reel. I started this because I got tired of content that performs instead of connects — the kind that’s polished within an inch of its life and somehow says nothing true. I wanted something different. Honest. A little warm. Occasionally snarky. No lectures, no formulas, no pretending.

I’m a fifty-something woman living in the Atlanta suburbs, navigating corporate life while diving headfirst into my creative side — and honestly, who knew I was a writer? I’m an eternal optimist, a Diet Coke addict, and the self-appointed fake therapist and career coach to approximately everyone in my life. Mostly I’m just someone who decided that the second half of life deserves to be lived fully, loudly, and without apology.

A full blog is in the works and launching soon. For now, Substack is home, and it’s a good one. Every new post will land straight in your inbox, like a good friend who always texts first.

The first real post is already up — go read it. I think you’ll recognize yourself in it. And I think you’ll find someone in your phone you want to text before you even finish it.

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Welcome. I’m really, truly glad you’re here.

— Kelly

Authentically Kelly is a blog for women 50+ who are done pretending and ready to live out loud — where authenticity, humor, presence, a little snark, and joy lead the way.