Woman.

Some days ago, this wonderful woman said: 'I'm turning 38... It's kind of scary.'
I had to smile, but didn't say much. (Everybody thinks she's 26... and age is in one's mind, isn't it?)
But yesterday I started to read the book of Lieve Blancquaert and Betty Mellaerts. It is a photobook, but next to that it contains wonderful daily stories.

I had to translate these fragments...

"It started with the question of 2 men, asking me whether I felt like making a book on 10 women. The women could be anyone, from Flanders, or Holland, famous or not. The only thing in common: they had to be 40 or above.
I said yes.

It was said at the beginning: in this book we would choose for women who wake up in the morning and dare to look in the mirror, watch their wrinkles, and read the stories of their life in them. That they laughed, a lot. And cried, and worried. And that with time, there came peace, knowing who they are, and what they want.
And what the world thinks doesn't matter anymore.

Women, always somebodies mother, daughter, lover. But after forty, also and especially: themselves. Vulnerable and strong."

[Textfragment from Betty Mellaert, pictures © by Lieve Blancquaert]