Nothing like a birthday to make us once again come to terms with time's assault on our looks, physique and, most importantly, our precious vanity.

Shame on us, in this culture of youth, for letting lines and wrinkles creep onto our face, that part of ourselves we must put forward to friends, family and strangers -- when we're not hiding behind Facebook -- and that ends up defining us in ways we'd rather not be defined.

I'm not as old as I look!

Birthdays, of course, come with a slew of mixed feelings. On the one hand, we're relieved -- or at least we should be -- to have survived another year. Not everyone makes it this far.

On the other hand, we're appalled that another 12 months have passed and we still haven't written the great American novel or stopped gravity from tugging on our once firm and spotless skin.

A friend of mine once told me -- when we were both in our comely thirties -- that when she looked at older women -- the age we are now -- she wondered why they didn't just kill themselves.

That's back when we thought lines and wrinkles could be kept off our face and extra pounds off our body simply as a matter of will; that women who let themselves look old or even middle-aged had just given up a fight that otherwise could be won.

The good news is that this friend is now -- and she can correct me if I'm wrong -- happier now than she ever was back in those earlier days. As lovely as she was, she couldn't help but think she wasn't. In her 50s, she can finally relax into her life and stop caring so much what other people think. Most of the time.

Mixed feelings.

As an aging character on Six Feet Under once said, "There comes a time in a woman's life when she realizes that she is no longer the youngest and prettiest in the room." That epiphany can either devastate a woman or liberate her.

If we're smart, we'll take the freedom over regret.

The recent passing of Eunice Kennedy Shriver reminded me of how stunning a woman in her late 80s can be -- she was by far the poster girl for graceful aging. Her ever-present smile was one of the keys to keeping her looking vital and vibrant. Age didn't matter.

I like to think that I and my fellow baby boomerettes are ripening rather than aging. And that we won't be fully ripe until we fall off the tree.

Until then, we are just getting juicier, tastier and sweeter.

Some of the best wines for foie gras and dessert are made from grapes that have been on the vine so long they've reached the stage of "noble rot." Only those grapes go into a Sauternes or Gewurtztraminer.

If we ripening gals could just be bottled, we'd cost a fortune and be sipped with care.