There Are No Grown-Ups, a recent collection of essays by the wry and wise best-selling author Pamela Druckerman, is just the thing for those of us who are missing Nora Ephron’s stellar voice. This book offers up Druckerman’s take on life in her 40’s—with musings on how waiters suddenly know to call her Madame instead of Mademoiselle (she lives in France), and what it’s like to honor her husband’s unusual gift request for a big birthday (it involves a certain act, in bed, and not just with the two of them).
Druckerman turns over the changes that happen, such resonant everyday moments as “There’s at least one sport your doctor forbids you 
to play” and “You become impatient while scrolling down to your year of birth” on surveys. Yes, a chunk of the issues she contends with could easily be called first-world problems. But she also deals with deeper issues (disease, frailty) with her honest, self-deprecating eye.
For those of us past our 40s, it’s a read that has us nodding our heads and embracing the new-found freedoms that come with age. And wanting to say to the author, “Just you wait till you turn 50, 60, 70 and beyond.”
– Janet Siroto
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