WHAT NOW?! ANOTHER DAY IN THE LIFE OF A WOMAN OF A CERTAIN AGE!

Did not have the best two days of my life but I did get through it, the throat and swollen lip thing! I’m almost over it now and starting to feel like the normally crazy person that I am. As I sat around moaning and feeling sorry for myself, I thought about how I tell you all to think positive and not to let the little things get you down. So don’t! and that includes me too! There were a lot of good things that came from my “down time”. I got caught up on some reading and writing letters to people I needed to write. You know, even with (or maybe I should say because of) the Internet and emails we get and send, we don’t always take the time to say more than 3 or 4 words. “Hi, how ya doin’?” or “I’m well, you?” There are so many things we just cut short, well, most people cut short. To be perfectly honest, I usually write 4 page letters and I’m sure my friends read the first line or two and say, “Okay, she’s on a roll”, then hit delete. It’s true, I tend to spout philosophically on occasion and it drives my friends crazy I’m sure. I see you nodding your heads. So sue me. Anyway, while I was not feeling all that great, I did the short, “How ya doin’?” stuff that gave all of my best friends a break from the usual long winded stuff and most likely left them totally confused but somewhat happy, even if they won’t admit it. You know, now that I think of it, it was because of those friends I started writing a blog. Guess they figured I would put it all down here and they could read it at their leisure, not a bad idea actually.

I’m like my father in that respect, the man loved to talk and especially tell stories. When he wasn’t writing, he’d be talking. When we were little he’d read to us, my brothers, sister and me, from all of his books he stored in the basement where he did his writing on his old Underwood typewriter. We didn’t have air-conditioning and it was cooler in the basement, an old rock walled basement that was partly dirt and partly concrete where he worked. After he’d read for a while, he’d stop and tell us stories about the author or why this particular story he was reading us was significant. He’d tell us stories about stories, which was always interesting to me. I could sit there for hours when I was little. He’d tell us stories from the bible too, about how it had everything in that one book, from murder, war, romance, bravery, sex and deception to mystery, suspense, humor, and love. He even read Shakespeare to us but we didn’t really understand the writings of Shakespeare until we were much older, we’d just listen to him read and talk.

So, yeah, I’m a lot like him I guess, or at least that part of him took hold and took root inside me and made me want to write and talk and just expound about things that were important to me. So whether anyone out there is reading this or not, it’s giving me a chance to continue that. I suppose most of the time I try and write about life and what it’s like as we get older in comparison to what it was like when we were young, but life is never the same, it changes everyday. Except for a few pains here and there or what we look like on the outside changing from being completely smooth and showing little sign of character in our faces to showing our lives, our disappointments, our failures, our successes and our hopes and dreams in every crease, we pretty much are still the same person inside. I know in spite of or maybe because of the millions of things that have taken me from childhood to maturity (yeah ya thought you were gonna catch me sayin’ old age, didn’t ya?), I am still this crazy kid who loves to hear and tell stories and wants to make every moment count. We might feel sorry for ourselves here and there, but don’t ever let it take over and ruin your day. Nope, there are way too many good things coming and I don’t want to miss any of them. If I had not forced myself to get out of the “poor me, I’m sick” mode, I would have missed my grandson singing in his first concert performance last night. Then I wouldn’t be able to tell you the story of how I walked into the hall where his choir was singing just as the door on stage right opened and all these gorgeous young people started filing though in their tuxedos and black gowns, a flutist played as they walked up the stairs in a beautiful line and my grandson glanced over his shoulder, saw me and smiled and waved. I was so proud of how handsome he was and how great he looked in his tux and then we took our seats and they began to sing so beautifully! Wow, I might have missed that and it would have been gone, never experienced, just imagine. I know you’re all wondering if I was alone, with someone or if the “ex” was with me. Yes, he was with me, after much prodding, he ended his protest and lifted his body off the couch in front of the T.V. and kind of joined me. He had a rather, “I can’t believe you made me do this,” look on his face sitting behind me near the back wall of the auditorium so he could make a quick escape but even though he probably will never admit it and even though he sat like a bump against the wall, I think he’ll always be glad he went along as well.

So, DON’T DO Number 18;

Do not miss something so wonderful when you know it will only happen once in you lifetime. Everything happens only once!