It's been a learning curve for me. Old age and forty plus years of slinging heavy plates and carrying countless bus tubs and huge buckets of ice took their toll on my body. It doesn't help that I'm basically a hundred pound walking saggy bag of bones but think as far as sixty five years goes, I pickled pretty well. (just don't get or look too closely at my face, mustache or goatee and random whiskers)
I look my best from ten feet away, without florescent lighting, and advance notice that you're looking at my face.
True facts at my age.
Resting Bi*ch Face is a real kill joy and is so hard to concentrate on not making sometimes. Unfortunately I have a mirror built into the wall above my kitchen sink. Fortunately it looks great there, and has an actual window frame around it complete with a sill and panes. Makes the entire kitchen look twice as big and I like being able and see all the way down the hallway behind me when I am at the sink. It has helped me with my RBF since every time I look in I need (and take) immediate action to correct my unprovoked grimace.
I'm learning to accept the fact that it is what it is. I'm a senior citizen now. When I was in high school it was all the rage and super cool to finally be a senior.
Now? Not so much.
How in the world did I end up being in the same age group as all my parent's friends? My mother died just after I turned seventeen. My father died in 2002 from West Nile Virus but I have kept in touch with many of their good friends over the years. There's not a large number of them left anymore but it's not a shabby number either. I'm going to guess about ten or fifteen. I write to a lot them (snail mail) and call the ones I have numbers for. I can even text the really savvy ones. Yes they tell me the same stories sometimes but I am also a compulsive repeater, especially if it's a funny story. I get it from my mother. My father used to make fun of her for it, and now so do my husband and brother... in their defense I am an easy target but in my defense they both still laugh when I tell them. So at least there's that.
Ya gotta count those blessings!
See what I mean about no florescent lighting and ten feet away? Works like a charm. Every. Time.
Dusk or dim lighting is even better! At my age you need to utilize your strengths, especially if it doesn't include any heavy lifting or walking up a lot of stairs.
I have one bad knee I twisted in a speed skate for mothers at the skating rink in the early 2000's when my kids were little...and yes I came in second.
Kinda ticked me off because at first they announced it was only a speed skate for mothers and I went out there (pushed by my kids) but eventually followed by one other mom.. Then the guy on skates with whistle and referee shirt on says into the microphone "Or fourteen and up!!"
Are you kidding me? Of course a young girl won but I was hot on her trail. Not too shabby for a middle aged woman.
This was at a skate night for their elementary school. I was still waiting tables at night and on weekends but had taken a job in the cafeteria of their school so they could remain there when a huge county redistricting happened and they wanted my kids to attend a school further away.
We were on the starting line and I could hear kids screaming "GO Lunch Lady!!" So I did.
I still have a bad knee to prove it. But that's okay, I have another knee that is just fine. A year or two ago I was raking clippings out of our shrubbery as my daughter trimmed them with the electric hedger. I slung the rake over the hedge the wrong way and my shoulder literally audibly popped so loud even my daughter heard it. It hurt so bad it made me immediately nauseous. It still goes in and out and makes me wince when it does, sometimes making me want to scream. Kudos for me though, I still have another perfectly good shoulder and is located on the other side of my body from my bad knee so I'm basically batting .500 at the tender age of fifty fifteen.
It's all about perspective at this point. At least that's my take.
We only have one dog now after losing my precious Ziggy last year but my brother still has two. I am the official Mon-Fri dog watcher for both houses, all three hounds, and couldn't have or want a better job. I scooter (my brother bought me the scooter for Christmas last year and love it) from our house to his at least a couple of times a day to let his dogs out and spend most of my day in our yards with our pup. I highly suggest hanging around dogs more than humans.
Love is a four legged word...that's for sure.
This little 55 lb. girl has us all wrapped around her front paw, which looks like black velvet but can rip my old lady skin back or up with one glance. I've used more band aids since I turned sixty than I have my entire life. My brother has two dobermans so that's even more hazardous to my old lady skin. Luckily they are older and not the clown that our boxer is. She's one hot mess.
My brother adopted a Dobie a couple of years ago that was an escaper. I don't know why she tried to escape, he treats his dogs better than I treat my own kids. If I was one of his dogs I would be attached to his hip. Post Note: she has since done exactly that.
But before that she was horrible. She would wiggle, dig under around or between any compromise in the fence. Granted it was an older fence but we were all worried she would get hit by a car. He finally paid well over ten grand to have a new fence installed all around his house and property.
While the fence was being installed I had to walk both Dobies on a leash. His older girl, Robin wouldn't leave the yard if the gate was left wide open and you called to her from the street. She knew which side of the fence was buttered.
Not Shelby. I was walking her one day in the yard with a leash on so she couldn't escape when one of our neighbors had the audacity to walk their own dog by my brother's house...on a leash none the less.
Shelby went ape sh*t crazy and ran circles around me (I had her on an extendable leash) essentially hog tying me and dragging me by my ankles up the gravel driveway. My neighbor looked horrified and asked if I was okay. I gave him a thumbs up and was glad we had more than that ten foot buffer because I was bleeding like a stuck pig. I still have scars on my ankles.
The next time the ole heifer got me was when I once again had her on the leash about a week later while the fence was still being installed. I was by some pine trees and a squirrel darted up one by us. Shelby took off around the tree, dragging my arm holding the leash with her. Raked back about a three inch slice of skin off my forearm and had to pick pine bark out of the cut before I washed it in my brothers sink, pushed my skin back the right way and wrapped my arm in paper towels before I could even begin to search my brother's house for bandages.
Shelby was a lot, but has turned out to be a perfect dog. Just took her a year or so and over ten thousand dollars worth of new fencing.
I can say I never ever took her out on a long extendable leash again. Four feet was all Smalls/Shelby got after that.
She's turned out to be a love bug and my brother has since adopted another Dobie after his other girl Robin passed away.
Now he has Shelby and Warlock. Warlock is a blue doberman. Absolutely stunning pup.
This is what a blue Dobie looks like:
Warlock (sorry I don't have a pic of him) has the floppy ears like the one on the left and the exact some coloring. I have never seen a dog more happy and complacent to be rescued and loved. Nothing bothers this dog, except squirrels and birds. He also knows what side of the fence is buttered and has no desire to leave or get out of the yard. He runs the fence line with his head up high, looking for birds and squirrels in the trees. How he doesn't have a massive crick in his neck is a mystery to me. He is obsessed and relentless. Luckily the squirrels and birds have (so far) been quicker. I'm hoping I am not on duty the day he finds a slow one. Dobermans aren't quitters by any stretch of the canine imagination.
I suppose where all this written drivel is leading is that I am still a pretty lucky person, regardless of how I think (know) I look or sometimes feel. At least I'm still kicking...granted not too high (don't want to pull a hamstring) and will never be a Rockette or in Riverdance but at least I can get out of bed every day, go about my business and not feel pressured to do something I don't want to do or clock in at a job and have to follow rules and guidelines while other coworkers skirt them on the daily.
Trust me, we all worked with that person. Every job has one. (or two or three)
So I'm going out on a limb here and saying I've done okay in life. I have been blessed, beyond blessed and then some.
I haven't changed the world by any means but feel that I have made a (probably insignificant but well meaning) positive difference at best.
That's all I have ever wanted to do or be. A good person.
Have I failed at times? Absolutely. Who hasn't?
With the new year rapidly approaching my mind is spinning. This latest election in the USA has proven (once again) that politics are not topics to be discussed or expressed anywhere except behind the (now proverbial) curtain in a polling booth. Our parents called that one right. I wish we would have listened.
It's turned into a flat out hate fest. It turned into a mudslinging of misinformation and the only ones benefiting are the puppeteers pulling political strings with their deep pockets and more often than not taking our hard earned money and using it for their own agenda and profit. And I am absolutely talking about both sides of the swamp. It's called a swamp for a reason, there is an extremely muddy and mucked up bank on either side and all around it.
Let's dial it back (especially on social media) to keeping political opinions to ourselves. Has that been hard for me? Extremely. I am not a fan of our newly elected president, but it is what it is. He won.
We shall see what we shall see.
Don't cry over spilled milk. Just be careful next time you pour a glass.
Till next time...COTTON
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