Another day without rain. You learn to appreciate dry air when you live through a horrific flood.
My son informed me yesterday that we needed to immediately get in the car and go to the store and buy marshmallows, chocolate, and graham crackers because he was CRAVING s’mores. Can you tell he lives in a house full of females?! If he were not such a boy’s boy it would worry me a tiny bit, but he’s all boy.
I have a question for you parents out there. When do kids develop tact?! When does that kick in? My daughter is a little behind her peers, emotionally, as I’ve mentioned, but she seems to be missing the tact gene entirely.
Alesia said the other day, when I asked her the age of one of our neighbors, “Oh, she’s elderly. She’s probably, I don’t know, in her 50’s!” Mother and I laughed. Not happy laughter, more like OMG! ACK!
Mother HATES the word “elderly.” She prefers simply “old.”
I think of myself as middle aged. I am 47. I guess, to be accurate, I should say I am “on the dark side of 40.”
Next year will be 30 years since I graduated from high school. I feel really really elderly, just thinking about that. There are almost no photos of me from high school, because I thought I looked so awful. Now I look back at the few photos we have and think, I was so delusional. [Or should that read DEElusional?!]
When I was a junior in high school, in 1979 to be exact, I played Mrs. Paroo in The Music Man. My daughter Marion was played by a sweet girl named Jamie. I just got a friend request on Facebook and was delighted to catch up with her a little bit. She hasn’t changed at all, even after 4 kids! She looks like she just got out of high school! I look like a hag, OTOH. I expect my next play I will be cast as one of the witches in MacBeth. Yikes!
It’s fun seeing old friends from high school, but man, the years have been kinder to some of us than to others. I should have an advantage, sort of – after all, fat fills wrinkles!
BUT SERIOUSLY
I like the 2009 version of me better than any other version. Yes, I'm too fat. I have grey hair and wear glasses. I burp too loudly. I don't shave my legs often enough. I never go clubbing, or to concerts. My favorite things to do are read to my son, grow flowers and vegetables, and watch movies at home. And that is OK. I had my fun. Now I have a real life, a life that means something.
I like myself, I have lots of love and lots of laughter in my life, and life is GOOD. If you want that too, quit judging yourself, quit trying to be perfect or look perfect, and just live. Just love. Just pray and be at peace about your life. Forgive yourself and forgive everyone else who has wronged you, because that's what we're supposed to do. That's the only way to be happy. I wish I had figured that out years ago.
Here endeth the sermon.
