Raise Your Glass!

I saw this photo on my Facebook and it reminded me of myself, and what I have been trying to tell my children of lately.

I am not what I used to be, but I keep trying. I can’t move the furniture like I used to. I can’t run anymore, unless I want to break an ankle.

My son will come down and lift something with one hand, and hint that I am a weakling. What he doesn’t realize is that before I asked him for help, I had already spent much time on trying to pick the darn thing up myself. It is like a slap in the face by my age number, that I have to realize I am not 21 anymore.

It was the funniest thing last fall. I was at Wal-Mart and I saw something that reminded me of my youth. A hoola hoop. When I was young I used to play with one for hours. I could walk with it moving, dance with it not falling. I felt like a kid, so I spent the five dollars and bought me one. The next day I took it outside, and I spent quite a bit of time, trying to get it to move, to flow without falling beneath my knees. My hips are bigger now then when I was young,so the stupid thing should stay in place. After trying and trying, I had to come to the conclusion it wasn’t the size of my hips, it was that the hips had gone stiff. They would not move gracefully, therefore, allowing the hoop to drop to the ground over and over. I got more exercise bending down and picking it up then the actual moves for the hoop.

Will I be able to let go of things I do now as I age? My mind says I can go for ever, but when I see the photo above, I may have to be told, Mom, give me the keys.

We need to keep our eyes on the Lord above, that he will fill our minds and souls with new experiences. He will need to teach me patience, as I am forced to admit that I can no longer be safe while driving, that I may hurt someone by not being able to brake quick enough.

Growing older is supposed to be wonderful, entering the golden years.  I say phooey to this. I don’t want to grow old. I don’t want to others to drive me where I need to go. I want to keep my youth, but I may have to be content with my wonderful memories instead.

I say raise your glass to spunk, vitality, laughter, love and life! Hip hip hooray!!

FYI

Did Jesus have a Facebook Page?

Forget ever going out to eat again.  Surfing the net was an article about the worst restaurants for labor and working conditions for 2012.  Where I live is a very limited dining experience to begin with and after reading this list, well I guess we will starve.

Cracker Barrel
Wendy’s
Sonic
Applebee’s ( and they have the best peach tea)
Outback Steakhouse
McDonalds (never get our orders correct anyway)
Dominoes Pizza
Golden Corral
Saxby’s
Denney’s
Starbucks (really?)
Dunkin Donuts
Olive Garden
Papa Johns
Panera  Bread
Subway
TGIF Friday’s
IHOP
Taco Bell

This is a travesty.  Aren’t we supposed to be living in the land of the free; the land of opportunity? Isn’t America a place to wallow in the French fries of grease and hamburgers made of what we called in school “mystery meat?”

Well, I can’t now. Besides the questionable ingredients in foods, the wages are poverty level and…

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Alone, Outside

Alone, Outside

English: One of many garbage bags at a sports event. (Photo credit: Wikipedia)

Before, I say anything, I just want to let you know that I am in a good mood. Although, having to go outside and pick up crap was not fun.

After getting up this morning,and realizing no one was going to be stopping by, I took my time drinking my coffee and enjoying my blogging friends. I even showed off one of my granddaughters earlier this morning.

The sun was hinting to me that it was warming up as the central air kicked on. I fought it very hard, but inside my heart, I knew I needed to get outside to clean the yard before I turned into a roasted marshmallow!

You realize this is the same thing we do with God also. We know what we need to do. It is right there in our mind and our heart, but we fight it and fight it. We either turn our backs on God and turn into a disappointment, or we listen to him and do what is right, and move in his work and word.

So, I get myself dressed in a one piece romper, terry cloth. I know I do not have the figure to wear it, but who is going to see me?, a passer-by, the squirrels, or maybe an old lady peeking out of her window? haha. I walk outside and I feel the heat. I have my flip-flops on. I know I should be wearing my shoes and socks, because I have diabetic Neuropathy, but gosh darn, it is hot, and my feet were begging me to be free. I felt the sun beat down on my delicate little fat toes, and I quickly moved to the shaded areas to start my job.

I believe this is the fourth clean-up job for me,although the other three were done together with other helping hands, so it is just me out here alone. I do what I tell others never to do. I work for a while, and then look at what is ahead of me yet. I do know that doing this makes me more tired than I was a moment ago. Never preach what you will not practice.

As I moved inch by inch, I was picking up nails, staples, little pieces of tar papers, and single pieces of shingles, and some of them were double shingles. I filled up three bags and a garbage can of trash. What made me a little irritated, wasn’t the fact I was cleaning up from the roof left overs, but I was picking up the guys junk also. Water bottles, bottle labels, cigarettes and food wrappers. Are you serious? I have to touch those dirty butts that someone else sucked on and had in their mouth? Cooties for sure! LOL. I know they deserved to smoke, and drink, and even eat, but something about touching those ciggy butts made me ill, and I smoke, so it must be a germ thing.

I had two small piles on the cement where the car sat, and I tried a couple of times to sweep them into the bag with my broom and a dust pan, but I could not keep the flimsy plastic trash bags open, and they are even Hefty ones, strong, powerful, made to do any job! Not!

I go inside where Al is sitting all nice and comfy in his recliner, in the cool air, and ask him if he can help me outside. He didn’t want to go, not so much because of the Parkinson’s, but he didn’t want to help, but he came out. I don’t know what was going on. Maybe it was the mental challenge, or the heat or the Parkinson’s or the idea he didn’t want to help, but it was a useless idea. He could not or would not hold the bag open for me, and when I tried putting the dust pan inside of the bag, it would only catch half and the other half went back to the ground. Now it is 91 degrees out here in the shade. I can’t do this. Diabetics, at least me, do not do well with our sugar management when we are over heated. I sent him back inside, and went to the natural scooper, my hands, and got all of the big stuff, then used the broom and dust pan for the final touches.

I put all the tools away, swept off the porch, ran the broom around the edges where there were millions of tiny pieces of sparkles and little beads from the old shingles. The edges of the house were coated so that the color of the house looked like black mold. After doing the sweep thing, all color came back. I picked up all extension cords, boom boxes, and walked all around the house with my little black bags. If a child would be a passenger in a car going by, he would wonder if I was Santa. My skin was turning red from the sun but I had a black goodie bag, instead of a red one!

After three hours, and a mild sun-burn so far, and a nice cool shower, and clean clothes, I have finished the project. Now I am going to post this and take a nap on my couch with the air running and a light weight blanket covering me with my own soft pillow. See you all later on, after Al wakes up from his nap!

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I See Myself Through You

I See Myself Through You

I was able to pick these photos yesterday from my Facebook. This little cutie is my granddaughter, Hanna.

She reminds me so much of myself when I was young. She looks just like I did. It is like looking at myself from about this age of four.

I don’t know what I looked like younger than this. I had one baby picture that my step-mom gave to me. I was somewhere of the age of four months old. I have since given it to my daughter for her to have.

I don’t do this crazy thing for my boys, because it doesn’t seem like they really would get much out of it at this point in their lives. Boys are different from girls, but with my daughter, each year at Christmas I give her a personal gift, of something of myself, and this one year I had given her my baby picture. I like to give gifts to my children so they can enjoy them now, instead of after I am buried. I don’t know why people wait until after they have left this earth to give away their possessions. I want to be alive and watch their enjoyment of things that matter to me.

I used to play make-believe games when I was younger. I knew from what people told me that I had long blonde hair that was so long I could sit on it. When my step-mom and my dad married, my mom cut it all off. I was told that she hated long hair.

One time I was in the basement with my father and I was rummaging through some old boxes, and I pulled out some hair, yes, real hair. It was two braids. I asked dad whose they were, and he said my moms, and that she had always hated those braids, so now I understood a little better why she cut my hair off, but I dreamed of what I looked like.  No extra weight on me, fair skin, a cutie-pie, with dimples and long beautiful hair. In other words, I saw myself as a princess.

The first photo I ever saw myself in was when I was the same age as Hanna. I was standing beside my grandpa and I had that blonde hair, short and curly, with a big smile.

Now yesterday, I see Hanna. She got the chance to go to a big water park, and from the looks of it, she had a wonderful time.

I can remember back when I was in elementary school, mom and dad always worked the day shifts, but in the summer, after suppers were over, they would take us to the big lake here in town and we would all go swimming. I don’t remember anything special that I can tell you about those times, but I do remember my mother always sitting on a chair on the beach. She never swam, although she would get her feet wet. I think she used this time to relax and read, while dad and I played in the water. Al was terrified of water, so he played with his little sand bucket and shovel in the sand. There were no big water parks that I remember but the lake was the biggest water park to me.

I wish I could go back and relive these times but the change would be mom and dad would still be here. I want to see my dad’s smile again and hear his laughter.

With seeing these photos of Hanna, I can see through her my own childhood, and that helps me to travel back in time to some wonderful times spent with my parents.

I love you Daddy. It has been four and a half years since you left me to go to heaven. Even writing this, makes my heart, feel a heaviness as I wish you were still here for me.

Happy Father’s Day. I hope you are waiting for me.