And SO IT IS HAPPENING…the time in my life where the sad reality of life is starting to hit me smack dab in the middle of my face. Just the other day I received an interesting piece of mail in my mailbox. It was something I had never EVER received before, or at least hoped it would NOT have happened so soon, but here it is. It was a piece of mail addressed to “Mr. James Terry” and it was sent from an organization known as the “AARP.” The “American Association of Retired Persons.” All I remember or knew about this organization is that it was for "old" people.
When I was younger, it was my mother’s response when she received the same piece of mail on the twilight of her 50th birthday that associated and engrained the term "old" with AARP for me. It was a response that will go down in history as a true and comical response from a lady who rarely swore but who was, at that moment, unconstrained by how she truly felt. Her response...“Damn, I’m old!” In thinking about my mother’s response and receiving that thought-provoking piece of mail, I personally had to stop and evaluate more of what is going on in my life as I approach traveling around the sun for my 50th time.
When I was younger, it was my mother’s response when she received the same piece of mail on the twilight of her 50th birthday that associated and engrained the term "old" with AARP for me. It was a response that will go down in history as a true and comical response from a lady who rarely swore but who was, at that moment, unconstrained by how she truly felt. Her response...“Damn, I’m old!” In thinking about my mother’s response and receiving that thought-provoking piece of mail, I personally had to stop and evaluate more of what is going on in my life as I approach traveling around the sun for my 50th time.
What once was a full head of hair is slowly thinning and greying. In thinking ahead and trying to secure a good retirement income, I figured in another 10-15 years that I can at least make use of this area on my body if my hair continues to thin…I have already contacted NASA to see if they might be interested or in need of a reflective orb in order to communicate with the satellites or the astronauts in space. Their response…" to be determined!”
The term crow’s feet are starting to become a reality at the corners of my eyes and if all that wasn’t bad enough, I also got my first pair of reading glasses within the last two years. (sigh)…I had to ask myself, ”So this is 50 huh?”
And other things are happening too. Have you ever heard of the term “Butter Fingers?” Nearly everything I touch now seems to somehow magically slip from my finger’s grasp and, just like in the movies and in slow motion, fall to the floor. As I was cleaning up the kitchen about a week after receiving my welcome to AARP (retirement) notice, I dropped a mug I received for my 49th birthday into the sink and broke the handle off. On the mug, it says, “ It’s a crime to look this good at 49!” “Is it really?” I said in my internal monologue with a quizzical look on my face. “And what is to come with more years under my belt?”
And speaking of belts, who, that is in my same age range or older, has noticed that you don’t even have to eat anymore and can still gain weight? A simple glance of a piece of food, especially the sweet stuff, will add another inch or two to any given area on my body. This then allows the eternal enemy, Gravity, to form “love handles,” “double chins” and anything that might resemble the Michelin or the Stay Puff Marshmallow man.
Whoever said, “These are your golden years,” must be a true optimist. Fifty, to me, feels more like a scene in the movie Dumb and Dumber. The two main characters, played by Jim Carrey (Lloyd) and Jeff Daniels (Harry), are trying to drive to Aspen, Colorado. They were doing this in order to return a briefcase to a lady that Lloyd has a crush on after she left it in the limo he was driving. Thinking they are almost there and after a wrong turn by Lloyd who drove through the night, they find themselves not in Colorado but on a huge flat open plain in the middle of Nebraska.
As the sun begins to come up and thinking they would be seeing mountains at this point Harry states, “Huh, I expected the rocky mountains to be a little rockier than this.”
As the sun begins to come up and thinking they would be seeing mountains at this point Harry states, “Huh, I expected the rocky mountains to be a little rockier than this.”
Lloyd then replies, “I was thinking the same thing. That John Denver is full of sh**, man.”
As I enter the great plains of my 50ties I too want to ask, “Where are my mountains John Denver?" Why is what I expected the golden years to be all the sudden appear to be not so golden? And why in all of those commercials that show retirees with perfectly white, straight teeth like in AARP, Ensure nutritional shakes and Activia yogurt commercials not true to form? I want to see the lifts that get the "old people" off of the couch and out of their beds and onto the bikes they are riding on in that commercial. I also want to know which denture adhesive they are using to make their teeth not fall out as they hit that slight bump in the road while riding that bike. And what person, IN THEIR RIGHT MIND, is going to be smiling ear to ear while wearing a depend undergarment? 😂
So with Spring finally here and what will be deemed an "unforgettable" birthday tomorrow due to an unprecedented virus, COVID-19, that is affecting us all, I was also hoping to bring a bit of laughter, hope and wisdom with today’s blog. I hope I have done that and want to end with one more thought.
I always used to make fun of those “corny” signs in hobby shops and at craft fairs that would say, and in no particular order, “laugh, live and love.” Isn’t it funny that at forty-nine and three hundred and sixty-four days old😏😁😉, I find that ALL of those words are applicable to me? I find that LAUGHTER brings me a better state of mind, which in turn brings more happiness and better health. Living my life in more happiness, then allows me to LIVE my life more fully. And if I am living my life more fully, I then can LOVE others and myself more completely. It makes sense, doesn’t it?
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So next time you are at a craft fair, look for that lowly stand in the corner with a fifty-year-old man sitting there with new “corny” signs to sell. Please come on by and say, “Hi.” Those “corny” signs I will be selling will definitely include “Laugh, Live, and Love” on them but may also include at least one other “L” word. “Learn” to laugh. “Learn” to live. And “learn” to love. "LEARN!!!"
Oh and just so you know, I "LEARNED" how to throw a piece of mail, the aforementioned piece I spoke of, in the trash rather quickly. Hey, I still have nineteen hours left before I am officially...OLD! 😊
Oh and just so you know, I "LEARNED" how to throw a piece of mail, the aforementioned piece I spoke of, in the trash rather quickly. Hey, I still have nineteen hours left before I am officially...OLD! 😊
HAPPY SPRING!!!
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