Conservation

Five months to go. At least, I hope so. Then I can choose which job to keep and which to toss. In my heart, the decision is an easy one.  In my wallet, not so simple.

I will have to learn to conserve our resources.

First, the water bill. Two of us taking showers daily is too much. I figure once a week is enough. My hair is short, hubby hasn't much. A washcloth every morning should suffice. I keep baby wipes on hand anyhow. Eating out will ensure that I don't need a lot of water for cooking. We can drink coffee at work, thus eliminating more dribbles onto our bill.

Second, gas and electric. I'll turn down the heat to sixty (also a very good year) and throw an extra blanket on the dog's bed. I have a battery lantern if we want to read after dark, and there's always candles.

And groceries. No, says Hubby, I will NOT give up Pepsi. OK, no more cookies. Really? he says. No more steak. He groans. OK, I say, smaller portions. He sighs. I'm going to starve, he says. The dog gets too many treats. I look down. It's a good thing Rocco can't talk. I hear a low growl and the beginnings of a snarl. I get it, fella.

Do we have to have car insurance? We haven't had an accident in years. Decades, even. The house is paid for. Do we still have to insure it? He rolls his eyes and I can see him start to twitch...

Cable TV costs too much, but not really, when you consider phone and Internet are rolled in. NOT THE CABLE, he says. OK, I agree on this. I like TV, love my computer, hate the phone.

Can't touch the budget for clothes. If I gain or lose more than twenty pounds, I'm sunk. You have enough clothes to last you the rest of your life, says Hubby.  But the color of the year is emerald green, I wail, and I haven't a single thing in green!  You always tell me you look like death in green, he says.  True, I can't argue there.

So far, I have edited out about ten dollars a month. Crap. At this rate I will be working till I am ninety. Or maybe we could just move in with our kids...I could buy our food, Hubby could pick up the cable bill....Rocco could share their dog's treats (I hear a whine).

I once asked my younger son if I could move in with him, should I ever feel it necessary.  He thought for a long moment (too long, I might add). Finally he said well, Mom, I'll help you pay for an apartment....

Signature

Just as a chef has a dish he calls his own, or as a writer is known for a theme so should every person have a signature.

I don't mean the untranslatable scrawl across the bottom of the HIPA page at your doctor's office.

I mean the one thing that, when anyone who knows you sees it, that YOU will instantly pop into their heads. It might be as subliminal as a fragrance, or as bold as a cayenne color you are known to wear, a phrase that you've coined, the way you smile.

It doesn't have to be obvious, just omnipresent. Every time this crosses my path, I think of you, like a song that refreshes old memories.

My hands....at 61 they aren't as smooth as they were at thirty. They are, however, rather pretty. Sue, my friend and nail techie, helps to keep them beautiful. No more hangnails, no more chips. Moderately long, glossy, unflawed nails with one--only one--sparkly design on my ring finger. I like it. An indulgence I can live with. A signature.

The jewelry I choose, sometimes outlandish...my friends can spot a piece in a store and instantly think of it as something I would wear. My hair, short, platinum, sometimes windblown on a calm day...a signature. My favorite beverage from the bar, a gin and tonic (lime, please), or when I feel like having something healthy it will be gin and juice. Once in awhile, a Lambrusco. Rarely deviating from the tradition, it's become a signature.

My friends have signatures of which they are not even aware. One has smoky eyes, another a laugh, another a rolling of the eyes. There is one with an attitude of grace,  one who cooks with a flair, one who can always make me smile. Signatures.

The signature, so I have found, is what draws people into a circle of friendship.  It makes you appear to be everywhere even when you aren't around.  You become a part of someone's life without even trying.

Ah, I wish I had understood the power of a signature a long time ago.

Going Away

I don't know who I will miss most. We've become a surrogate family. Each one fits into her own pocket.

You only work there because of the clothes, says Hubby.

Of course not, I quip. There's also the jewelry and shoes!

But it has been so much more.

They have taken me to a place where I can trust my co-workers. I'm more free, less buttoned up. I recognize the value of lace and the personality of jewelry. My suits are less formal, my lingerie sexier--and it isn't for anyone else. It is for me.

The girls almost have me convinced that I'm cute, but now that they're gone...well...there isn't anyone to help maintain the facade, no reason to wear the classy jewelry with a t-shirt or scrubs, is there?

And the customers! We did so much more than sell them articles of ready-to-wear. We gave them confidence. We showed them how pretty they could be. We gave them a new sense of being.

Saturday we spent our last hours together, at least for now. We babbled about exchanging phone numbers and chatted about summer picnics....but in my heart, I know how it will end. It will be another of those glad-I-ran-into-you-let's-have-coffee-someday friendships, meaning well but not materializing. I've had enough of those, thank you.

I want to see them again, regularly and soon. They have given me a sense of self that I didn't have before. Not just a style, but a deep breath.....and when it whooshes out, I have turned into ME.

Tami, Danny, Becky, Theresa, Ruth, Sharie, Jodie, Dani and Eunice and those I knew only briefly...and yes, Abby, you, too--I will miss you. You made me whole.  Godspeed.

Locking Doors

I am a door-locker. Always have been. If there was a lock on the door, even my tiny hands would find a way to lock it.

Why? I can't tell you, only that even as a little girl I had a need for privacy.

I have a recurring dream. I hear whispers of violence in the streets. I don't know where my husband or our sons are; it is me and the dog (not the one I have now).

I go to the hardware store. I purchase plywood to cover every window. I buy 2x6's and brackets and put them on the doors like Grandpa did at the camp. I pull my car into the yard after the tank is filled, and lock the gate. I store food and water and Pepsi, dog food and medicine. I have matches and candles, batteries and a wind-up radio. Deadbolts, front and back and basement doors. Ammunition. Manual can opener. Blankets. And I wait.

Wouldn't a dream interpreter have a ball with this one?

I'm not scared. Apprehensive, perhaps.

I awaken as usual, go into the bathroom, and lock the door.

I leave for work, get into the car and lock the doors, Hubby leaves for work, I lock the windows, the storm doors, the inside door.

I don't feel unsafe. Maybe a bit menaced, yet there is no threat.

Where did this start? It's been a part of me for so long that I don't remember being without it. Just because you're paranoid doesn't mean someone isn't chasing you...the phrase pops into my head. I can't lock it out.

I say that I am being safe. I am being sensible. I am being cautious.

Yet the dream persists.

Why have I the need to lock doors?

Fitting In

Confession time.

Somebody confided to me to me once, long ago, that, if he hadn't played sports, he wouldn't have "fit in" with the right people (whatever that means). Another says that she felt left out because she wasn't living on the "right" side of town. Another had acne, another weight. So many excuses, and all very real to a seventeen-year-old.

But I am not seventeen. I am sixty-one. There is no pressure to be part of "the crowd". If they want me, fine, but I have lots of friends who consider me an important part of their lives. I am lucky to have them, and I cherish every one.

I'm not particularly shy. I do tend to say what I am thinking. My real friends know this and accept it or tell me to shut up (gently, of course). In some others I inspire awe (or awful). No matter.

But there are days, and recently a handful of them, when I feel left out. I do not belong. The hurt continues long after the incident. I feel avoided. No matter....but it does matter. I know it is time to move on, but I feel stalled. Is this the root of The Blues?

Why should it bother me? I don't know, yet it has always been there. It's a feeling of inadequacy. I'm not pretty enough, not funny enough, not patient enough....the list goes on and on.....too aggressive, not aggressive enough, not smart enough. Lazy or ambitious. Nothing I do is right.  I think more vertically than horizontally and some folks don't get that. I haven't the patience to explain it. 

A person the other day was uncharacteristically nice. My hackles went up.  She ordinarily doesn't speak. This time she gushed. I found the reason, of course, and was crushed. Believing you have changed a person's mind about you, looking forward to civility (if not friendship) burns inside. I like to be liked.

So there it is, my latest confession, the latest thing I've been shown in my prayer to "change me".

Everyone doesn't like me. I won't always "fit in". That's the way it goes. I can't let the way someone else feels about me rule my life. They don't know what they are missing.

See, for the people I care about I am important. I am special. I am loved. They like me, faults and all.

I fit in.

Milestones

Thirty was a milestone. Thirty-one was not. Likewise fifty and fifty-one, and sixty and sixty-one.

Sixty-two is a milestone.  I will be officially a senior citizen in most quarters. I will sign up for Social Security. I will no longer accept any backtalk or crap. I will be a curmudgeon if I choose to be.  I will be sassy, relentless in my pursuit of happiness.  I will be a sexy grandma. People will call me  "feisty", a euphemism for "old".

Not all milestones are as obvious as the age related ones.

There's the mortgage paid off milestone. There's the first-timer club where you finally get the courage to go skydiving or climb a mountain or dance to disco once again (no, not in my lifetime!) There's the day when you decide to forget dieting because the clothes you have now fit and you like them. The day you quit your job because you realize you hate it. The day you lose a loved one. The day you decide to never look back. The day you decide to take a chance. The day you decide to touch one life and bring it....something. 

I no longer feel as though I have to do anything I don't want to do. I don't have to care about things in which I have no interest. I've earned my stripes. I no longer feel a need to explain my choices.

I didn't say all milestones are good ones. Sometimes you look at a choice you made and wonder how the course of your life would have changed. I should have a college degree. I don't. I've made no effort to get one. It is never too late, I know that. But now I don't want to. I should have finished my book by now. It isn't too late, I know that, but the chase is better than the catch.

Sometimes the milestone is more of a millstone.

Turning sixty-two isn't as traumatic as turning thirty, nor as freeing as fifty-eight. I've reached an age where my regrets are few. I will take each day as it is given to me. I will put people in the cubbyholes where they belong--friends, family, acquaintances, associates. I will expect nothing so I won't be disappointed when nothing happens. Instead, I can take the dramas of my days at face value--a moment of joy, a moment of crying, one at a time.

I am what I am. I am chubby. I have nice eyes. I am smart. I am disorganized. I have a strong faith in God.  I spill my thoughts into my blog, hoping someone will understand.

Understanding one more thing about myself is another milestone I have achieved.

Secret Garden

If you took all the people who think they know me, put them in a room and asked each one some secret they knew about me, what would their answers be?

Wrong.

Not even those who know me best really know me.

I am a tangled web of emotions and convoluted thinking. My innermost thoughts are mine alone, because when I speak them aloud they  can cause trouble. I keep quiet on most of my political, religious and social beliefs to avoid argument. I need to suppress my feelings so as not to injure yours, or to keep from scaring you away.

Of all those in that room, not one--not one--knows me.

I am not being deceitful, just private. I need to know there are places in my mind where I can go and wallow in my dreams of notoriety or riches or magic. It's the one time when being alone isn't lonely. It simply is.

Look in a mirror.  Do you see a person who is totally honest with the world, or even with one other person?  No, you see a person who has unshared thoughts, so personal that they won't even share with themselves.

I believe God gave us a mind that can dream, fantasize and record simple memories and pleasures so that we are never alone and so that we always have one thing that truly belongs to us. 

It's a secret garden where we plant only the things that energize us, make us happy, give us life and make us smile. It's a place where we can shut the door and disappear for a little while.

If I have let you in to my being, it is because I trust you. I have learned, however, that no one is allowed into the secret garden. 

I'm not alone, I simply am.

Uncle Frycook

Of all the relatives I hold dear to my heart, I think I liked Uncle Frycook the best. He was actually a great grand uncle by marriage to Elspeth, a fourth cousin several times removed on Antwerp's branch of the family tree, she being some relation or other to Zelda and me by way of my grandma (the nice one, not the other who was surely spawned by an ogre).

Uncle Frycook was the family comedian. He could make a funny story of most any event.  He could make a poor wench feel like a princess, make a chubby little girl like me feel radiantly beautiful with his smile and his twinkling eyes.

Maybe that was what I loved about Uncle Frycook He was charming,  funny and, above all, kind.  A hug from Uncle Frycook would keep one smiling for weeks.

Uncle was a giver of gifts, not advice or criticism. A tie made of pearls, a knickknack for your whatnot shelf, a surprise drive in the country ending with two scoops of banana ice cream....ah, he could spoil you with his kindness. 

It was his gentleness that finally finished him.

A dear soul, a neighbor of the Frankincense family by the name of Myrrh, was trapped in a mine (yes, gold) one wintry day in October (yeah, those days happen).  Frycook was taking advantage of the early snowfall by snowshoeing near the mine entrance when he heard the hollering from the shaft. He wasn't able to get Myrrh out, but he did manage to feed his warm wool coat and a bag of peanut M&M's through the small hole. Poor Frycook got caught  in a a freak blizzard that night and was never seen again. Some say he was eaten by a mountain lion, others that he was stolen by aliens. Myrrh was found some two months later, kept alive by M&M's, a slow-moving freshwater stream and a mad desire to live long enough to claim all the gold in the mine for herself.

Uncle Frycook played only a small, short part in my life and in Tiddlewink's diary. Tall in stature, big in heart, a giant of a man in every way that counts.....farewell, Uncle.

So Little

I think too much.  I try to understand other people when I am evidently not meant to. I read things into their behavior that aren't there. I expect them to fit my idea of what they should be.

It takes about three weeks to make a habit, but only a nanosecond to break one.

We only wear about twenty per cent of our wardrobes on a regular basis. Eighty per cent of the time we eat from the same menu. About twenty per cent of the people we are acquainted with can we call friends. Eighty per cent of the time we are disenchanted with the outcome of whatever.

This is the kind of trivia that trashes my brain.

I tried clearing it all out once upon a time, but somehow, like the Screwtape Letters (C.S. Lewis), they keep coming back to distract me from the most important things.

I need to smile more. You make me smile when you say hello with a smile in your voice. You make me smile when you don't mention the things about me that are wrong, but only the things you find right. (I know what is wrong. I don't need your help to discern it.) You make me smile when we share a secret or a coffee or a gin and tonic or the bay on a winter day.

I am not high-maintenance. The people and things that slow me down or make me feel ugly have to go. Some of them are already gone. I need to finish cleaning out my closets, my drawers, my mind. I began the job some time ago, but like the habit that takes so long to make and is so easy to break....I got distracted.

I thought I had found myself, but I have begun the journey over and over again, finding new things I love and discarding what I don't ant anymore.

My thoughts may be random but they contain my truth.

Shutting the Doors

I don't know why it bothers me. It is just a part-time job that I took just over a year ago to help defray gas costs.

I've worked for places that closed before, including my own store.

Maybe it is my age, and the fact that I would have continued here till I couldn't do it any more.

Maybe it is because I will miss these women more than most of the others I have worked with.

Maybe it is because we say we will stay in touch, but if the past is any indication, well, we won't.

It is just two weeks away, the final closing of the doors. The 80% off signs no longer appeal to me.  I have, as Hubby says, enough clothes and jewelry to last the rest of my life. I have plenty of friends, another job and a valued faith gift. So what's the problem?

This place has given me a new outlook. I have become more confident. I wear my personality instead of polyester. I've become more outgoing. It and my church have driven me to be more ME. The boss's young daughter says she wants to dress like me when she's sixty. Some of the others say I have a certain zing for my age. I don't think they realize that they are the ones who helped me to be the person I was once, and am again.

I tend to look at everything from the time Mom passed away. Many things happened that year. Facebook, old friends entering my life again and new friends appearing. New jobs, new blog, new church. The YMCA. Dancing.  Confidence. The bucket list. It wasn't all good, but I learned from the hurts, too.

"Busy Bee's", as Hubby nicknamed the joint, became a place of fun and refuge. I'll miss that fun. I'll miss the customers. I hope I have gained enough knowledge of myself that it will carry on, even if the friendships don't.

So, farewell. It just won't be the same without you.

Windy Days

There have been a lot of windy days of late. I sit at the front desk of Job 1, listening to the howl of the gusts as they follow the patrons to the warm insides of the Y. Most of them comment on the cold or the briskness of the day.

I love the wind.

I love the way it tosses my newly-nearly-perfectly-cut bob. I tuck my eyeglasses into a pocket so they don't blow away when I lift my face to the breeze. I take deep breaths.  Wind is so much fresher, so clean compared to the stagnant air of the building. How can one not appreciate it?

Think of anything more satisfying than a summer night, cool winds, stars twinkling. Or a spring day, a slight chill in the air, fresh  scented breezes bringing lilacs and hyacinth from another place into your world. A fall afternoon, leaves blowing at your feet, a gust that makes you catch your breath, taking in great gulps, The water, playing in a strong wind, waves crashing against the breakwaters. Or winter,  the old man huffing and puffing, driving the pellets of snow in cyclones around the parking lots, dashing the fluffy stuff from the  branches, whipping your face, making you draw your coat closer. 

It's hard to think of other things when you are being battered by the wind.

Today is another of those days. It catches the back door as I let the dog out for the 132nd time this morning. My old friend stands in the yard, his face to the wind, closing his eyes as it flows through his fur.  I watch him, coffee in hand, as his ears flap. He seems to like windy days as much as I do.

I want someone to enjoy this day with me. Hubby is sleeping off a third shift. Friends are unavailable or disapprove of my love of winter bluster. I guess it's just me and my elderly canine.

Hey, Rocco, how about a romp in the yard?

The Haircut

OK, I told you about the haircut from Hades that sent me running to a new hairdresser.  The first couple of cuts from the newbie were great. The last was abysmal.  Tomorrow I am giving her one chance to make good.

I no longer have the long, thick sometimes-auburn locks of my teens. My platinum epidermal cover (thanks, old Thesaurus) has thinned considerably. It needs layers to lift it, six-week trims to keep it fluffy and special shampoo to make it shine. Occasionally it needs something to squeegie out the yellow from my ever-present hairspray without turning it blue.

The haircut makes all the difference. Too short, I resemble Telly Savalas in the Twilight Zone episode before he shaved his head. Too long, I resemble Mick Jagger. You know what I mean, but I won't say it lest I get sued.

I need five minute hair. Wash, brush, spray. No curling iron, no gel or mousse. I rarely touch it up during the day except to give it a tussle. I like it soft, silvery as a new dime and volumized enough to keep the scalp from showing. One more vanity trophy for me.

So, Sue repaired the nails I had let go too long. I checked this a.m. and there is no moustache. My eyebrows need work (next time, Sue, I promise). As long as I only look in the mirror from the chin up, I don't look so bad for an almost-senior citizen.

Mrs Hairstylist, you've got one more shot.

Make me HOT!!

Serving God in a New Way

Tonight, with the blessing of Church Council, I became Council President.

It was a goal I had hoped to achieve, though not necessarily right now.

I have prayed about it, knowing I would be nominated. I needed to know, within myself, if I wanted to be president because of vanity, pride or a desire to be a part of spreading God's word by serving in this capacity. 

My faith has its ups and downs. My ego goes from high to the cellar from week to week. I hate arguing. I like everything on an even keel. Can I have any control over the way the meetings go? Am I strong enough to do this?

I need broader shoulders.

I have long ago forgiven those who hurt my feelings or made crude remarks. It doesn't matter in the end. Perhaps God will teach them to be kinder and gentler as he is teaching me. I am not who I was two years ago, or three, or five.

At any rate, it is done. I will see it through. God must want me in this place. I'll know soon enough.

Crap!

All the subtly dirty words came to mind, the ones most of us use only to ourselves and never in polite company.

Fubar

Snafu

Sh*t

Son of a biscuit and grandma, too.

DAMN!!!!!

What brought on my tirade of expletives is not important. It only matters that I was beyond upset, on the verge of well-deserved tears and fit to be tied.

I tried so hard, I really did. I was sweet, loving and tender. I kept my hands soft and fragrant. I didn't wear anything where I had to fool with buttons.  I was careful. 

And still, even with all that gentle sweetness that is me, the unthinkable happened.

I tried to be brave.  It was a little speck compared to the cosmos. The loss hit me with far too much power.

I had, after all, seen it  the  first time some two years ago. Like the proverbial thunderbolt that strikes one and creates a sensation of joy that is almost unbearable, this...this...THING hit me. And now that it is gone, though I know there will be another, the memory is burned into my brain.

I love quickly. I forget slowly.  Everything feels different now. I hide. I have lost confidence, even to shake hands.

Woe is me......I'm going to walk into the shop tomorrow and get chastised for my carelessness. I have to be healed before my secret is out.

I broke a nail.

Personally, I'm Shocked

There are still some people who don't know that I write a blog. There are still some who haven't read it. There are a handful who don't care, and a minuscule amount who haven't subscribed.

I guess it shouldn't bother me. I write my own thoughts about faith and drivel.  My opinions are mine.  You may find a morsel that suggests that I'm talking about you, yourself and you. Chances are, unless it's specific, it's a mish-mash of a collection of friends and relatives. After all, my blog is about me, myself and I, and how the world looks through my slightly blurry vision.

Oh, I do care about you. I'm just tired of caring about whether or not you like me, whether all you notice is my (very) slowly shrinking gut or trendy jewelry. Sigh....I have a long way to go. I think I'm ok, then I get self-conscious all of a sudden. 

If you see me adjusting my belt or my sweater, that means I'm uncomfortable. If I chew my lip it means I am biting back anger or sarcasm. I am not complex.

I thought I had broad shoulders and was not easily hurt. I have to work on that.

I am not different from you. I just say out loud what I am feeling or thinking most of the time and you don't.  I got over my shyness in most situations long ago.

If you are reading my discourse for the first time, or the first time in a long time, I encourage you to check out the archives. Comment if you are so inclined. We can learn from each other.

Personally, I am shocked we haven't had this talk before!