Today is my 64th Birthday..............wow............the lyrics from the Beatles song keep rolling around in my head.......'will you still need me, will you still feed me, when I'm 64'...........The first time I heard that song was in 1967 when I was 17 years old.............. 64 seemed prehistoric then........... yikes.*I was thinking about this last year, all that happened with my difficult child, all that I learned, all the changes........right now I'm feeling grateful to be above ground...........there were a few times I didn't know if I would survive my daughter's life.........but I have and I'm still here kickin'. In fact, I'm feeling pretty wonderful.
I am not going to step aside from life and give up that sense of adventure, excitement and joy.........there are plans in the works to do some serious travel once my granddaughter graduates from HS in June, moving to the gorgeous and serene island of Kauai in a year or so, living that funny saying........."Life should NOT be a journey to the grave with the intention of arriving safely in an attractive and well-preserved body, but rather to skid in sideways-Chardonnay in one hand--chocolate in the other--body thoroughly used up, totally worn out, and screaming WOO HOO, what a ride." ................Yup, that's my new mantra.
It was actually my difficult child who woke me up to the preciousness and value of each moment of my life. It doesn't seem to start to dawn on us humans that life is a gift.......... until we start to see those days dwindling down and all those days/weeks/years spent worrying about things we can't change or control begin to look pretty meaningless............. and a complete and utter waste of time. At some point, we're all going to hit that point, so why wait? Live now, live it to the fullest, grab each moment and take a BIG GIANT BITE out of life.............
Life has suffering, no doubt about it, but it's what we do with that suffering that matters. Do we let it take us over, do we get buried underneath it, do we rail against stuff we can't change, do we get bitter and lonely..............Gosh, I've done all of those things...........but now it seems kinda dumb, it makes more sense to move through it, like Cedar mentioned in that song, when you find yourself in hell, keep on moving.............move right on out back into joy, any old thing you can find to be joyful about..............the paint is not peeling off the wall...........geez, how lucky am I?
Gratitude changes my perception.........I have this whole day to hack around in, how great is that? I'm healthy, my family is healthy (well, maybe that's a bit of a stretch with all that mental illness..........) I have a job, I have a car, I have a dream................there is a guy in the market I go to all the time, when I see him I always say, "so how are you?" He always says, "I'm living the dream!" I love that. I've decided to respond to that question the same way, I'm living the dream. (Beats the hell out of living the nightmare!)
Johnny Carson once said, "old age is ALWAYS 10 years older then you presently are." So, I'm not old! When my Dad was 87 years old he used to call his neighbor, "that old guy," ............and the neighbor was 72. Dad never saw himself as old. I am clearly taking after him on that one.
My life has been filled with lots of trauma and failure and struggle and pain............isn't everyone's on some level? And, here I am................ I get the great honor of sharing all of that stuff on this forum and it may help another in their struggles..........so all that suffering actually had some meaning...........go figure............makes me feel as if I am inside a huge cosmic fantasy.........which somehow balances itself out if you can hang tough through the yucky times. Which reminds me of a funny quote I read years ago, I think by Tom Robbins, "life has only two states, YUM AND YUCK."
Well, today and as much as I possibly can, from this point on......... I am going to choose YUM.
*******************************************
PS/Just wanted to add how lucky I feel that I have the GREATEST playmate EVER in my SO.........clearly I am one lucky broad!
Last edited:
