Wild pitches.....

Curve balls. Stolen bases. Wild pitches.

Life's analagous relationship to sports comes naturally, doesn't it? It's one reason I love to watch competition on the field of play. (Another one is the fact that I can watch huge, muscular men in tight uniforms, but that makes me sound creepy, so let's move on.)

As we age, we learn never to leave the room until the game is over. Even if the home team is down by 10 at the beginning of the ninth inning. Wellsprings of strength can be tapped, the tide turns, and there goes the scoreboard, reflecting what no one would have thought possible mere minutes before.

Much like our lives. Just when we think we have everything under control, here comes that wild pitch, knocking us out of the batter's box--or even to the ground. But, like the player knocked on his butt in the dust, we must get up, too. Unexpected events demand fortitude, courage, and faith in ourselves, a surety that grows the more innings we play.

Recently, I lost a contract that provided 95% of my income. Luckily this isn't the first time I've had to dodge a ball. My teeth rattled when I hit the ground, but I got back up and dusted myself off before the next pitch left the pitcher's glove.

This kind of assurance is only attained over the course of time; time and the resultant knowledge that we are capable of facing and handling whatever life throws at us. When we are young and new in a game, every curve ball or wild pitch seem like a catastrophe. The experiences, however, can lend us cumulative strength as we mature.

As long as we pay attention over time, learn to trust ourselves, and above all, stay in the game.

“Adversity causes some men to break; others to break records."

No filters.......

As we mature, we tend to filter less. And I think that's a very good thing.         

• When did a group become a "cohort"?
• Why is my phone now a "cell"?
• And why does my home have multiple cells but no phone of its very own?
• Why can't I buy a digital camera anymore but intersections have lots of them?
• Why does my gym offer CHAOS as if its a good thing--AND I have to pay to have more of it in my life?
• My daughter's wallet was stolen recently and it never occurred to me to ask if there was actual money in it.
• It doesn't seem like a wise decision to force taxpayers to use garbage receptacles that are bigger than most people, much less when those bins are filled to the brim and thus immobile.
• Why does my credit union attempt to socially engineer my choice of vehicle by designating parking spaces for fuel-efficient cars--especially when they financed the car I am not allowed to park in front of their building?
• Since when can't I be trusted to safely make a left turn on my own?
• Do we really believe more signs and longer crossing times will remedy stupidity on the part of drivers who plow into pedestrians?
• How come telemarketers call my phone (oh, sorry....my CELL) and then refuse to speak for several long seconds? Didn't THEY call ME?

 “Progress has not brought about universal happiness...”
― Adam Leith Gollner

I know not what I do.......yet

It's that time again!

The one where I do something I've never done before.

Each month around the date of my birth (the 28th), I embark on an adventure of some kind, stepping out of my personal comfort zone and into the realm of the unknown. And that's the whole purpose.

As we age, we tend to lose that sense of excitement, anticipation, wonder....call it what you want, but we kind of collapse into a boring, dreary puddle until it's hard to divine any fresh water in our lives. So far, I've had some great experiences, some truly awful ones, and some that I continue today.

I asked for suggestions from friends on my social media site a couple of weeks ago, and got some good ones....as well as some scary ones, at least to me. A trapeze? Zip-lining over alligators? Not sure about those two, in particular. But then there was attending a great mini-conference with Maria Shriver and Martha Beck in Savannah (too late for that one; it was last weekend when I couldn't go), swimming with manatees, acupuncture, hot yoga, some other workout routine whose name escapes me right now, rock climbing. One that's been on my own mental list for quite a while is to ride a bus in my city, and that idea won't go away, so I'm adding it to the master list right now. (I'm sure many of you who live in cities with excellent mass transit systems find this idea comical, but believe me when I say that it's not the same thing in many southern cities at all. I'll just leave it at that for now.)

I haven't decided which adventure to choose yet for the month, but the whole process invigorates me. The process of thinking of things to do and then deciding on one keep my mental systems on "go" and that's a good thing. Carrying the activity out is often physically challenging, and that, too, is a very good thing.

So, stay tuned. By the time I get back here, the latest event will be over and I can share it with all of you.

Be brave enough to live creatively. You have to leave the city of your comfort and go into the wilderness of your intuition. You can only get there by hard work, by risking and by not quite knowing what you are doing. What you will discover will be wonderful: Yourself.
Alan Alda

Liberals and social engineering......

They're still empty. Unused, unoccupied. I know because I checked yesterday.

I found this building a week or so ago, a brand new branch of my credit union in a part of town I only frequent a few times a month. But I had some other business to transact in the area and there it was, so I zipped into the parking lot and searched out the front door.

Sounds simple, right?

Well, it couldn't be located on the first side that faced me--every one of those parking spaces was empty. I noticed all the cars were parked on the other side. That must be it. I kept driving around to another side (front? back?) of the building.

Oops. No door anywhere. Maybe it's one of those new "no building" banks, where all your business is transacted in cyberspace......somewhere. But why would they have this beautiful building then? I circled again, totally confused now.

Oh, there's the door, tucked over there facing--wait--all those empty parking spaces!  As I turned into the first space, a sign stopped me in my tracks: "Fuel efficient cars only." Well, that's open to interpretation, isn't it? I drive a Kia, a small one at that. But somehow I gathered that's not what they meant at all.The space next to it was the same. I drove slowly to the next one: Handicapped.As was the next one. No problem with those at all. There were still two left down there at the end. I was bound to find one soon.

"Van pools only." Both of them.

Are you kidding me? When was the last time you and your coworkers decided to hop into the van and head on over to the credit union to do your banking in a cozy little group? Women often go to the restroom in herds, but banking? That's a new one.

As I told the manager when I finally was able to GET INTO this edifice, I'm probably more liberal than most people walking around. As a matter of fact, as I've gotten older, I've become even more so. I think that goes counter to what happens to most people, but I've never fit the mold in any aspect of life, so why start now?

But social engineering carried to this extreme offends even me. The manager's explanation of being designated as a "Green building" doesn't carry much weight. As I told him, I guess it's a matter of deciding what you want more: a "green" plaque on the wall or customers inside doing business. I'm guessing they will have to make that decision soon, too, because each time I drive by that building now, I make a point of checking out the parking lot: All of those spaces remain empty. Every time.

Or maybe I'm just not aging perfectly this week........

A man's age represents a fine cargo of experiences and memories. ~Antoine de Saint-Exupéry,

Road trip!

It is sad to go to pieces like this but we all have to do it.”
  Mark Twain

Do things move farther away the older we get?


It used to be a one-day road trip from my home now to the town where I attended college. You know the one, right? Their football team just won a National Championship. But we'll get back to that topic another day.

It is only three hours away. No problem at all to jump in the car, head west on the most boring interstate in the country and head over to attend a game. When it was over, we'd hop back in the car and come home. There might have even been a stop for dinner at one of those dark exit ramps along the way. Then, it would be midnight or later before the headlights hit the garage door back home, but hey....who cared? That still gave us 5 or 6 hours before the clock alarmed us out of bed--literally--so we could get to work on time.

Nostalgia is painful. 

Here's how it goes today. All because things get moved farther and farther away as we age.

You have to consider the time to drive over there (and the interstate is STILL boring after all these years), PLUS then you must add 4 or 5 pit stops to that itinerary. You discover early on which rest areas have the cleanest, safest bathrooms. They become favorite haunts, much like bars or diners used to be for us. You never pass one by without stopping. And your destination just got a little farther away.

Finally you get there, and parking is the next mountain to climb. It's not realistic any more to park 2 miles away and hike on over to the venue. In the olden days (before we were the olden ones), not only did we walk it, we carried coolers, chairs, jackets, and sometimes children the whole way without breaking a sweat. That stadium is farther away now, right? Now we need to a pay a fortune to park somewhere in the back 40 and ride the shuttle.

Keep in mind, though, that all we have accomplished so far is getting there. The event happens, and it's great. But when the clock on the scoreboard ticks down to 0:00, the reverse of the whole trip kicks into gear. Notice I didn't say "high" gear. That gear got stuck about two hours ago as we waited in line for a restroom in the stadium, which....yep....got much farther away from our seats than it used to be. All those steps, all those (young) people walking and texting and pushing and.....

Someone call and get a hotel room. Please. 

 

Magic Erasers.....then again, maybe not.

Just my luck it would end up stuck in my cheek instead of my upper lip.

I looked into it, I'll admit it. There had to be a way to get rid of the tiny vertical lines that appeared, seemingly over night, around my mouth. It looks like I'm a Raggedy Ann doll with the stitches on the outside of the fabric instead of hidden away where they belong.

But I thought the remedy would be like those Magic Erasers sold in stores that ARE magic at getting marks and other annoyances to disappear. Seemed logical to me. The answer, though, was strange and kind of creepy, if you ask me.

It seems that they inject some kind of substance around the mouth that serves as a way of filling up that thin, collagen-thirsty skin. You've seen the results, I know you have. You probably just didn't know why that woman at the grocery store had an upper lip that transformed her into Daffy the Duck.

The skin around her mouth IS smooth as a baby's bottom, that's for sure. But her lips are twice as big as they should be, thus her sudden kinship with Daffy and his family. Sometimes it's just the upper lip, which is even odder in some twisted way.

Celebrities do this all the time, and they keep it up until we don't even recognize who we're looking at anymore. But celebrities actually live on another planet, and we expect them to trade in the bizarre; it's another thing completely, though, when your friendly librarian or hairdresser or workout partner shows up with balloon lips. Are we supposed to say something or is that verboten? What's the etiquette here?

I think this is an area that can be instructional to teenagers, in that it simply proves that humans of any age are  prone to the "It can't happen to me!" syndrome. Some of Daffy's new relatives have witnessed friends and strangers submit to these injections, with sad and crazy results.....yet they still think it won't be their experience when they decide to lay out the big bucks to do the same thing. Somehow they will be immune to the incipient disasters awaiting.

The substance that is injected under the skin to stretch out those horried lines is a plastic that is pliable, too. I'm sorry, but that is just creepy.

Because you know what would happen to ME? During the night I would turn my head the wrong way on the pillow and that plastic would end up under my eye. And my mouth would still looked like a bad seamstress had attacked me.

“It's paradoxical that the idea of living a long life appeals to everyone, but the idea of getting old doesn't appeal to anyone.”
― Andy Rooney

Buy my latest eBook, Nothing to Complain About: My 125-Day Journey to Become Complaint Free here.  Only $4.99!

If it looks like a duck and quacks like a duck.....

......and is advertised as a "gambling" cruise, take them at their word.

Believe me.

As I've gotten older, I have become cynical about advertising. In other words, I believe NOTHING. This has proven to be a safe tactic to follow. Usually.

There are exceptions, it seems. I found that out this weekend. We had purchased a "Casino Cruise" and even though we don't gamble, we thought it would be a nice evening on the water and a chance to spend the night out of town. The price included dinner for two, a $5 coupon for some game of chance (which we gave away later), and the cruise. Good deal, huh?

But it WAS a gambling boat. And that was advertising truth. The owners of the business wanted its patrons to do one thing: gamble. After six of the longest hours of my life, we knew that we should have taken them at their word on this one.

I worked in a facility once for delinquent boys. I was a "housemother" (which is terribly funny to me now, but that's a story for another day) who lived in a big house with about 10 boys who were....well, the name says it all, right? And we ate in a cafeteria, so I didn't have to cook for them. Serving as target practice for thrown furniture was bad enough.

When we herded the boys through the line to get our "food," it was often unrecognizable. The "dinner" we had on this boat was reminscent of those good times. The chopped steak was gray, the ham was overcooked, and the mixed veggies swam in a green liquid. The "chef" plopped a scoop of mashed potatoes on our plates and then swirled a brown gelatinous semi-pudding gravy over them. At least he had the good grace not to smile as he moved us through the line.

One of the worst meals of my life. Bar none. Plus they wouldn't serve alcohol during the meal. THAT was only available in.....the casino, of course! While we ate this delectable cuisine, Santa Claus serenaded us on his karaoke machine. Of course, that wasn't his real name, but it was hard not to make comparisons with the full white beard, suspenders, and jolly tummy. He did have a good voice, though, and there was even a dance floor. AHA! we thought. We had found our hang out during the rest of the cruise. We would return there later and enjoy the music and dance, which is all I need in life to keep me happy. Then later we can return to the open-air deck and relax in deck chairs under the stars. Who needs gambling? Our plans were laid.

The boat left dock while we were eating, and we soon went up to that open-air deck to find three metal picnic-type tables with combined hard bench "seating" for about nine people, if you squished together real tight with seven people you didn't know, five of them (at least) smoking. Not a deck chair--or anything with a back on it at all--in sight. The deck below us, with a smaller observation area had no chairs or benches at all. So, we stood there as the boat chugged out to the three mile limit and then it began circling. Downstairs the casinos opened for business.

People raced down the steep metal stairs to one of two complete decks devoted to gambling. Everything from poker to routlette, plus those noisy slot machines. Folks found their game of choice and hunkered down for the duration.

And everything else on the boat shut down. Everything. We returned to the dining hall to listen to Santa and found him sitting in a corner; the music on this evening of fun stops when the casinos open for business and it stays quiet until time to return to the dock, some four and a half hours later. Plus, they lowered the thermostat in the dining hall to tundra temperatures to discourage "visitors." There were more comfortable chairs in this area, but we hadn't brought our down jackets in August; who knew? And there was nothing to do in there anyway. (We had considered bringing our own deck of cards on board to play rummy, but thought managment might not take kindly to that, so we left the cards behind. Mistake.)

In order to find a restroom (which had no soap in it all evening) or get a drink, you had to walk through......the casino.....where everyone in sight was smoking. Everyone. I haven't seen so many cigarettes alight in one place for decades. It's been three days, and I can still smell it somehow. My clothes had to be burned upon docking. Within 24 hours I developed a head cold, probably due to all those bodies crammed in one space for so long, the lack of soap, and a boat that isn't kept very clean to begin with.

So, if it advertises itself as a gambling cruise, believe it. If it quacks and walks like a duck, don't pretend you can transform it into a swan.

"Advertising is the rattling of a stick inside a swill bucket."

George Orwell

 

Sports, sex, crime, and narcissism.....

I am not interested in President Bush's red and white striped socks. I'm just not. I can't imagine too many others care about something like that, either.

Don't get me wrong. I have a lot of respect for President Bush I. It has nothing to do with his political affiliation or his policies while he held the office of POTUS. He seems like a decent human being who conducts himself with dignity. His wife rocks, too.

But why would the media think it newsworthy to include a close-up photo of his socks in a recent article about something totally unrelated? (What ISN'T unrelated to his socks?) Besides, it's a tad disrespectful, I think.

It reminds me that we have arrived at an era of way too much information. Our technology has drawn the edges of our world up over themselves, like a won ton wrapper, folding one corner over the other, until all that is left is a tiny triangle into which information is stuffed 24/7. I guess that leaves us with a great deal of "news" that isn't newsworthy at all; it merely takes up space on the page, whether that's a real page or a page in the electronic media. But that wonton is plenty fat all the time, you can bet on that.

With items about important stuff like red and white striped socks.

The contrast with our history is astounding when you think about it. King George III (no relation to George Bushes I or II that I know of) and those pesky rabble rousers in the American colonies managed to pull off an entire revolution in an era when it took weeks to get a message across the Atlantic. Patriots like Thomas Paine had enough to do spreading the word throughout the colonies without the use of the Internet or (gasp!) Facebook--or even a typewriter for heaven's sake--much less make mention of the King's droopy pantaloons. (I don't think they wore socks back in the day.)

From my perspective as an Active Master, so much of the news today is more aptly dubbed "drama." I don't care what George's (Bush, not the III) socks look like, or how Celebrity X is doing with fiancee #3 who just gave birth to their second child, or any other such nonsense. I'm smarter than that. I also know when I'm being manipulated by the media to fill up space in a newspaper or time during a newscast spouted by talking heads.

Maybe we should all delay reading or watching the "news" a matching amount of time that it took for a missive to sail the Atlantic in the 1770s. Then pull it out and see if it was really important after all.

Want to take bets?

Today’s journalism is obsessed with the kinds of things that tend to preoccupy thirteen-year-old boys: sports, sex, crime, and narcissism.

STEVEN STARK


Nothing to Complain About: My 125-Day Journey to Become Complaint Free by Deborah Hansen is available NOW for $4.99 at

http://store.kobobooks.com/en-US/Books/nothing-to-complain-about-my-125-day-journey-to-become-complaint-free

Chicken skin vs. muscles.....

Maybe the increased muscularity of my arms will counteract the chicken skin.

I can only hope.

If you recall, I noted this cruel irony when I started this Aged to Perfection journey a couple of years ago. (See  http://agedtoperfectiondeborahhansen.blogspot.com/2010/11/chicken-skin-and-other-indignities.html for a reminder.) My arms were as toned as they had ever been, but their outer covering looked like the skin of a chicken that was sitting in my frig, the main course for dinner waiting to be cooked. 

But now it’s worse: my skin looks like that everywhere on my body. I can remember seeing older women with this crumpled up skin on their arms and thighs, wondering why in the world they didn’t DO SOMETHING about it! I was almost offended, like I shouldn’t have to look at all that “elderly” skin, Surely there was something that could be done to fix it….right?

Ouch. Now I am one of THEM. Women of a certain age with crinkly skin.

I recently signed up for a year of twice-weekly sessions with a personal trainer at my gym. I had to do something. Unless I can inject large doses of collagen directly into my flabby skin, I have no choice. 

What in the world is a personal trainer going to do about my crepey skin, you might ask? Especially a man who is probably half my age (at least), someone who won’t ever truly understand the depth of this problem? After all…he’s a man. And young. He won’t face this for decades, if ever. (Probably by that time they’ll have rolls of new skin that you can buy at Wal-Mart or on the Internet. Isn’t technology wonderful? A little late, but extraordinary.)

Here’s what I thought: let’s build these arms up with some more muscle and fill that skin and stretch it out. I’m not sure what I’ll do with the rest of me, but at least I can start by getting rid of the barnyard fowl hanging off my arms. 

If nothing else, you won’t want to mess with me in a dark alley. I'll be able to kick butt, plus I'll be really angry that all this torture didn't work.

Great ideas originate in the muscles.

Thomas Edison

This one or that one?

I stood in the bathroom stall and watched my hands shake. The breakfast I had eaten in my dorm room was threatening to reappear and I gulped air like a fish jerked out of the water, trying to keep it down where it belonged. My breakfast, not the fish.

Speech 101 was a requirement in my course of study, which is a logical thing when you’re working toward a degree in teaching. Logical, maybe. But certainly not pleasant for young adults like I was at that age: socially inept, painfully shy, and generally miserable.

But there I was, in the cavernous bathroom of the red brick building on campus where the speech class met twice a week.

Hiding.

Hoping the sky would fall or someone called in a bomb scare, anything to postpone my agony.

No such luck, though. Dissidents never show up when you really need them, and the sky stayed stubbornly in place. I did end up getting the speech over with that day, at least for that one grade. I think this was where I also learned the trick that helped throughout college: volunteer to go first, because no one in the room would be listening to you. They were too busy wrestling their own demons to the ground as they anticipated standing in front of the class in terror. After my turn was over, however bad it was, I could sit and relax. (I didn’t listen to anyone else’s speech, either, but at least mine was OVER.)

I later took a popular public speaking course, only because my boss at the time suggested it, and I didn’t think it professionally wise to refuse him. That was probably the best thing that has ever happened to me, but I shook a lot during those days, too. I visibly trembled all over, including my voice and lips as I stood in front of the group. I know that surveys say that public speaking is one of the biggest fears most people have and I can attest to the sheer fright of it all.

All of this is strange to me in retrospect; I have made much of my living since then standing in front of people talking about a variety of things. I also learned that there is a difference in speaking to one’s peers and speaking to students. Sometimes the former is still intimidating.

But I have also learned something else.

Before I show up for a workshop or speech, I still dread it. The day arrives, along with an overall veil of angst, a sense of discomfort that takes me back to my college days. But once I stand in front of the group, whoever they might be, something happens to me. A switch is thrown somewhere deep inside me, and the gloom is gone. It feels as if I become someone else for that period of time. And it’s great. I enjoy myself. I enjoy the interaction between me and the people listening. I’ll admit that I enjoy being seen as someone worthy to hear.

The question is this: Which one is the real me? I still carry that shy, withdrawn person inside me. Sometimes she is the dominant personality. I’ve even been called a “party pooper” (actually, lots of times!), once very recently. But then an occasion arises where I must “perform.” Those of you who are aging to perfection along with me know that I even became a ballroom dancer, complete with a public performance thrown in for good measure. And I loved it. The energy associated with it is intoxicating.

So, which one is the real me? Did I finally let the true person out of hiding, or did I create a new persona to meet a need for my work?

And you thought aging meant this stuff got easier, right?

“There are always three speeches, for every one you actually gave. The one you practiced, the one you gave, and the one you wish you gave.” -Dale Carnegie

Breaking rules......

 It had already flipped as I rounded the curve but the back window shattered as the car came down on its roof and the crash was followed by an eerie silence. I pulled over and jumped out, phone in hand as I dialed 911. Another vehicle stopped and its driver joined me as I gave the dispatcher the location. We peered into the car, its wheels still spinning, but we heard nothing. As we walked to the other side, the one that wasn’t quite as smashed, we saw movement. The driver was a young woman, strapped into the car by the seat belt, and she was now hanging upside down, probably dazed and unsure of what had happened.

The man spoke to her, but only got whimpering in return. I don’t think she even knew where she was right then, much less that there was someone talking to her. It’s strange the things one’s mind does in a situation like this: all she seemed concerned with was the fact that her skirt, now pulled up around her waist, was exposing too much of her to strangers. She kept trying to pull it down, vainly of course. After all, she was upside down, hanging from the strap that probably saved her life. 

And her phone was in her hand. Had she picked it up after the car flipped or had she been using it at the time? We saw no blood, and she was moving quite a bit, struggling to free herself and get that errant skirt in place. More people had stopped but no one else came closer. Did they want to gawk or what? Are these the same people who slow down and create backups on the highway when they pass a bad accident, waiting to see….what? We asked if anyone had a knife so the seat belt could be cut.

The young man closest to us shook his head. “You should wait until rescue gets here, man. You’re not supposed to move her.”

You’ve read the articles in the media of schools that expel 5 year children for having a butter knife in their lunchboxes to spread their PB & J, right? Well, here was another example standing in front of me. Someone who hears a “rule” and applies it the same way in every instance, with no thought process accompanying it. It can be a school principal or teacher, a politician, a city council member, a parent.....or a bystander at an accident scene.

It’s happened to me before. One day, a student in my classroom began to have a seizure, and I knelt next to her and laid my hand on her arm to let her know that someone was there. Not to move her, or restrain her, or try to get her to “stop.” Just to offer human kindness in that moment, whether she was even aware of it or not. Suddenly, another teacher came shrieking through the connecting door. “DON’T TOUCH HER!! YOU’RE NOT SUPPOSED TO TOUCH HER!!”  That woman berated me for days about that in front of my class and anyone else who would listen, seemingly incapable of seeing the situation for what it was at that moment. Of course I know about seizures and neck or back injuries and the fact that bystanders can do more harm than good sometimes.

But I also am a mature, thinking human being who is observant enough to assess a specific situation and make some judgments about how to proceed, even if it’s only to lay my hand on an arm to offer solace. I know that I’m not an expert in emergency situations; but I am an educated person who has a great deal of information in my head, as well as a heart that is capable of offering comfort to someone who is hurting in some way.

As it turned out, the young woman in the car was able to unsnap the seat belt herself, and she crawled out of the car just enough to straighten her clothes and sit up on the grass. I laid my hand on her head (no, I didn’t twist it or attempt to move her any more but I did let her know that she wasn’t alone), and told her that help was on the way, all would be fine. She appeared to be okay, but was still dazed. She was intent on making a phone call but was too disoriented to make that happen, and insisted she didn’t need any assistance from rescue, which I’m sure is normal under the circumstances. I’ve never flipped a car, so I’m only guessing here. And shortly after that, I left. I don’t know what happened to her, but I’m sure the whole experience was frightening for her. I hope she’s okay.

What I do know is that sometimes unthinking adherence to “the rules” stands in the way of common sense and humanity.

“Know the rules well, so you can break them effectively.”
Dalai Lama

Back in port: Cruise control

I had never thought about it. Why would I?

How do over 3000 people on a cruise ship all get off at once? The logistics are astounding when you do stop to consider it.

Embarking at the other end of the cruise is a bit different. Not everyone arrives at the same time, all giddy to walk that gangway to start the fun. Your travel or cruise agent informs you that there is a window of time for boarding, several hours long, that travelers can use to plan their journey from home to port, so boarding is spread out over that time.

But getting off? That's a different proposition altogether. Crew members have to get rid of all of us--PLUS our collective luggage--in order to clean and restock that floating paradise for all those other passengers arriving. That same ship will pull out of port to do it all over again just a few short hours after we leave, a new group of over 3000 just starting their bit of heaven for a week or so.  How do they pull that off?

At the end of my first cruise, I felt highly inconvenienced the last night at sea when I got a message from my cabin steward--the one who waits on me hand and foot, remember?--directing me to pack up my luggage that night and have it out in the passageway by midnight. What?? What was I supposed to do without all my stuff from then until I got off this floating city? I learned that I could keep a small bag with me (whew!), but everything else needed to be collected by the crew the night before we even sailed into port.

When you stop and think about it, how else would they get it all gathered up and off the ship without starting early? Imagine how much luggage 3000 people can accumulate. I had two large suitcases myself for a 7 day cruise. (I know, I know, but there were TWO formal nights and that's two complete dressy outfits with different shoes and accessories, PLUS all those cute sundresses I got for the trip. Yes, they all had to come along, because you never know what shows you're going to want to see, and.....never mind. Every woman reading this understands what I mean.)

So, at midnight the night before you arrive back in port, the passageways are lined with every kind of suitcase you can imagine, waiting to be picked up. You sleep in undies (or nothing at all, because after all, you're still on vacation, and what happens on a cruise ship, stays on the ship, but we won't go there....) a small bag with toiletries, and the next morning it's time to rejoin reality as the ship majestically slides into port before dawn.

And then all those thousands of people have to get off with some planned exit strategy, another amazing feat of logistics. Each traveler is given a window of time and a location of the ship at which you gather with other bleary-eyed cruisers who don't want to go home yet, either, and you wait until your group is called. This has always gone well before--but not on this cruise, I must say. If you recall, the government's furloughs had begun and there was one--count him, the poor guy, ONE--customs agent waiting to chat amiably with all 3000 of us.

It took a while.

And remember all that luggage? All 6000+ pieces were waiting in one room to be claimed.

Welcome home!

Seven days worth....

Floating paradise!

In line for customs at the end of the cruise.....

One small area of luggage....good luck!

 

Cruise Control: Day 6

Roller skates, anyone?

This time we asked for a cabin in the middle. 

Meaning mid-ship, instead of all the way forward in the misty recesses of the longest corridor I have ever seen in my life. Ever.

On our cruise before this one, I almost started stashing my clothes in a restroom near the Atrium so that I wouldn't have to walk that corridor again.  Of course, my stuff would have disappeared almost instantly, due to the uber-efficiency of the housekeeping staff on board, just like every other department we had contact with on these ships. But I did think about it.

We'd open that passageway door leading to our cabin, look helplessly at each other, and begin the long trek. The other end wasn't even visible, as outrageous as that sounds.We walked and puffed and stopped to rest, and then we walked some more.

These ships are immense. I'm thinking that they build them that way in order to board literally thousands of people who pay a tiny fraction of the value they are going to experience while cruising. This way, the cruise lines maximize the concept of quantity, without sacrificing quality at all. It's a thing of beauty. Just about any other industry could learn a great deal from these companies.

The ship we were on for this cruise shakes out like this:

Year Built	2008
Refurbished	2011
Tonnage	113,000 tons
Length	950 feet
Beam	118 feet
Passenger Capacity	3,080

 3000 plus folks contained in a floating city. And that 950 feet is a long way from stem to stern, especially when you're sunburned and hungry, believe me. (I still think they need a buffet on each end of the ship, because no matter where I was starting from, that sucker was on the opposite end. I never did figure that one out.)

One day I walked the entire length of the ship--twice--trying to find the adult swimming pool. I didn't realize that there were TWO of them on board, and I was calling the one I wanted by the wrong name. I never found either one on that particular trek: the one I didn't know existed in the first place or the one I had been looking for when I set out from my cabin. (I think part of it was that "no window in my cabin" thing that I found so disorienting this time; I never knew which way the front--or back--of the ship was when I left my cabin, because I couldn't see which way the the ocean was flowing by. Very confusing.) I finally fell into a deck chair at one of the family pools out of sheer exhaustion. 

Of course, this won't stop me from cruising again, and we did do better with our cabin location this time. We also decided maybe it's in our best interests in the future to focus on smaller ships with fewer people. 

And only one adult pool.



 

Cruise Control: Day 5

Water, water everywhere.....

You know that old saying, right?

I'm not sure where it originated but I understand it from a new perspective now. And I have a finer appreciation of the readily available fresh water we have every day....and perhaps more incentive to help protect it.

I cruised to two new island paradises, St. Maarten and St. Thomas, during my latest voyage that can't say that. Who would have thought?

Rivers? Nope.

Even a tiny stream--somewhere, anywhere? Afraid not.

Lakes, springs....something?? No, and no again.

If I hadn't sailed hundreds of miles due east into the Atlantic last year to spend two days in Bermuda, it never would have occurred to me to ask such a question: Does this island have a fresh water supply? But because of what I learned there--they capture rain water for drinking and other necessary uses in specially designed roofs on all the buildings in Bermuda--I asked in both St. Maarten and St. Thomas recently as we toured these two islands paradises. The only difference this time is that both countries use desalinization plants to turn the salt water surrounding them into fresh water.

We took an island tour in St. Thomas and stood at 1100 feet at the top of its one "mountain," the Atlantic Ocean on one side and the Caribbean Sea on the other. Water as far as we could see in all directions.....and not a drop to drink.

Needless to say, neither restaurant we visited on these two jeweled isles offered us water at the table. And I certainly didn't ask for any, either.

We spend a lot of time haggling over how to protect our own water resources, and I'm sure there are a myriad of ways to do so and still protect not only the water supply but also just about everyone's interests along the way. I see this constant bickering from a different perspective now, one of being grateful first for the great river that wends its way through my own city here in NE Florida. My next thought is to be a bit more proactive in speaking up for its protection. It's hard to envision living without this natural resource at all, like thousands of people all over the world do every day. 

They would be overjoyed to even be part of the discussion.

Water is the driving force of all nature.

Victor Hugo

Anti-ci-pation......

Anti-ci-pation......

Anti-ci-pation......

You remember that song, right? I think it was Carly Simon who was lamenting that anticipation was makin' her late and keeping her waitin', but that refrain is dominating my mind right about  now.
Oh, you want to know why (or what) I'm anticipating? Let me share.....

A week from today, almost to the minute as I write this, I'll be boarding a ship for a 7 day cruise to the southern Caribbean. Heaven.....

Worth a little anticipating, as far as I'm concerned.

Some folks, upon learning of my upcoming trip, look at me aghast, wondering why I would agree to get on a CRUISE ship! Don't they run aground a lot, or lose power due to on board fires, or forget how to back up? How about diseases that run rampant throughout the ship way out there in the middle of the ocean, with no easy escape?

Well, yes...all of that could happen, I imagine. But I know an intersection near my house that makes Daytona Speedway look like a senior citizens' exhibition, and I still travel it every day. And even though planes fall out of the sky once in a while, I get on one occasionally if I want to get where I need to be.

In other words, I play percentages. The chances of disaster befalling ME on the cruise I chose are miniscule, taking into considering the number of voyages these ships make with no incidents at all. Could it happen? Sure, but I'm betting on the side of most likely not.

And I've learned, since I've reached the point in my  life where I can take some trips like this, that the anticipation of the journey is almost as fun as the actual voyage. We booked about three weeks ago, and ever since we've noted the number of days on the calendar in a variety of ways: 

"Do you realize that two weeks from RIGHT NOW we'll be boarding the ship??!"  

"Seven nights from tonight we'll be dancing in the night club on the cruise!!"

"It's only five days until we'll be arriving in [name of port] to take the sightseeing tour!"

 Anti-ci-pation......

And the other thing I learned from my previous cruises is that the actual event lives up to all this pre-excitement, something that is not always the case. No phones, no computer, no demands at all: just people waiting on me hand and foot, lots of quiet time to read, write, snooze, whatever I choose to do. As I have aged, I have become a world-class cloud-watcher, with the ability to sit and do absolutely nothing for long periods of time, with no guilt about it at all. For someone like me, a former Type A personality, that is huge. And wonderful. 

And a cruise plays to that new ability. 


A writer has to write, though, so I'll keep a journal and share some of my experiences on the cruise when I return, especially for those of you who think I'm a little crazy for getting on that ship to begin with.


Anti-ci-pation......

“Oh the places you'll go! There is fun to be done!"

Dr. Suess

Room service, please!

The experience didn't quite match my expectations.

There is much in life like that, isn't there? I remember the first (and last) time I rode a ferris wheel. Never mind that I was in my 30s. Leaving the ground seems like such a foolish thing for people to do. I finally got up the nerve and climbed into that basket that insisted on rocking wildly no matter how still I sat, and then I was facing a lot of empty sky as the wheel turned and carried me upward. It was even worse when I was going backwards. At least I did it once.

Early this month I took a cruise to the Bahamas. I used to live in the Islands so that part wasn't new at all. Being on a cruise ship, though....all of that is relatively new to me. And this time I did "my thing I've never done before" by ordering room service for breakfast one morning.

I've never had enough money to do  things like that, so just the idea was extravagent to me. Have someone bring my meal to me in my room, and I can stay in my pink fluffy robe to eat breakfast? Unthinkable. But on a cruise, your food is included in the price of your ticket. As much of it as you want. Whenever or wherever you want it. Heaven.

So, we put the hanging order form on the door knob before going to bed the night before. We even specified what time we wanted it delivered in the morning. And, sure enough, a knock on the cabin door woke us, along with hot coffee and a plate of eggs and bacon. And pancakes. Plus orange juice and fresh fruit. There may even have been a bowl of cereal with milk. Don't you love it?

I took the food-laden tray from the perky young woman who delivered it, turned around, and stopped. There was no place to put it except on the bed. These cabins are tight. Doors open and one of us has to flatten against the wall. Forget getting any privacy while you're in the bathroom. There must be about 50 square feet in the entire space you get along with all the food you want. Of course, you don't spend a lot of time in your cabin on a cruise, but even still, I needed a place to lay that tray down before I dropped the whole thing on the floor.

The only flat surface available was the bed. Have you ever eaten a whole meal in bed before? Two people trying desperately not to tip the edges of the cups and bowls far enough to slosh all over the sheets, the ones we needed to sleep in later that night. Not the experience I had envisioned, that's for sure. 

There is a first time for everything, and I'm having fun seeking new adventures out each month. Aging to perfection means being willing to step outside my personal comfort zone, stretching that zone far beyond what I thought was even possible for me.

Some I have repeated. Some have become part of my life.

Room service won't be one of them.

Room service? Send up a larger room.

Groucho Marx

 

Hope and a lot of change.....

Let’s talk about change. Not necessarily hope. Just change.

The kind that collects in the bottom of a woman’s purse or a man’s pockets.

Periodically I empty all of the coins from my wallet into a smaller change purse I carry so that my wallet doesn’t look like a chipmunk preparing for a bad winter. I’m not sure what I’ve gained, though, since all that metal is still weighing my shoulder down. It does seem to help for some reason that I can’t explain, though.

Pennies have their own repository in a ceramic dish in my kitchen. When they start falling out of the dish onto the counter, I gather them up and make a trip to that noisy machine inside the door of my local grocery store that whirs and sorts and counts and then spits out bills at me. Who said a penny has no value?

Here’s the thing I’ve been pondering, though. I’ve noticed that “older” shoppers (certainly older than me) must really hate change. There are many levels to this statement—many don’t react well to new ideas or ways of doing things or they haven’t taken the plastic off their furniture in decades—but let’s focus here on the coins that are the inevitable result of buying things. That kind of change. It’s just going to happen.  You give someone a $5 bill for an item that rings up at $4.27 and boom—there it is. Seventy-three cents to add to the collection in your wallet or pocket.

But seniors must hate the stuff beyond all reason, because the next time they step up to the counter to pay, here’s how it goes. Their purchases total $16.63, but rather than hand over the $10, the $5, and 2 one dollar bills, they start digging in their wallets or pants to come up with exactly sixty-three cents to add to the $16 they have begrudgingly pulled out. (We won’t even discuss the oft-seen option of attempting to ferret out the $1.63 entirely in change. My heart won’t take it.) And heaven forbid they use the $20 bill they have hidden in there. Not going to happen.

In the meantime, we all stand patiently (or not so much) behind them, watching this archaeological dig, as the clock tick-tick-ticks away our perpetually disappearing time. And maddeningly, all this searching sometimes ends with, “Oh, here!” as they toss bills on the counter anyway. They give up the quest, and we all sigh in relief.

Maybe legal tender for those over a certain age should ONLY be paper money. No change allowed at all for them. I’m sure merchants wouldn’t mind, especially if they round up to the next dollar when they see white hair approaching. None of us would mind, either.

That would be a welcome change, wouldn’t it?

We can always hope.

 What I like most about change is that it's a synonym for 'hope.' 

Linda Ellerbee 

The LIST......

No one told me about this. There are just so many surprises as we age, aren’t there?

It seems that the day your Medicare card arrives in the mail, something else comes with it. I’ve never actually seen this list of “ ready-to-use after age 65” statements  myself, but I’ve been exposed to enough people in this category to surmise that it does indeed exit. It has to….why else would so many older folks use them on a daily basis?

You know the ones I mean, right?

“Look how fast he’s going!! What’s the big hurry anyway??”

“Only girls wear earrings. And he needs a haircut, too.”

“Look at all those tattoos! You know what they’ll look like when they’re our age, don’t you?”

“How do you carry that purse around? I’m surprised you don’t have back problems.”

“Why can’t they have paper towels in bathrooms anymore? I hate these blower things.”

And my personal favorite:

“Why are all these people out on the roads? Isn’t it a work day? I thought there was a recession.”

And each such statement is followed with a sound that I used to think writers made up, but it actually does exist. I’ve heard it myself:

Harumph!

But to make it all the more fun, EVERY time we drive an interstate or go shopping, or need to use a public bathroom or venture forth anywhere, the applicable statement is pulled out from their wallets (behind their Medicare cards where they hide it, I guess) and used as if WE are deaf and didn’t hear it the first thousand times or so they said it.

I know, I know. I’ll be there myself soon and should have more empathy. In all fairness, it does seem to take a few years past 65 before these statements are used regularly, but they seem to catch up with everyone eventually.

You’re probably right, I should be more understanding, but in the two years until that happens, I’m taking my huge purse and going shopping. I may even speed a little along the way.

And I’m sure I’ll hit a few bathrooms while I’m out (a topic in this category for another day), and I assure you that I won’t mind those hand blowers a bit.



 The older you get, the more you tell it like it used to be.
-- Author Unknown

 

 

 

 

Turning mirrors to the wall......

Here's a question for you: If you hang a mirror with the glass toward the wall, will it reflect backwards, too?

Oh, stop laughing. I'm serious. I'm asking because some parts of my life today look so much like a very long time ago.

Remember when we were teenagers and we had finally made contact with that hot new crush from school? Maybe a few dates later the two of us needed a more private place to go, because....well, you know why, right? Holding hands and a quick kiss on the front porch after a movie just wasn't going to satisfy us any more. We needed some ALONE time.

But mom and dad simply insisted on being home, and things like closed bedroom doors with a non-family member of the opposite gender or staying out all night weren't even part of the cultural conversation at the time.

So, we made out in cars, both front and back seat, or went to a friend's house after school where maybe there was less supervision. Sometimes we really pushed the envelope of the era (and believability) and lied about spending the night at that friend's house and never went near the place at all.

Such was the life of a teenager in heat.

Well, deja vu just sauntered into the party! Those of us who have worked our way through marriages in a variety of ways--divorce or death (the widow/widower kind, not murder, although it might have been merited)--find ourselves single after 60 again. And if you younger readers out there think that all that hand holding/kissing/making out stuff is over after 60, you are in for a lot of fun when you finally get here.

But there's a strange little crack in the mirror. If you recall from previous columns here, many of us are also taking care of elderly parents. Or returning adult children. So, many of us are cramming our clothes--and selves-- into smaller and smaller spaces in our own homes to make way for all these people.Which has snatched our privacy away, as surely as if we were......teenagers!

We can't throw these people out. We don't WANT to throw them out. We just need some privacy again.

Somewhere. Anywhere. It's like that mirror turned to the wall is seeing the past and bringing it forward into the present.

I really don't know what to do with that mirror, but I do know that hotels get really expensive. And people still want to know where we went when we get home.





It's hard to just kinda get some privacy and do your own thing.

Shaun White





Dancing fool finis.....or not

"Those who dance are considered insane by those

who cannot hear the music.” 

George Carlin

 

This is a hard one. It has been percolating for weeks, working its way to the forefront of my attention, and now clamors to be released. The writing process for me is much like a coffee pot in that respect, the idea getting hotter and hotter, my attention turning to it more frequently the higher the internal temperature rises, until I simply cannot keep my fingers off the keyboard no matter how hot those keys are. Or how much it hurts to release the lid of the pot.

 

George's words caught my attention, because I feel a bit insane right now. Many of you will remember when this Dancing Fool was born [http://agedtoperfectiondeborahhansen.blogspot.com/2011/05/dancing-fool.html] the day my feet dragged me into a dance studio as my "one thing I had never done" for that month. It was April 28, 2011. And my life changed forever.

 

I was 62 years old and I was terrified of dancing. I had been my entire life. You know how it is, I know you do: We think everyone is watching us, judging us, even laughing at our awkward attempts to move our feet and bodies in time with the music. (I learned that they aren't. They're only thinking about their own clumsy feet, but that's a topic for another day.)

 

I have become more adventurous as I aged, but I really only intended to take that one lesson and quickly check it off my bucket list. Life has its way with us, though, and I signed up for dozens of lessons with my instructor, a young man who taught me the basics of the waltz, tango, cha cha, swing, hustle, and salsa. No one was more surprised than me at these new turns on the dance floor.

 

He moved to another studio and I followed. I brought him a new student, a man who later became more than a potential dance partner. (He was only taking lessons to....well, that really is a story for another day.) My instructor put on an open house, and he and I danced the waltz in front of my friends and family, a magical experience for me that proved that you CAN teach a not-so-young woman new things.

I learned to trust someone else to lead. I learned to listen and not talk, even if I disagreed with the instruction given. I learned to stop thinking and just move, a torturous thing for someone who has lived solely in her head. I learned to smile and never stop moving. I learned to continue to move forward and not look back. My body literally changed shape as a result of using it in new ways. My love of music now has a physical manifestation that is wondrously satisfying to me. All of this was unexpected and brought such beauty to my life. For those two hours every week, I was transported to another place, one that transcended my problems, my irritations, my every day life.

The result? I can now walk onto the dance floor and do just about any dance anyone wishes to do. In fact, I can't stop moving, as those around me can attest. My feet and my body sway, tap, twirl, accompanied by a beat no one but me hears.

 

Which makes the sudden, ripping away of my dance lessons even more difficult. The details are not important to anyone but me, I'm sure. We trust people, and then we find out we shouldn't have, but would we have done anything differently if it meant never experiencing it at all?

 I will never regret dancing my way into a new life, filled with beauty and grace. No, I wouldn't change any of this for a second, regardless of its difficult end.

I guess George was right about the insanity.

"You must understand the whole of life, not just one little part of it. That is why you must read, that is why you must look at the skies, that is why you must sing, and dance, and write poems, and suffer,

and understand, for all that is life.”