Now I Understand

Seeing a Reader's Digest in large print used to be the joke of the month to me, but now it's something to be considered.  With each passing day of age being added, I understand more and more the adage:  With age comes with understanding.

I understand the need for large print books, or a page magnifier.  I understand why I forget what I was looking for, or why I forget what I was going to say.  I forget what I was looking for, and what I was going to say, because I've misplaced my short term memory, and can't remember where I left it.

I'm fairly certain that the person who created Rice Krispies was a person of a certain age.  Otherwise, how would they ever understand the snap, crackle, pop?  With age comes understanding, and it's often things we would rather not understand.

Laser?  Oh I understand the desire to have hair lasered off.  What I don't understand is why they use young, beautiful people for those ads?  It's us old people, or people of a certain age, who should be on those billboards. They should be holding tweezers, and nose hair clippers, and razors, and, oh the list goes on.  I don't want to understand why hair grows where it grows, and stops growing where it should grow.

I understand now that blank look an older person gives you when you stop to speak to them.  I understand it's not a look of idiocy.  It's a look of searching within for a name of the person standing in front of you.  It's the blank look of searching through the memory files that are pretty much depleted of all things, except the memory of a sleepless night, because of all the aches and pains, and the worry of things that can't be fixed.  And when they say, "Do I know you?"  You gently explain to them that yes, you are their niece, their neighbor of 25 years, their child's best friend since grade school.  Too bad at that time you don't have the understanding that comes with age, because you would be more understanding of the blank look you are seeing, and will one day be your look.

I understand why older people say, "Don't mumble."  It's not about you mumbling, it's about them not hearing what you said to begin with, and it sounded like all your words ran together like a pile up on I-40.  Speak louder, talk slower, and do not walk away from me while talking to me.  I will only ask you what you said, or I will just ignore you completely, because if you can't talk without mumbling, or you can't talk louder, or if something in the other room is more important than talking to me, why I should I care if I heard you.

And having said all of that, I now understand why older people are thought of as grumpy.  It makes me grumpy when I can't find my glasses, and then when I find them I can't remember why I needed them.  It makes me grumpy to stand up and hear the snap, crackle, pop of aging bones, and know that they are my aging bones.  It makes me grumpy to find hairs sprouting out of my chin.  It makes me grumpy when I see someone who know me, and I can't remember them.  It makes me grumpy when people  mumble when they should be speaking clearly.

I'm aging, so with aging comes understanding.

You Sound Northern

It always amuses me when someone says to me, "You have such a way with words and expressing things, would you write........for me?"  Oh sure, I can write chapters and chapters of words and expressions ~ if you do, or say something that I think is dumb.  Sarcasm flows directly from brain to fingers, and my fingers are flying across the keyboard.  But to write something intelligent, something meaningful, something deep, something profound....NOPE, don't ask me.

 My brain cramps up, the signal to my fingers makes them freeze just millimeters from the keyboard.  Tell me something like....."You don't have an accent like I thought you would.  You sound Northern." I will be chowing down on wall paper paste, and my fingers will be flying across the keyboard, because, because, because,  "What do you mean I sound northern?"  I meant to say chowing down on wall paper paste, because my friend who told me I sound northern said grits taste like wallpaper paste. Yes, she said that, even though she has never eaten wall paper paste.  Me either, but I know grits are much, much better than wall paper paste.  I know that because I am NOT northern.  Grits are the glue that hold a southerner together while they wallpaper their entire house, and line their cupboards with the leftover paper.

 See what I mean?  Nothing intelligent, meaningful, deep or profound about what I just wrote, but boy can I write sarcasm.  I did not just say, "Man, this wallpaper paste sure tastes a lot like grits. Maybe I'll put some sugar on it."  Oh...now that's a new chapter in the book of sarcasm.  Sugar and grits should not cohabitate in the same bowl.  Cheese and grits in the same bowl.  That's fine and dandy.  Cheese, grits, a little bacon grease for flavor if real butter is not available...fine and dandy.  NO SUGAR allowed with grits.  Only someone who sounds like a northerner would do such a thing.

Genetics

Sometimes I absolutely detest genetics.  If we have to cope with genetics, why can't we pick and choose which ones we will be blessed with?  If I was going to have the genetics of either one of my maternal grandparents, why couldn't it have been Grandma's?  Her quiet, gentle nature.  Her loving  tenderness.

Was it really that important to pick up the depression, the anger, the moodiness?  Did I need those genetics to make me who I am?  Wouldn't it have been better for this old world if I had been blessed with grandma's nature?  Did the world really need another depressed, angry, moody person?  Was sarcasm and meanness in short supply in October 1960?

I don't know what genetics I acquired from my dad, or his family.  Maybe I should be blaming him, if we can actually blame the bearers of genetics.  Someone told my mom that if you have a blood transfusion, it changes your genetic make up.  STICK ME A NEEDLE AND DRAIN THIS BLOOD! Ah, I know that isn't true, but what if it were so?  I might get something worse than what I deal with everyday.

Genetics are genetics, and glorious in so many ways.  After all, who doesn't love to look into the mirror and see those droopy eyes, the frown that thrives on the unsuspecting face?  You tell yourself today you will overcome the genetics that make you who you are, and then, and then, well...and then you don't.

Footprints

I love to hear Greyson running through the house.  I hear those little chubby feet pitter patter from one end of the house to the other.  Along with the pitter patter is the baby chatter.  Wonderful sounds that are part of my day.

Those little feet leave footprints on the freshly mopped floor, and when he escapes from the bathtub without getting dried off, wet little footprints mark where he has been.  Footprints that will be mopped up, dried up, and soon forgotten.

It's the footprints on my heart that will never go away.  Grandkids open our hearts door, and just walk right in.  Pitter, patter, pitter, patter, little things that matter.

Words

That's it!  That's final!  I am going to write my own dictionary.  It's either do that, or finally give in and acknowledge that some words I've known since childhood just are not words.  At least not words that Mr Webster knew when he wrote the dictionary.  Mr Webster never met my family apparently, because my family knows words that Mr Webster doesn't know.

We all know how the first dictionary was created.  Mr and Mrs Webster just kept talking, one word leading to another, and soon they had a book of words. They defined them all, submitted them to a publisher, the book was printed, and today we still refer back to Websters Dictionary.  The publisher, like the Websters, apparently didn't know my family either, because he/she left out a large quantity of words.

Some of these words that really are words, are not words that are recognized in the Scrabble and Words with Friends dictionaries.  That just frustrates me, because these are words that I have known my entire life.  Who do I need to talk to about getting these words in the book?