In the name of pretty

When I read Helen's post about late-night TV commercials, I was reminded of another commercial I saw recently. Over time we’ve all become familiar with TV ads for a well-known brand of undergarments for people who, shall we say, have bladder control issues.

The older I get, the faster I need to move after that first little urge hits me, so let me state up front that it’s reassuring to know that this type of undergarment is available. I hope I never need this product, but I won’t make fun of anybody who does. (Unless, of course, it’s the occasional astronaut who wears adult diapers to save time when she travels to kidnap her boyfriend’s other girlfriend.)

What caught my attention about the new commercial is the statement that their product is now available in prints and colors. Heh. Heh-heh-heh. Bwahahahahaha! Talk about putting lipstick on a pig!

Do you think the new colors and prints were requested by consumers? If not, can you imagine the sales genius of the ad man who managed to sell this idea to the product manufacturer? He must have been some VIP’s son or brother-in-law.

Now, I’m sure there are sexy, vibrant women in all parts of the world who use this product and whose partners understand the reality of the situation and find the women as desirable as ever. But I’m willing to bet the diapers, plain, colored or printed, disappear before any lovemaking gets too steamy.

I’ve been trying to imagine all sorts of scenarios involving candles, wine, batting eyelashes, and a healthy adult male’s reaction to the sight of fancy-printed diaper-panties. So far, every scenario I’ve come up with makes me laugh.

Do you think this is as funny as I do, or is my sense of humor just way too twisted? Am I the only one who thinks that even if she might be grateful to have these absorbent panties someday in the (hopefully distant) future, she won’t be deliberately showing them off to anyone just because they’re prettier now?

Maybe the colors and prints aren’t for others, you say. Maybe they’re to build the self esteem of the wearer. Hmm. Maybe. Whatever works, I suppose.

I guess it all depends on your point of view.

Something in the air

My house apparently sits directly under the flight path from Baton Rouge (our state capital) to the oil-challenged Louisiana Gulf Coast. This year, along with the usual summertime sounds of chirping birds and buzzing insects, we regularly hear the whup-whup-whup of helicopters overhead. I don’t know whether the frequent flyers are government officials or news reporters, only that so many of them fly over each day that Butch and Kadi no longer pay the slightest attention to them.

Of course, this isn’t the dogs’ first exposure to the whirlybirds. The many helicopters that flew overhead during hurricanes Katrina (2005) and Gustav (2008) may have desensitized them to the sound.

To me, though, that sound is still a little unsettling, especially when two or more helicopters are traveling together. It isn't the noise that bothers me; they fly high enough to keep from creating a disturbance. It's the sound itself. Somehow, in my mind, the clacking of those propellors has morphed into an aural symbol of suffering and urgency, and I feel just a little bit anxious every time I hear it.

It’s been a rough five years here in Southeast Louisiana.

Favorites: a matter of taste

I keep a loose list of things to blog about; otherwise, I'll forget them. Apparently, that practice isn't too helpful, because a recent review of old posts proved I've already written about some of the things on my current list of blog ideas.

Okay, so I'll scratch 'em off. For now. I can't promise some old theme won't show up again.

I did discover, in going through the old posts, that some of them feel special to me, and I decided to list them as "favorites" in the left sidebar, underneath the archives. It wasn't too difficult to differentiate between the posts I "phoned in" and the ones I really wanted to write. But it was tough choosing favorites. So many old posts seemed as comfortable and familiar to slip into as the old pair of sandals I'm wearing now.

I made a long list and winnowed it down to twenty-five, not at all sure I'd come up with the same list if I were to do this exercise again. These posts are "favorite" only because they're special to me in some way. Some of them are about feelings or experiences, some make me nostalgic. Some were just plain fun to write, and some wouldn't be special at all except for the wonderful comments left by you, dear readers.

I tried to list these posts chronologically, with the oldest posts at the top so there wouldn't be any spoilers, but Blogger doesn't seem to offer that option. So, they're in alphabetical order, which, I guess, turns out to be pretty random after all.

I know that the fact these are my favorite posts doesn't mean they'll be yours. But maybe, if you're new to this blog, you might enjoy some of them. Or, if you're a long-time reader who visits here on a day when I haven't posted anything fresh, instead of hurrying to click the back-button, maybe you'll read something you've forgotten and give me a pass.

Will I ever be mature enough to control inappropriate laughter?

A couple of weeks ago I posted about the floater that had suddenly popped up in my right eye. It was annoying, but I wasn't worried about it.

On the night after I wrote the "floater post," I started experiencing flashes of light -- tiny, moving, macaroni-shaped lightsabers -- when I'd go from a bright room into a darker one. The flashes weren't particularly bothersome, so my initial plan was to ignore them. But it was the weekend by then, there was plenty of time to nose around on the Internet, and almost every article I read said something to the effect of, "It's usually nothing to worry about, but if you don't get immediate medical attention, there may be dire consequences."

On Monday I called a retinal specialist (I have early-stage macular degeneration and had been to this office once before) and ended up there again on Tuesday. That appointment went well. The doctor said he couldn't see any signs of a serious problem but wanted me to come back again in two weeks and then again in a month. "Sometimes these things take a while to appear."

I was fairly perturbed about having to go back for follow-up exams. Because they dilate my eyes at every appointment, someone has to go with me to drive me home.  This means one or the other of my daughters has to take off work, which, while it makes all the waiting-room time more interesting for me, makes me feel guilty for wasting a big chunk of their time.

Anyway, this past Wednesday was the two-week follow-up.  I expected we'd breeze in and out fairly quickly. Instead, the doctor found a little retinal tear. He explained the significance of it, then told us he'd need to do a laser procedure to "spot weld" the area to prevent a retinal detachment. Fortunately, he could to do it that day, right there in his office.

So, we waited again. We waited a long time, and then another long time after that.  At one point, Kim said, "I wonder what's taking so long."  I replied, "Hmmph. He's probably sitting in his office reading up on laser procedures." Kim instantly put her hands in the typing position and said aloud as she typed in the air, "How... to... do... laser... surgery... on..."

Maybe you had to be there to appreciate the humor, or maybe it was because I was a little nervous, but the air-Googling struck me really funny. I laughed out loud, then Kim did, and it turned into one of those moments that grew funnier the longer we thought about it.

Right then was when the doctor came in, and his first words were, "I'm sorry you've had to wait so long." A wave of humor hit me again. I was sitting in the exam chair, my head was tilted waaaaay back, the doctor was standing right beside me with the laser instrument in his hand, ready to go, and my lips were clamped together so tightly that my smile must have looked like a maniacal grimace. Just as the doctor leaned in over my head, I couldn't hold it any longer and let out one short burst of laughter.

"I'm sorry," I apologized. "We were talking about something funny just before you came in, and I need a second to regain my composure."

The doctor chuckled, too, presumably because laughter is infectious.  "That's okay," he said.  "I expect you'll stop laughing as soon as we begin."

He was right. But as soon as we were safely back in the car, it got funny all over again.

My purpose in life...

...at least from the perspective of Butch and Kadi, has been made clear to me: I am their maid.

Judging from their recent behavior, it's a good thing I retired when I did. They adapted so quickly to my being home all the time that I suspect they may have had previous discussions about their need to hire additional staff. Part-time help just wouldn't cut it anymore.

For example, Kadi has always loved to have her belly scratched, and I've always loved to do that for her.  But she used to wait until I'd sit down on the sofa to roll over at my feet and expose her belly.  Now she's just as likely to race past me when I walk through the house, hurl her big body across my path, flop onto her back right in front of me and stretch all four legs into the air as if to demand, "Stop! Scratch me now."  I don't think this has as much to do with the itchiness of Kadi's abdomen as it has to do with my increased availability.

An issue that's bigger than the belly-scratch-tripping-hazard is the way they manipulate me for treats.  Especially Butch.  Years ago I thought it made sense to give each of them a treat when they came back in the house after taking care of their doggy business in the yard.  I wanted them to be happy to come in quickly when I called them.  This was especially important when I was working and their outside time was often a quick trip in the morning or sandwiched into a lunch hour.

Once I retired, though, Butch, began asking  to go outside many, many, many times a day.  He's always had a bladder like a bathtub.  Unlike Kadi, he still does.  So I've tried to ignore him when I know he's been out only a short time ago.  But he's persistent.  He'll stand at the door and scratch it every ten seconds or so for as long as it takes to wear me down.  My daughter suggested that if I let Butch stay outside longer, he might not ask to go out so frequently.  But for Butch it's not about being outside; he's an inside dog through and through.  The whole bunch of us can be outside, and Butch will ask to go in by himself. It's all about coming back in. It's about the treat.

It's hard to relax with all of the extra interruptions.  I mean, come on, Butch doesn't just pop outside and pop back in again.  He's blind.  It takes him a while to find the perfect spot to squeeze out two or three drops to prove he needed to pee and another little while to find the back door again.   I often have to stand in the door and clap my hands to help him navigate. I'm trying to figure out how to communicate to Butch that it would be easier on both of us if he'd just learn to ask for a treat and stop the whole fake in-and-out thing.

I know Butch is faking it because I can predict when he's going to do it.  Example:  Both dogs stand at my knees while I eat my meal, and usually, if it's something that isn't bad for them, I will give the last two bites to them.  Kadi considers her bite a treat.  Butch considers his an appetizer.  He'll wait about one minute before he goes to scratch on the back door.  Every. Single. Time.

But maybe Butch is getting tired of the charade, too.

The other morning I woke up about five-thirty and let the dogs outside. As soon as they came back in, I gave them each a dog biscuit, then went back to bed.  Usually, they'd go back to bed, too, and maybe they did, for a while.  All I know is that just before seven I heard a little whine and there they both were, tap-dancing eagerly beside my bed.  I knew they couldn't possibly need to go outside again so soon, but I stumbled out of bed and headed to the back door anyway. I opened the door and stood waiting, finally realizing I was alone.

I turned around and there were Butch and Kadi, twenty feet behind me, standing side-by-side with their noses stretched upward to the package of rawhide chews I'd left on the dining table. Because they did this together, I can only assume they had discussed their plan beforehand and agreed between themselves that it was perfectly fine to wake me up to to give them rawhide.

If I'm being honest, the unnecessary interruptions bother me, but it's the manipulation that bothers me more. It's the fact that Butch thinks he's so much smarter than I am.  And Kadi probably is smarter than I am, but it hurts my feelings that she uses that against me.

Seriously, although I've groused about some of their annoying habits here, I am loving spending more time with these two old dogs.  Butch turned twelve in March, Kadi will be thirteen in June, and I'm no spring chicken myself.  I consider it a privilege to grow old with these two sweet souls.

Even if they do take advantage of me.  

Beware of deceitful Flemishallies

During the time I was AWOL from this blog, I found plenty of activities to keep me busy. Some of them were things I chose to do, but at least one tedious task was a result of switching from a PC to a Mac.

Some of you know that genealogy is a passion for me, one that began when I found some notes my grandmother left behind when she died in late-1988. The genealogy software I used for for all those years was Family Tree Maker. It did a wonderful job of organizing family records and creating interesting reports, and I couldn’t have been happier with it. What I didn’t know until I’d decided to buy the iMac is that Family Tree Maker isn’t available for Macs.

So, based on online reviews, I purchased Reunion genealogy software for Mac the same day I bought the new computer. Reunion, too, does a fine job, and it was really easy to transfer my family file from Family Tree Maker to Reunion. All the names, dates and places made the move flawlessly. The notes, however, were a different story. Those pages and paragraphs of narrative attached to many of the names didn’t make the transition as smoothly. All the words of the notes were transferred, but many of the spaces between the words didn’t make it.

After more than 20 years of research, there are 6,787 names in my genealogy database now, and I had to go through them all one by one, read every word of every note, and insert spaces as needed. It was extremely time-consuming but, most of the time, not too difficult.

Then came a sentence that stumped me: “He was betrayed by his Flemishallies.” What? What the heck are Flemishallies and how did they betray him? A quick second glance made it obvious I needed to insert a space: "Flemish allies."

Everything in the database is back in order, which pleases me immensely. Still, I must admit that thinking about Flemishallies pleases me almost as much, in a whimsical way. I imagine them as some kind of magical, mildly malevolent creatures of the sort Harry Potter might have encountered in the woods around Hogwarts.

I think that in the future, on those days when one thing after another seems to go wrong, I might choose to blame it on the Flemishallies. It would take some pressure off me, and, after all, it wouldn’t be the first time they’ve caused trouble for my family.

A Brief History of an Early Romance

I thought he was a handsome prince
Who'd take me to his castle.
Turned out he was a vagabond
And something of an ass'le.

One more eye-doctor story...

...before I forget to tell you:

It had been more than five years since I'd had my vision checked, so when my daughter said she needed to get her eyes examined, I went with her.

The beginning of the exam was fairly typical of what I’d experienced in the past. I pushed my face into the giant-goggle machine and rested my chin on the cold metal bar. First, the doctor darkened the room. She looked at the inside of my eyes while I looked first in one direction, then another. She caused little puffs of air to blow onto my eyeballs. Then she asked me to read several rows of letters on the light box on the far wall. That went fairly well.

While the room light was still off, the doctor went to the far end of the room and fiddled with something I couldn’t see. (My face was still pressed into the machine.) When she turned back to me, the following conversation took place:

Doc:     “Can you see this?”

Me:      “Yes.”

What I saw was a large, dark area that almost totally obscured the light box.  On the dark area I could see a red rectangle and a neon-green rectangle, both kind of shadowy, and both with something written on them in a large, unfamiliar script.

Doc:     “Okay, read what you see.”

Me:      “Well, I can see it, but I don't know if I can read it.”

Doc:     “Just try to read whatever you can.”

Me:      “Okay. ‘You. Are. Something something something. To God.’”

Doc:     “Uhhhh, okay, wait a minute.”

She leaned in to the machine and made some adjustments.

Doc:     “Okay, let's see if this is better.”

Me:      “It’s still not very clear, but I’ll try: ‘You are. Never. Something something to God.’”

At that point the doctor shook her head as if she were totally confused, then turned around to get another look at what I was reading. That’s when she burst out laughing and announced that she’d inadvertently left a cabinet door open. The large, dark shape I saw was the inside of the cabinet door, which opened directly in front of the light box. The red and green rectangles were brightly colored sheets of paper taped to the inside of the door, each one bearing a handwritten affirmation.

Apparently, when I was saying, “You are something something something to God,” the doctor was hearing, “U-R-something-something-something-2-God.” To her, it sounded like letters and numbers. She said later she had thought I must be “blind as a bat,” and she couldn’t imagine why I kept saying “God” after I messed up.

The rest of the exam proceeded normally, except that neither of us could restrain an occasional fit of giggles.

Float like a butterfly, er, mosquito

When I went to get my vision checked in November last year, the optometrist referred me to an ophthalmologist to check out "some things going on" in my eyes.  Both doctors mentioned the presence of "floaters." Since the floaters weren't in my line of vision, and since the doctors told me they were very common, I wasn't the least bit concerned.

All that changed late Thursday night.  A new floater popped up, one that appears to be hovering about three inches in front and just to the right of my right eye.  It's a group of little black "threads" that have joined together to look like a side view of a fairly large mosquito.  I've known a couple of other people who have had floaters, and they've told me, "Eventually, I got used to it."  I'm counting on that.

In the meantime, it's driving me insane.  I never realized how many tiny eye movements are involved in the routine business of life, but there are thousands of them. And with each little upward or downward or left-to-right flicker, this bug-thing darts in front of me.  Have you ever used a computer mouse that wasn't adjusted correctly so that the slightest movement of the mouse made the cursor jump clear across the screen?  That's how this floater moves.

It's distracting when I read, although its position keeps it from blocking the words I need to see.    If I'm reading the left-hand page of a book, the floater flutters around on the right-hand page.  If I'm reading the right-hand page, the floater crawls around on my hand.  It flies all over the place when I'm looking at the computer screen.

Yesterday, after drinking a cold Diet Coke, I glanced into the glass and saw a "bug" sitting on the pile of ice cubes.   I moved my eyes and, in my peripheral vision, saw it fly away.

The floater is much less noticeable when I watch TV as it seems to get lost in the motion.  I noticed the same thing yesterday when I was driving; it didn't bother me at all.  Maybe I need to do more things that involve movement.

Or maybe I'll just wait and see if I get used to it.


SPEAKING OF EYES...
Doctors who advertise on television fascinate me.  They are probably quite competent in the performance of their professional services, but often their amateurish commercials make them seem to lack confidence.

On the other hand, there's one local eye surgeon who speaks with assurance of his abilities and of his experience:  "more than 20,000 Lasik surgeries."  He makes me believe he's  probably quite good at what he does.  Still, there's just something about him...

I can't let March slip away...

...without announcing the birth of John Owen Hoover, born on the 16th day of this month to my granddaughter, Kalyn, and her husband, Adam.  I am in love with this tiny, sweet boy.

The photo above was taken by his Aunt Michelle about an hour after his birth.  Now, at two weeks old, Owen is fine and healthy.  So is his mother.  I'm so proud of his mom and dad, the kind of home they've made for their son, and the kind of parents they're already proving to be.

I realize that this event officially makes me a great-grandmother, and as old as that sounds when I say it, I can't think of any new title I'd be happier to hold.

I think my daughter Kelli feels the same way about becoming a grandmother.  If her feet ever touch the ground again, I'll ask her, just to be sure.

(Thanks, Michelle and Kelli, for the use of your photos.)

It's harder than it used to be

Blogging, that is. And dealing with changes, too.

My retirement gift to myself was a new computer. Having nearly pulled my hair out over repeated virus problems at home and at work, I took my daughter Kim's advice and bought an iMac. I'm very satisfied with the computer itself, but what I failed to realize was that some of my favorite software isn't available for Mac systems.

I like to write my blog posts in a word-processing program (where editing is easier) and transfer them to Blogger for posting. There used to be a version of WordPerfect (my old favorite word-processing standby) for Mac, but there isn't anymore. When I bought the new computer, I had to decide between Pages and Microsoft Word. I knew I wasn't nuts about Word, so I chose the less expensive Pages. So far I've been able to do everything I've needed in Pages, but it's always taken longer than it would have in WordPerfect. (Maybe I need to read that manual I bought instead of relying on the trial-and-error method.)

Also, the little keyboard that comes with iMac, streamlined and quiet as it is, isn't as comfortable for me as an older style keyboard. The keys are full-sized on the new keyboard, but they're closer together, too. The problems were worse because the arthritis in my right hand has increased during the last year. When I hold my hand flat and try to put my fingers together, there's a distinct "V" space between my middle finger and ring finger from the fingertips to the second joint. That made it very easy to type a semi-colon instead of an "l" on the closely spaced keys. For example, if I'd had the holiday spirit, I might have typed: "Deck the ha;;s with boughs of ho;;y; fa ;a ;a ;a ;a ;a ;a ;a ;a!" Fortunately, Kim came up with a spare, older-model keyboard that has made it much easier to keep my fingers where they're supposed to be.

Today I decided to do a little blog housekeeping and clean up the sidebar. Much to my surprise, somebody apparently broke Blogger while I was gone. The "drag and drop" page elements neither drag nor drop. I was able to edit existing elements, but I couldn't add anything to the sidebar, and I couldn't move anything from one spot to the other.

Have you experienced this problem, too? Do you know of other things that have changed about Blogger in the last year? Any good new features I might enjoy? Or bad things I may not have discovered yet?

Any tips will be appreciated.

2009: Spectacular in its suckitude!

Come on, Ryan Seacrest and the rest of you New Year’s revelers, let’s send up some balloons, throw bags of confetti, and fill the midnight sky with fireworks. Whatever we need to do to escort 2009 to the exit door, let’s get on with it. Let’s kick this past year to the curb, dust off our hands and heave a big sigh of relief. Goodbye and good riddance!

Okay, I’m forced to admit that a few good things happened in 2009, but if I actually took the time to make lists, my list of good things would be shorter than my list of bad ones. I suspect that’s true for many of you.

On the good side, our family was blessed with two new babies (Jaydon Cole in June and Henley Blake in November), and another baby boy, my much anticipated first great-grandchild, was conceived and is scheduled to arrive in March of 2010. I couldn't be happier about that.

We’ve had a couple of serious illnesses in our human family this year, but we’ve survived them. Illnesses would go on the bad list, but I guess they’d be balanced by survival on the good list.

Definitely on the bad list are the losses of two prominent members of our fur family this year. BeBe, my mother’s dog that was adopted by my daughter Kelli following Mother’s death ten years ago, died this summer. BeBe suffered from epileptic seizures her entire life, nearly 15 years, and almost every time she went to the vet in the last eight years, they predicted her imminent death. Somehow she held on until this year. Then, just days before Christmas, my daughter Kim’s little Yorkie, Winston, whose funny, furry face you’ve seen on these pages before, died suddenly from anaphylactic shock following an injection to relieve a bout of back pain he experienced occasionally. This was a hard loss, one that will sit heavily on our hearts for a long time. It might have been BeBe’s time to go, but I can’t believe it was Winston’s.


On the good list (knock on wood), the rest of our fur-babies, including my beloved Butch and Kadi, are doing well.

A couple of the prior posts I’ve managed to eke out this year referred to my retirement. Retirement has definitely been a good-list thing, though it hasn’t been the smooth sailing I had expected it to be. I never thought I would spend so many hours sitting in doctors‘ offices while they tried to pinpoint the origin of confusing blood test results. First they knew exactly what the problem was; now they’re not so sure. As an unexpected trip to the emergency room yesterday confirmed in my mind, the treatment thus far has been worse than the disease. I was feeling pretty good before all this medical speculation began and still feel very well most days, though I’m now identifying strongly with that poor, maligned creature, the guinea pig. The unexpected medical infringement on my time lies squarely on the bad list.

I’d be neglectful if I didn’t add a couple of other minor items to the good list:

• We finally got a traffic light at the scary intersection near my house. It feels wonderful to be able to travel the shortest route home without taking my life in my hands.

• I’ve only bought three tanks of gas since I retired at the end of July and still have more than three-fourths of the third one.

• The parish is building a brand-new branch of the library about a mile from my house. Since my retirement income won’t support my book-buying habit, this is great news.

• There’s been a big increase in the number of flocks of ducks and geese flying over my yard this year, and I've loved seeing their V-formations and hearing the wildness of their calls. Despite a couple of avid hunters I still consider friends, these birds in flight symbolize hope and freedom to me, and I cheer them on to safety as they fly.

Back to the bad list, we've had week after week of constant rain. On the good list, I didn't have to get up and go to work in any of it.

2009 got off to a good start, I thought, with the historic inauguration of Barack Obama as the first African-American president of the United States. Even as I put this on my good list, I have to wonder if President Obama is still putting it on his. He may have some doubts by now.

There isn’t enough time left in 2009 to list all the bad stuff I’ve seen on the news this year, and I know from reading your blogs that some of you have struggled fiercely to climb your own mountains. I must say I’ve been impressed with the dignity with which you’ve faced your challenges and the honesty with which you’ve shared them with us, your readers. Your problems go on my bad list, but your courage and humanity go very near the top of the good one.

My blogging productivity (a grand total of nine posts for 2009, counting this one) was so pathetic that I may have to start a third list, a list of bad things that are also embarrassing. Way up on the good list, though, will be the fellow bloggers who kept me on their blog rolls in spite of my poor performance.

I’m thankful that the year is over and hopeful that someday I’ll be able to look back and remember some sort of valuable insight I may have gained in 2009. Right now nothing comes to mind.

I do know I’m happy for the chance to begin again in a new year, a new decade even. I’m ready to pull my head out of the semi-dark place where it’s been hibernating and take a fresh look around.

Next year I’ll tidy up this neglected old blog and tell you what I see, okay?

Happy New Year!

I'm not the only one getting older

The granddogs have been staying with me since last Thursday afternoon, when Kim and some of her friends took their Harleys and left for Sturgis, South Dakota. Her little dogs and my big ones are used to being together during the daytime, but it’s been interesting to watch them adjust their nighttime routines to accommodate each other.

My Kadi stopped sleeping with me about six months ago, preferring to sleep on the cool floor of the hall just outside my bedroom. Kim’s Lucy, on the other hand, thinks sleeping in the bed with me is a great idea, and Kadi isn’t willing to let Lucy have the spot that used to be hers. What neither Kadi nor I knew was that things have changed in the last six months.

Kadi can no longer jump up on my bed. She tried twice and failed both times, hanging on with the nails of her front paws while her back feet tried to gain some purchase to help her pull herself up. The expression on her face when she couldn’t do it made me feel sad for her.

So, for as long as Lucy is here, and longer if Kadi wants, our bedtime routine has changed. After the goodnight treats, after the last drinks of water, I climb into bed and Lucy jumps in after me. Butch makes a few circles on his bed, then settles down in the middle of it. Winston searches over the entire bedroom, trying one spot, then another, before finding the perfect Yorkie-sized nook beneath the window. Kadi stands in the hall, watching everybody get comfortable. Only then does she approach my bed and focus intently on my face. That’s my cue to get back out of bed, put Kadi’s front paws on top of the mattress, hook my arms together under her Big-Bertha butt, and boost her up.

She doesn’t stay long, half an hour maybe; the hall is still her favorite place to sleep. She just needs to be in my bed long enough to make her point, and I need to put her there so she’ll know she doesn’t have to handle her infirmities alone.

Retirement: beginning the settling in phase

Retirement feels weird so far. As much as I've looked forward to it, now that it's here I feel like I'm cheating. Playing hooky. Shirking responsibilities. There's just something about the concept of never going to work again that's mind-boggling.

Maybe this is just a transitional phase, a rare period of time in which the final paycheck overlaps the newfound freedom. Right now I'm not experiencing any consequences of walking away from a perfectly good job. Maybe in a couple of weeks, when penny-pinching becomes my full-time occupation, I'll struggle at least enough to feel as if I'm paying a fair price for the privilege of being a woman of leisure.

I have big plans for the month of August. I'll schedule appointments with the dentist for a cleaning, the women's clinic for a mammogram, and the orthopedist to see for sure if I need knee replacement surgery. My family doctor urged me to take care of those last two items way back in March, and I no longer have an excuse not to do it. I'll also drag my reluctant behind to the gym to explore the idea of setting up a series of exercises to strengthen my upper leg muscles in case the knee surgery becomes a reality. I'm not looking forward to any of those things.

One immediate project that does excite me is the plan to clean out and totally restock my pantry so I can start cooking and baking again. Years ago, when I was a stay-at-home mom, I enjoyed the creativity of planning interesting, tasty meals, and I think I'll enjoy it again. Cooking for one won't be the same as cooking for a family, but it's bound to beat the frozen and take-out dinners I've become used to in recent years.

Prolonged grocery shopping (or shopping of any kind) does a number on my knees, so the plan is to break down the grocery list into several parts and string out the shopping over several days. One day I'll buy canned goods, the next day I'll buy spices, the next will be baking ingredients, and so on. My theory is that shopping this way will allow me to go to a single location in the store, gather up the items on my abbreviated list, and check out in the 20-items-and-under aisle. Today was dogfood-and-treats day (because we were out of rawhide strips), which has made me fairly popular with the pups this afternoon. I'll let you know how the rest of this plan works out.

There are some long-term projects that excite me, too, but they'll have to wait until some of the more immediate stuff is out of the way.

And there was one more goal, an important one and a big motivator in my decision to retire, that I hoped would be an easy one to achieve. Since it's after six p.m. and I won't be going out again tonight, I think it's safe to consider it already accomplished: I've made it through this entire day without once feeling the urge to call someone an a$$#ole.

Hmm. Maybe I can get used to this.

Sad goodbyes and new beginnings

As of quittin' time today, I am officially retired. It seemed like this day would never come until about two weeks ago, then time started snowballing so fast it was hard to find time to take a breath.

Even in those last two speedy weeks, every time I thought about retiring I was all "Yeeeee-haaaaaw!" That was the way I felt when I arrived at work this morning, but half an hour later everything changed. My head was still excited, but my heart jumped up and demanded to express its own opinion, turning on the tear ducts in the process. I hate saying goodbye.

The people I work with are my good friends, my confidants, the ones who are first on any given day to sense what kind of mood I'm in and help me shake off any cranky ones. I would miss them terribly if I let them slip away, and I'm determined to stay in touch. We've been a good team.

And, speaking of missing friends, I've missed some of you folks in the blogosphere more than you could ever imagine. It's going to be a really busy weekend (lots of loose ends to tie up), but near the very top of my list of Things to Do in the Retirement Years is dusting the cobwebs off this old blog.

I'll be back here Monday to try to shake some life into it. See you then.

Forgive me, Blogger, for I have sinned

It's been three months since my last confession post.

Holy crap! I cannot believe the time has flown by so quickly, but I hope the next 74 days will pass at the same warp speed.

My last post was written on the day I told my boss that I plan to retire at the end of July. I didn't want to be specific when I posted about that decision, because I wanted him to have time to process my unexpected announcement privately, so he could think about how it would affect his own plans. After a few weeks of weighing the pros and cons of each of his options, he has decided to retire at the same time I do.

I had always thought my boss would be ready to retire by this year (he's a couple of years older than I am), and I'd planned to stop working when he did. Instead, he just kept plugging away with no talk of stopping. When the image of the Energizer bunny began popping into my head every time I looked at him, I knew it was time for me to make the first move. My decision wasn't sudden. I'd been having happy thoughts about the idea of retirement for at least three years, as this short post written in January of 2006 demonstrates.

Anyway, even with five and a half months' notice, the process of getting ready to do the actual deed has kept me in some kind of an A.D.D. whirlwind. There are so many lists in my head, things I have to do at work, things I have to do at home, that I can't think straight enough to write a blog post in one sitting. Reading, a favorite activity, takes more concentration than I can muster for more than a few pages at a time. About the only thing I seem to be able to do easily these days is watch TV; then, if I'm distracted by the mental lists, I can just hit the rewind button and try to catch the story line the second time around.

My bad knees have also become a blog deterrent. After sitting at a desk all day with my knees bent, it's hard (and painful) to straighten them out when I want to stand up. Adding a couple of evening hours at the home computer desk makes walking afterward extremely difficult. Obviously, something had to give. Choosing between the job and the blog was almost a no-brainer, but until the job ends, I'll have to put the blog on the back burner.

In the meantime, I'll make a conscience effort to write at least a short post every now and then to let you know I'm still alive and kicking. Except for the knee thing, I'm fine, as are Butch and Kadi, whose status as elder dogs is one more reason why I'm looking forward to staying home.

I miss all of you and try my best to keep up with you by reading your blogs. Thanks to those of you who have reached out to me through comments and e-mail; it means a lot to know you've noticed my absence, and I'll try to make it up to you with better posts somewhere down the line.

Testing, testing, 1, 2

Tonight I feel like the performer who arrives late and steps onto the stage after the show's over, the lights have been dimmed, and everybody's gone home. I'm standing here alone, squinting my eyes to see all the way to the cheap seats. Is there anybody out there?

In the month since I last posted, I've been engaged in an internal struggle, the origin of which I couldn't readily identify at first. Introvert that I am, I had to circle my emotional wagons and mull everything over by a slow-burning mental campfire until I could sort out specifically what was bothering me and figure out what to do about it. It isn't anything I can talk about yet, but I did reach a decision.

My second husband (the good one), told me early in our marriage that his father once told him to remember the following words of wisdom: "Over 35, do; under 35, don't." As much as I distrust generalities, this advice has proved through the years to be reliable. I'm way over 35, and today I did it. Not all the way yet, but at least I set things in motion.

While I was deeply ensconced in the "should-I-or-shouldn't-I" mode, a fellow blogger unwittingly gave me a little nudge. That would be Patsy, who posted this cartoon. Thanks, Patsy, I needed that.

I already feel a hundred pounds lighter.

Yes we can -- feel the magic

If I am fortunate enough to be spared the ravages of Alzheimer’s in my last years, I will remember the events of the next few days always. We live in an amazing time. History is being made, and I can sense it in the very air around me.

This morning I watched the first legs of President-elect Obama’s train rally from Pennsylvania to Washington. It was good to see him standing tall and smiling as he and Joe Biden waved from the back of the train to throngs of people who waited at the station, but it wasn’t he who inspired me today. Today I was moved to tears by the faces of all those people, young and old, black and white, bundled up in hats and coats and waiting for hours to share one brief moment of hope and promise.

Journalists on the train reported passing through rural areas, places where there was no obvious sign of habitation, only to spot one person standing by the edge of the woods or two on a barely visible rooftop, waiting for the train to pass. Those people waited for nothing more than to experience this moment today and share it with their children and grandchildren through all their tomorrows.

*******

Near noon, I rode into Baton Rouge with my daughter to take Lucy and Winston to the groomer. At the exit ramp where we left the interstate, a familiar figure sat on the grass to our left. He’s a thirty-something white man, shabby but not desperate looking, who has been somewhere near that underpass nearly every time I’ve been to Baton Rouge in the past year. Whenever I see the man, I also see his big, brown dog, the faithful companion who stays so close beside him that some part of the dog always touches some part of the man.

The man keeps long hours in his open-air workplace, displaying the kind of hard work and dedication that would earn him a good living if he were to apply the same effort in the business world. I don’t know his circumstances. I won’t judge him.

My daughter and I waited in the right-hand lane to make our turn. In the left-hand lane, nearest the man with the dog, a late-model SUV pulled up to the red light and stopped. In the next instant, our attention was diverted by someone running past us.

The driver of the SUV had left her vehicle with the door wide open and was running in high heels back toward the man. We couldn’t see her face, but she seemed to be a young person. She was nicely dressed and had long, straight black hair and skin the shade of brown that made me think she might be of Hispanic or middle-eastern origin.

When she reached the man, she handed him some money, but she didn’t do it in an impersonal way. She stopped and petted the dog, then reached out and hugged the man before she ran back to her car as the light changed.

High as I still was on the passion of all those people on TV who waited for a glimpse of Barack Obama, I burst into tears again. I wish that young woman knew how much she moved us today, not by her donation to the homeless man, but by her acknowledgment of his humanity.

**********

The new administration has requested that Americans consider Martin Luther King Jr. Day as a day of national service. I love to think about how much we can accomplish as a nation when we all work together. There's even a website (www.volunteermatch.org) to help us locate agences in our own communities who can use some help.

I checked out what’s available near my own zip code and found a few things even an older lady with bad knees might be able to do, but nothing I’m ready to commit to on a long-term basis. What I can do for this Monday, though, is go through my closet and pull out some of the perfectly good clothes I never wear (too small, mostly), clean them if they need it, pack them in the nice set of luggage I never use, box up a couple dozen hard-cover books that are taking up space, and drop off the whole kit and caboodle at the local Goodwill store. It may not reach the level of personal sacrifice a lot of people will make, but at least it’s a step in the right direction.

Domestic disturbance

It was the kind of incident that, had they been famous, the paparazzi would have loved to capture on film and sell to the tabloids: a sudden flare-up of violence behind the closed doors of a home where love and peace are the norm. The fact that it may have been born of frustration repressed for years does not excuse the assault.

Those of us in the family have been aware for a long time that she has a tendency to mind his business. We've seen her manipulate him to get what she wants. We've watched her lord it over him occasionally, and even, once in a while, make no attempt whatsoever to hide her embarrassment at his overly friendly interactions with others. We've talked about these things behind their backs, and we pretty much all agree that she doesn't behave this way out of malice. It's just that she has a strong personality, and she's always absolutely certain that she knows better than he does what's right and what's wrong.

Maybe he got tired of it. The thing is, though, he's never given us the slightest indication that her dictatorial nature might get on his nerves. He's an easy-going guy. He's always seemed to tolerate her affectionately, leaving those of us who know them well to admire his "don't-sweat-the-small-stuff" attitude.

There was no sign of tension between them at bedtime, when they passed by one another with scant notice as we all performed our nighttime rituals. Nor did anything seem out of the ordinary when I accidentally woke them at four-thirty in the morning. I got out of bed and tiptoed to the bathroom, hoping not to disturb them, but by the time I was finished, they were wide awake. They answered nature's call, too, then poked around looking for something to eat. I was ready to go back to bed, but instead I gave them cookies.

She got comfortable and nibbled her cookies leisurely. He ate his quickly, standing up all the while, then moved amiably toward her to see if she had anything left that he might eat. I didn't specifically see or hear her reaction, but I'm guessing she expressed her unwillingness to share in a way that pushed him over the edge. All I know is that something I didn't see or hear sent him into a rage.

Instantly, he was standing over her, menacing her, threatening her in his loudest, angriest voice. I can't quote him directly, but the essence of what he screamed at her was, "I am SICK and TIRED of all your CRAP, and you'd better WATCH OUT, B----!"

It was surreal. I screamed at him, "Stop it! STOP it!" and he did stop it, just as quickly as it had started. He walked away to the other side of the room, but I could tell the fight was still in him. He stood tall, shoulders back and head held high. He didn't say it in words, but his body language said quite clearly that he wasn't sorry at all. "She had it coming," his posture seemed to say. "Enough is enough."

As soon as he backed off, I turned my attention to her. She had no physical injuries, but her feelings were hurt, and she was obviously shaken. She sat erect, her body trembling, for several long minutes. As I spoke to her in what I hoped was a soothing voice, her wide, fearful eyes locked onto my own. She looked at me pleadingly, as if to ask silently whether I'd witnessed what had just happened and whether I would have believed it in a million years if I hadn't seen it for myself. I felt really sorry for her. She seemed so shocked, so confused.

I talked to both of them -- to each of them -- trying, I guess, to reassure all three of us that the anger had dissipated enough that we'd be safe to go back to bed. Finally, he headed off to sleep where he always does, and she climbed into my bed, seeking refuge. It took a while for my heart to stop pounding, but once it did, I drifted off to sleep. I imagine they had a hard time getting to sleep, too.

The next morning, before I left for work, there didn't seem to be any major tension or hostility between them, though she did snap at him once. Fortunately, he had the good sense and self-control to leave her alone. I worried about them the whole time I was away, but when I got home from work, they acted as if nothing out of the ordinary had ever happened.

Maybe they've mastered the art of living in the moment, but I can assure you that I haven't forgotten the incident. I find myself watching them more closely now, looking for undercurrents of emotion that might erupt in another explosion of violence. I never want to see that again.

I hope they can put the hard feelings behind them. After all the years they've been together, it would be devastating if their relationship broke down at this late stage of their lives. Kadi is 11 now, and Butch is 10. They've always had each other to count on, ever since they were puppies. This was the first time I've ever seen them fight.

2009 and life is fine

The holidays have been wonderful, though I'm not sure I could keep up this pace for another day. Fortunately, as my daughter pointed out earlier, this particular day that feels like a Sunday is actually only Thursday, and we have three days left to recuperate before returning to work.

The time off from work would have been much more restful if it weren't for all the people who celebrate the season with fireworks from Christmas Eve through New Year's Day -- and maybe a few more days if they haven't managed to use up their stash. So far that's nine straight nights of trembling, terror-stricken dogs who have refused to go outside from dusk until sometime in the wee hours of the morning, long after the last pop or boom. The quantity of sleep has been sufficient, but the quality of it has been poor.

There have been several days lately when I haven't even turned my computer on. Though I've checked in a few times to read my favorite blogs on the fly, I haven't stayed long enough to leave comments. I regret not having had the time to tell you individually how much I appreciate you, and I hope to spend more time with all of you in the coming days and weeks.

In the meantime, I hope your Christmas was all you wanted it to be, and I wish you the happiest 2009 possible. I have a feeling it'll be one we'll all remember.

Happy New Year. It's a wonderful world.