Hello I Must Be Going!
Just a quick post to say hello and I’ve missed you, too. I’ve been crazy busy the past few weeks so haven’t posted, but I’m okay, family is fine. Just nutso.
Mom needed some doctoring (she’s fine, no worries); I’m preparing for a couple of speeches*, and Bill and I babysat our grandkids all last week. I am telling you, older peeps, if you ever start feeling complacent about life, or as if you lack purpose, or wonder if the younger generations are deficient in any way whatsoever, please offer to babysit for an extended period of time. Then, when you go home and brush your teeth at night, and notice the mirror is splattered and needs attention and you won’t care for at least a week, or that there are no clean washcloths so you wet the corner of a towel and wash your face with that, just remind yourself that this what the kids do day in and day out. They’re such heroes.
Here’s to you, younger people! You are amazing.
If I had to go back and be young again, working fulltime in a demanding career and trying to raise a family, I’d cut myself way more slack than I did then. I wouldn’t hassle with the small stuff, to the extent possible. Because you can stretch yourself too far, and die trying.
My kids told us last night (at a victory/birthday dinner) that Grandpa and I are more attentive than them, that we dote on the grandbabies in a way that, were the parents to maintain that level, would exhaust and deplete them. I mean, they’re great parents! But I totally understand, because I’m exhausted. Also, it’s good to let the grands have some independence. They need to develop a sense of self. Were Bill and I to do it more often, we’d probably disengage a bit more, because we’d develop the courage to do so. But of course, we’d have already keeled over from Too Old to Raise Kids syndrome.
And now I must run, again! See you in a couple of weeks.
*I’ll be speaking on Monday, April 11, 2016, at the Mizell Senior Center in Palm Springs, to the WOW social group, at 10:00 a.m. I’ll be sharing inspiration and good news about aging with a positive outlook. Then on Friday, April 15, I’ll be speaking in Las Vegas at the BAM (Bloggers at Midlife) national conference about how to use your platform as bloggers to reshape the aging experience.
