Ruminating!!!!

When we were young newlyweds, we had other young newlywed friends and most weekends would find us sharing dinner at one of our rental duplexes.  One of our favorite meals was spaghetti, served by candlelight, which made our Melmac plates shine.  We all had the same single candle centerpiece.  An empty wine bottle-- globe shaped at the bottom with a long slender neck, a candle would drip colored wax that would slide down the neck, spill over at the bottom and build up layer after layer.

That southward wax slide sort of reminds me of life in the seventies.  Not the 1970's.  Being 70 something in years.  It's the years of things going south body-wise.  

It's also the years of the 4 C's- cataracts that make cobwebs and chin hair and crepe paper neck skin invisible!  What you can't see can't hurt you! 

Things purchased with a lifetime warranty information are assessed to figure out if it will for sure last your lifetime.

It's driving the highway of life and realizing you are edging over to the exit lane and the sign is saying you must exit.  Now.

Seventies are the age of summation.  You add up all the things you have done and even with brightness of hope, for do-overs, on the LifeBasket labeled- try again. one more time.  You realize- time is pretty much up.

At 60 you thought you knew a lot about life and living.  At 70 you know you know a lot about life and living.  No one cares because you have entered ghost-ville and are now invisible to the majority of people.

It's now pasture time and yes, sometimes the pasture does look greener as others dash about doing all the things that you once did on that lush green other fence side.  The women who once led Stakes and Wards and served on every committee that got mentioned and put on all sorts of extravaganzas and were forever being asked to speak or teach or take charge of something are now relegated chewing fodder.  A lot of time is spent with others in chewing the cud.  Oh, those memories of bygone times of full Church activity.  That's a mouthful!

Last week a seasoned sister, not from my Ward,  said that she didn't know why she went to RS because she wasn't learning anything new and would rather stay home but decided she had to show the young ones that it's important and she wanted to show them about endurance. 


I've heard other comments like....new people in the Ward don't even know who I am....I could easily move and not be missed...people act like I don't have a brain anymore...If I do say anything, I feel like people roll their eyes and really don't care what I think.


There is depression and some take meds to get through it.  There is painful resignation to life as it is.  There is denial that our body is actually aging.  That we are sick.  That we actually can't do what we used to be able to do.  We are tired.  As a friend told me about going on a trip and pausing for a snack and then finding a place for a nap.  In the car!  I told her we are at the "snack and nap" stage of our life.


My very own life is so blessed.  I'm of the age to be munching grass but actually I don't feel like grazing yet.  I still feel alive and am busy with both life & my Church calling.  I'm happy most of the time.  I feel ready to take on my birthday challenge, of increased health and feeling closer to the Holy Ghost, and to work hard to create a great year.  (I find it funny to think that I feel this way and yet someone else could look at me and think...poor thing.  She's delusional and doesn't know the barn is now her residence!!  

I know my friends in Pasture-Land just sort of ended up one day, not by choice, gunny sacking and never having the strength to get up and out.  

So I will keep a wary eye and make hay while the sun shines!!!!  

73!!!