THE SHRINKING WOMAN

I'm on my way down to large. I figure if I want to be a happy little old lady, the key word is little! I'm already happy, and getting older. I'm not dieting. Diets only work for a little while and then I gain back any weight I have lost. At present my face, arms and legs look fine. I simply have the shape of a pregnant woman. I suppose that is one step up from a sumo wrestler. When I was a young woman I used to call myself a broom stick with door knobs. I had no hips.  Then I had my daughter and gained an hourglass shape. I have come full circle now. I am a pear.

I am now five pounds lighter than I was when I turned 65. I'm due to be 69 next week.  I figure if I can continue to lose 5 pounds every four years, in another 24 years I will be at a weight I can really enjoy...but then I will be 93. It makes more sense to simply celebrate my new clothing size and get on with enjoying life.

A MATTER OF VALUE

I belong to a site online that sends a daily challenge to members each day. Today's challenge was to wear an outfit that instills confidence some time in the next week. I saw that as backward to my way of thinking.

 A woman from my medical insurance company called me and asked me to do a survey yesterday. She listed off things my primary care physician will want done when I make an appointment. I have no desire for most of the procedures, so I told her that for as long as my body is still my own, I will be saying no to most of the requests. My reply to a colonoscopy is, "You want to put that where?" No way. I also refuse to have my breasts ironed. I had that done once and promised myself to never do that again. Well, you get the idea. I am 68. I'm already five years older than my brother was when he died. I feel fine. We all have to die of something. How I live is far more important to me than how I die or when I die. Having someone call to try to frighten me into taking tests I don't want, isn't my idea of a healthy experience.

I helped the woman to laugh before she hung up. It's what I do. I was dressed in only a house dress and I had my dentures out at the time of the call, but I was not lacking in confidence. My personal value or ability isn't dependent on anything outside myself...other than God. It is I who give value to my clothes (and all other possessions) not they that add value to me.

TRUTH IN ADVERTISING

LIBRARY DAY

Each Wednesday a bus comes to where I live and takes me to Princeton Public Library, picking me up four hours later. Library day in the middle of the week is my Aruba. (Only another dedicated nerd will truly understand that.)  Consider this: when I was a child and decided to run away from home, I went to the library. (I've always been book smart, but not world wise.) 

I could write a post about Princeton Public Library and the wonderful services and events they have, but this blog is about being not quite seventy. As I was standing outside the library today waiting for the bus to pick me up, it dawned on me that I live everyday now as if it was my last. There are a few things about me that haven't changed since I was a child. I got my first library card before I could read. All that was required was for me to print my name on a card. I could do that. When I came home from walking with my brother to the library, I handed my mother a book and asked her to read it to me. I remember the book: BaBar the Elephant. 

My library card was my first credit card. Today it is my only credit card. (I paid off all cards in 1978 and decided to live a cash and carry life.) 

Library day insures that I will continue to read physical bound books. Each week I find a book that interests me and I go to one of the very comfortable chairs and snuggle in. Today I choose a psychological thriller THE CELLAR by Minette Walters. Since the book was only 175 pages, I finished reading it today. If I hadn't observed my weekly library day, I'm sure I wouldn't have read a book. 

I read a book today.  I read a lot online daily, but there is something really special about being able to say I read a book today. It means I unplugged and spent quiet time in a world of imagination. Me. All by myself. I'm a big girl now. I can go to the library all by myself and I can read all of the words in any of the (English) books on the shelves. 

My library has machines that will scan my library card and the books I want to borrow, so that I can now check myself out. A pre-school boy was standing in front of one of the machines, so I handed him my library card, and showed him what to do.  It was the first time he checked out any books, but his mother saw what we were doing and smiled. I'm sure she will let him do so the next time they visit the library.

OK. I don't just read books when I go to the library. I borrow grandchildren, too.