It’s Been A While

I haven’t written one of these in a couple of years so I thought I would set down and see how dim-witted I have become since then.  I have written, maybe, a hundred of these over the years, and it always entertains me as I look back on what occupied my mind at that point in time.  There were times when I thought about assembling them into a book of sorts, but I have yet to schedule that project.  I have a Boogie Board here at my PC, and two in the shed, that I keep a list of my daily projects on (www.myboogieboard.com).  The one at my desk has been a companion for 4-5 years.  The two in the shed are recent additions (one for short term projects and one for longer term projects).  Anyway, I am off and running, trying to get another WOW out the door and on its way to you.

I hope your life has been as interesting as mine since our last visit.  I usually visit my son (Rusty) on Wednesdays and he visits me on Sundays.  That schedule is flexible, depending on our needs, but we always manage to spend some time together each week.  I’m getting ready to turn 75 on January 30^th, and I’m guessing, he probably realizes that I won’t be around too many years.  His mother passed away last fall, and he has suffered immeasurably, as has his sister.  On the Wednesdays of my visits, we set around and talk about things that interest us (sports, special projects, work, etc) and on Sundays, when he visits me, we try to have something we can work on together.  This past Sunday (10/25) he had a storage cabinet that he purchased from Amazon that needed to be assembled.  It would be positioned in his kitchen and be used to store cans of food.   It took us about 3 hours to put that thing together.  It amazes me that they can sell these things because of the complexity of assembling them.  I’m guessing that if I had done it alone, six hours would have been required with a few hours of sputtering going on as the work progressed.   Anyway, it looked good and sturdy after it was  finished and loaded into the truck.  I’m certain it will serve him well, and we were able to spend some quality time together which made it worthwhile to me.  We all get older. Time is not our friend or our enemy.  How we spend our time says more about us than our age.

Last Saturday (10/24) Jerilyn and I (along with our friends Don & Louise), travelled down to Edenton, NC to see a country music show (Rockyhock).  It was about 1 ½ hours away from home, and the show started at 7 pm, so we left home around 2:30pm and arrived down there at 4pm.  After a delightful dinner at the “Nothing Fancy†restaurant, we attended the show and returned home around midnight.  We enjoyed the show and the meal, but what really made the day special was spending time with friends.  I think that too often we exclude others from our activities and become sorta isolated.  I do enjoy my own company (wife included), after all, If I don’t like myself how can I expect others to like me; however I enjoy supplementing that time with the company of others.  I believe the following quote sums up exactly how I feel about friends: “Each friend represents a world in us, a world possibly not born until they arrive, and it is only by this meeting that a new world is born.” – Anaos Nin

I looked out the window this morning and observed fallen leaves all over the yard, a true sign that fall is upon us.  I have worked diligently in our yard since early September,  thatching, aerating and sowing grass seed.  Two days after putting down  seed, a gully washer sent a lot of it to other yards badly in need of it.  A second round of seeding was followed by remnants of Hurricane Joaquin and, thus again, our grass seed was moved to other, more needful, yards and into the tidal creek behind us.  Yet another round of seed was placed in areas devoid of grass, but alas, the weather has cooled precipitously and, therefore, some of  these seeds refuse to germinate.  Reminds me of the old saying: “If you want to see God smile, tell him what YOUR plans areâ€.

We have been watching the Republican debates, trying to determine which candidate we would vote for in the election.  Sometimes, I have trouble keeping my opinion about politics to myself.  A recent example of that is a conversation I had with a close friend and I made the statement that “Donald Trump was a blooming idiotâ€.  The problem is, I said that before thinking that maybe his opinion of  Mr. Trump was vastly different than mine.  If it was, he was very kind and said nothing to start a discussion of Trump’s pro’s and con’s.  As soon as the statement slipped from my tongue, I knew I had made a mistake.  I made the age old mistake that goes sorta like this:  If you want to argue, bring up politics or religion, otherwise don’t. You are not going to change someone’s politics or religion with a conversation.

I love this quote and wanted to share it with you (thanks Louise):  If every morning, you can find a reason to say, “Yes, it’s going to be a beautiful day.†And every day, you find a reason to say, “Yes, it is a beautiful day.† And every night, you find a reason to say, “Yes, it was a beautiful day.† Then one day, you’ll look back and easily say, “Yes….it was a beautiful life.â€â€¦..Doe Zantamata

I wear a pedometer every day and have tracked my daily steps since 2008.  I am on my way to 2 million steps this year, currently having 1.5 million.  Well, things are changing for me.  I recently purchased a Fitbit Surge on eBay and it is supposed to replace my pedometer.  The Surge is a wristwatch that, in addition to telling me the time, measures my heartbeat, steps taken, distance travelled,  amount of time I sleep, where I’ve been (GPS) and how many stairs I’ve climbed, etc.  I’m left wondering why it can’t tell me how much fun I’m having?  The amount I paid was a little pricy, but I really shouldn’t be concerned when I do things that will, hopefully, help me become healthier.  Of course, I’m aware that I could become overly concerned about such things, but I firmly believe that if we ignore our health, it will silently slip out the door and into the wilderness, impossible to track down and haul back to the house.  I have concluded that I would rather live the life of a hobo than lose my health.  Albert Einstein said, “ Life is like a bicycle, if you want to keep your balance, you have to keep moving.†  With that in mind, I think I’ll head upstairs for the exercise machine J .

We have four family members attending college (NY, TN, SC).  All of them study hard and make good grades, and we are so proud of them.  The younger members of our society often get criticized for lack of drive and ambition.  Yet, as I look around at the young people in my life, I see just the opposite.  I am of the opinion that a lot of times we are only exposed to those that put little effort into extracting the most that life has to offer.  Those kids that get straight “A’s†in school, and do a lot of volunteer work,  seldom get the recognition they deserve.  I remember my younger brother (Jerry) and I as young lads in school.  He was an “A†student and me, at best, a “C†kinda guy, with an occasional “Bâ€.  He was so bright that he was offered the opportunity to skip a grade, but Mom & Dad decided that it would be unfair to me and refused to let him do so.  It seemed to be so easy for him to do well in school, while for me, it was a constant struggle.  He never made a point of telling me how smart he was and was always willing to help me understand some problem in Algebra or Physics (he was a year behind but was taking some of the same classes).   I believe it is important for us to support all the young people in our life that are striving to better themselves thru a better education.  Sadly, neither my brother nor I went straight into college after high school.  I went into the US Air Force for four years and he went to work for Newport News Shipbuilding as a welder.   If life has taught me anything, it is that you need a good education to succeed in this world.  When I was a young man, you could still make a good living without a degree.  I do not believe that is true today. As Flora Edwards once said, “In helping others, we shall help ourselves, for whatever good we give out completes the circle and comes back to us.”

I read the other day that the oldest person on earth lived to be 122 years old.  The article went on to say there is a person alive today that will live to be 150 years of age.  They believe this will happen because in the next 10-20 years we will conquer cancer, diabetes, Alzheimer’s, heart problems, etc.  The article continues on to say that within the next 50-60, years people will be living to be much older because of our ability to replace dying cells within our body.  In other words, go to the doctor every couple of years and he will renew all your vital organs via stem cell implants: new heart, new lungs, new kidneys, etc.  I kinda doubt that happening within the lifetime of my great-grandchildren (my youngest is 10 months).  I can remember reading Popular Science when I was about 14 (1955),  and it said that by 1975 everyone would be flying around in helicopters.  Well, here we are 60 years later and automobiles are still the primary source of transportation.  True, we have done some magnificent things during all those many years, but it appears the helicopter thingy will never happen J.  If you were asked what was the greatest invention of all time, some would probably say computers and the internet.  Others may believe it is the automobile.  I am of the opinion the winner has to be electricity.  At our house, when the electricity goes off, everything comes to a grinding halt until power is restored.  We have gone to great lengths to hook up a power generator to our electricity panels to allow us to power 75% of our home if it is going to be off for very long.  My opinion (nominating electricity as the greatest invention of all time) is prejudiced because I lived in a home with my maternal grandparents for the first five years of my life and it had no electricity.  We went to bed when darkness enshrouded us and awoke to the sound of our rooster proudly declaring that another wonderful day had arrived.  It was not just one person who discovered electricity. While the concept of electricity was known for thousands of years, when it came time to develop it commercially and scientifically, there were several great minds working on the problem at the same time (Benjamin Franklin, Alessandro Volta, Michael Faraday, Thomas Edison & Joseph Swan).

Oh! Wait a minute!  Can I change that greatest invention thing to ice cream?  J

I hope you’re enjoying whatever season it is in your part of the world.  Thanks for reading my missive.