Victory

The market place.
How I love the market place.
The market place is where community starts and ends.
It is the time immemorial human meeting place.

And there was Darla.
I hadn't seen Darla since I retired several years ago and left her behind in the workplace, the local hospital.
Yet there she was.
Happy to see me!

Catching up, Darla said, "Oh course I look good, Riverwatch!  I beat cancer."

Four years ago "they" gave her 2-6 weeks to live.  Even with chemotherapy she was considered doomed. Pancreatic cancer.
Thank goodness she went to see her favorite surgeon before starting the chemo.

He is one of the favorite surgeons for so many of us who worked along side him in the local hospital. 
He looked at Darla's tests and said, "Darla, I think I can save your life."
And he did.
The surgery was horrendous....took everything.....her recovery was slow, the chemo also deepened her nausea, but eventually that was all history.  "Can you believe the only thing I could eat was tomato soup?  How strange is that when you are nauseated?  Tomato soup, tomato soup, tomato soup!"

She was celebrating her advent into her 80's.  A happy shopper.  Cancer free.

"By the way", she said as we parted, "my husband died last year."



Beating cancer caps everything.


Riverwatch
Thanks for your visit.

I am my mother's mother.

Long before children become parents,

                                                           they begin to remake their parents. 

Wordsworth was talking about something else,

                                                                        but his line captures the point: 

“the Child is father of the Man.”

                                                                                                             



Think about it.

One of the sterling gems of old age is seeing how fluid are relationships.
How nothing is cast in stone.
How blended we are.
And how ok that is.

How identity is a cloak we wore to do that which we needed/wanted/had to do.
A cloak that is now worn and ragged, pulling apart at the seams no matter how rich we are,
showing glimpses
of someone else.  Someone finer.
Someone so valuable, who was cloaked in identity. Even multiple identities!

Ahh.   Old age.


God is Great.

                                                                                                                 thediamondworks.co.za

Pass the red wine!  I want to drink to old age.
Grateful for you,
Riverwatch

Seriously.  Pass the red wine!

A Different Kind of Prayer

A Different Kind of Prayer

I have always been serious minded and consequently I had to field my former husband's accusation that I am "heavy weather".

What can I say?

Am I supposed to choke up over what the irresponsible say about me?!  I think not!

Some doc once told me....in the work arena....that I think too much, but I was quick witted back then and reminded him he didn't think enough, "so it all evens out".

My kids have all told me multiple times (as though I don't get it!) that they get it on the first sentence and do not need a whole paragraph. That shuts me up for a whole day, or maybe an hour.

I've always been a sitting duck for extra large assignments because "if you want something done, ask a busy person".

As you can see, I'm not a party girl.  Never was.

But lately, since the sawdust has gotten soggy....or dry, I don't know which....I've begun praying a different kind of prayer on my behalf.

"Please bless me with a fun day today."

The first such prayer was in desperation.  And I  had trepidation.  Praying for fun? That doesn't sound humble. Naive and childlike, maybe. But, come on!

Really?

The whole world is going to hell in a hand basket and I am praying for a fun day for me???!!

Dare I?

Should I pray to be more mindful, more concerned, more focused on the trials and tribulations of the world??

I need help having fun!      I don’t need help having more panic attacks.

I justify my prayer for a fun day for me this way:

If I am having a fun day, that means there is no war within the sphere of my influence.

If I am having a fun day, there is no suffering within the sphere of my influence.

If I am having a fun day, my family, my friends and I have escaped death another day.

If I am having a fun day, my relationships are not gyrating in a whirlwind.

If I am having a fun day, there is no...well there might be poverty, but no grinding poverty.

If I am having a fun day, diseases have been held at bay for my family, my friends and me.

If I am having a fun day, I have far more energy to spontaneously impart to strangers needing care.

If I am having a fun day, there are no floods or fires or earthquakes or asteroid collisions in my neighborhood.

Winds make me happy (never having experienced a hurricane nor the twister funnel), so..... there might be winds on a fun day.

My little prayer is short, but it sure wraps up a lot of heretofore lengthy requests.

My little prayer turns out to be the most unselfish of prayers.

Do you wonder how am I doing?

Well, each prayer is followed by the relaxing of my hunched up shoulders.

I find I have stopped  waiting for the other shoe to drop.

Let it take me by surprise!  What the heck.  Quick surprises may not be as bad as long anticipations.

And I have had some surprising fun pop into my field of vision.

Glad I am I prayed for fun.

Still and all, I am thinking of the blondie bottle.  

They say blondes have more fun, and hey, one of the nice things about aging  is you might have snow white hair which you can color whatever color you desire.

I wonder about going red.

But it's fun I want, not comments.

So......I am thinking about going blonde.

It is always appropriate to do your part in helping get your prayers answered.

"Oh, but white hair is SO BEAUTIFUL!!"

Right you are.

But the three things that show our age most are, in order of impact:

1. gray or white hair

2. extra weight, overweight

3. wrinkles

We are first and foremost identified by our hair.

Want to remain relevant and “seen”?  Get rid of the gray.  Get rid of the beautiful white.

We live in a culture that dismisses old women.

Old men don’t need a dye job. They remain relevant through thick, thin, missing, gray or white hair.

Old men become distinguished.

Not so for us gals.

We need to fool people just a little.

“Go for the dye job!” I say.

Or not.  Whatever. If you think role modeling the beauty of aging is the way to go, I say you are probably thinking that because you still have a little waistline!

Good for you!

As author and screenwriter Nora Ephron once quipped: 

“There’s a reason why 40, 50 and 60 don’t look the way they used to, and it’s not because of feminism, or better living through exercise. 

It’s because of hair dye. 

In the 1950s only 7% of American women dyed their hair; 

today there are parts of Manhattan and LA where there are no grey-haired women at all.”

Me? I'm for the dye job.

My family starts going gray in our teenage/young adult years.

I have been dying my hair for years and years and years and years and years.

Ok. Decades and decades.

It's easy. It's quick. It's inexpensive.

But maybe blondes do have more fun.

They certainly couldn’t have less!

"Please bless me with a fun day today."

I appreciate your visit,

Riverwatch

A Good Name For God

A good name for God is Not Me.

                                                     comment by Anne Lamott.

                                  

Laughter

"Laughter is carbonated holiness,

                                 and grace has the last laugh."

                                                                                     Anne Lamott

knoxnewsentinal

Glad you could visit today and hear me quote a fellow Presbyterian Christian and one of my favorite authors,

Riverwatch

Against the Tide

blog.moneta.co.kr

The tide is moving.

and now,

all that I accomplish or do,

will be against the tide.

Wait!

I feel fresh air!

Perhaps I have been too hasty in my assessment of my place on the beach.

giphy.com

Thanks for dropping by,

Riverwatch

Remember: it isn't over until it is over

Drenched in Thinking

"God loves you, anyway."

That sounds like an ok message, yes?
That was the title of a little leaflet devotional handed to me by a "caring" semi-friend.

I like her but I list her as semi-friend because she is a person I do not tell my secrets to.

I like her but I list her as semi-friend because I am guarded about what I say to her, being careful to not expose her to the fire of my brain.  PJ Media

In other words, I am often silent while visualizing hitting her in the head with a 2 by 4  for not following good health habits, for not keeping up with the grooming as she ages, and for whining.

Did I mention she whines?
Whiners do not make much of an effort to sweep the entry way, do they?

But she is nice.

So here came the little leaflet:  "God loves you, anyway."

Do you think this was about being loved in spite of being a sinner?
Oh, no.
OMG!
This is about God loving me in spite of the fact I do not have physical beauty.

Oh, my God!

Did my semi-friend think I am beached and have no knowledge that I am 73 and UGLY?????

Do such little "devotionals" strengthen your inner beauty?

Oh, my God.  Have mercy.  I want to hit my semi-friend in the head with a 2 by 4.

PJ Media

But let's be honest here.  If I had physical beauty I would be more compassionate.  Yes?  No visuals of 2 by 4 smacks to the head.

It's all about the "lack of physical beauty".

OMG.

I am drenched in thinking.


Thanks for understanding,
and thanks for dropping by to hear me whine.
Riverwatch