AGELESS

I often hear the phrase, Age is a state of mine. I sometimes wonder if that is just a way to make it easier to deal with the everyday aches and pains of getting older. My wife Kathy and I are getting up there on the age scale. She is in her mid sixties and I am in my mid 50's. We are both fairly active. With my job, I stand on my feet all day and when in season, she delivers veggie boxes. We both go to the gym. Still some days I have a few aches and pains. I always say getting older isn't for sissies.

When I go to the gym and see these folks with their walkers looking like they're probably in their 70's or 80's working out I think, WOW! I am so impressed with that. Yet here I am complaining about my hip or my back. My Mom always said to me, when I was younger, be careful of your back, don't lift so much, and bend at the legs before lifting. Of course, I never listened and now my back suffers. But not as much as some and not as much as others.

In our household Kathy is what we call the inside girl and I am what we call the outside girl. Meaning she takes care of cleaning and cooking inside the house and I take care of the yard and grilling on the outside of the house. This seems to work for us. Still there are times that I think man I would love to have someone come and mow this yard. But alas, I don't, I do it myself and in the end I love it! My speed at mowing is not as it was when I was young but with my mower all I have to do is guide it...the mower runs itself thank goodness. Shrew...

Now don't get me wrong I do realize that Kathy and I aren't Over The Hill not even Close! Age IS a state of mind and with age does come wisdom. Just the other day I saw this young person on a skate board and I just knew that I sure didn't belong on that skate board. Of course others have to learn the hard way.  My grandmother had a saying that she use to say all the time, Live and Learn Die and Forget it All. A wise woman my Grandmother was..

These are my Thoughts and Feelings from Jillsville.

IT'S COMPLICATED

So many relationships are complicated. The family ones are the ones that are truly the most complicated. The relationship that I want to talk about is the one between Mother and Daughter. In particular mine. It happened 5 years ago. My mother decided she didn't want to have anything to do with me all because of a letter that I wrote to her. This letter was design to open up a dialog between us instead it opened up a wedge. I always thought my Mom and I had the kind of relationship that was open and close. I soon realized that wasn't true much to my surprise and disappointment.

It all started back when I began going to therapy. My therapist was/is fantastic. She would allow me free range with my feelings. Hell she taught me about feelings. I never knew that feelings are different emotions and each one has a name. I know it sounds strange and at the same time nonsense that someone of my age and reasonable intelligence would have a problem with knowing what feelings are but it was true. I never thought about feelings. But boy did my therapist bring them out in me. Thank goodness. 

During this time in therapy I began to realize that my childhood was one of complexity in that my feelings didn't really matter and that each emotion that I felt wasn't allowed so I began burying them deeper and deeper until my therapist help me to bring them up to the surface and start to deal with them. That is when I decided that I really needed to write a letter to my Mom expressing those feelings to her. Boy did that backfire on me!! Oh did I mention there is a step-father involved. They were married when I was 8. I call them the roller coaster years..

Shortly after my Mom received the letter from me, I received a certified letter back from her stating that she no longer wanted a relationship with me, this is putting it nicely. You would think that a letter like this would upset me and say F you...but it didn't instead it made me see my Mom in a different light. It made me realize that my feelings really don't matter to her and that we didn't have the relationship that I thought we had.

I have attempted to talk to her on many occasions to no avail. She will not take my phone calls, she will not answer my texts. I don't even know if she has gotten any of my letters that I have sent to her asking if we can just talk. I just need closure or do I? ..

These are my thoughts and feelings from Jillsville.