Old Age Day by Day January 13, 2014

Dear Readers,  I am discontinuing this blog, as I have bored myself with my own life to the point of oblivion.  However, I will begin a new blog:  Pass the Popcorn - Movies from where I sit.  This will be my random observations on movies new and old.  I'm also working on a novel (Isn't everyone?).  Thanks for your loyalty. 

Old Age Day by Day December 22, 2013

Every bone in my body aches today, and it was so worth it!  I loved my own party and had a great time, seeing friends, cooking, feeling festive and lucky in my life.  The food was a success and my husband, son and I were all grins after the last guest left and we had put away leftovers.  No even the daunting array of pots and pans to wash could dampen our spirits.  It was a big effort, and with big rewards.

Of course, today I had to finish putting stuff away, then go to 3 grocery stores to get the stuff for Christmas Eve and Day.  I'm numb with exhaustion, but what a nice feeling it is, in service to friends being together and sharing conversation, food and joy of the season.

Old Age Day by Day December 21, 2013

It's the shortest day of the year - but that means tomorrow the days will be getting longer1  Yeah!  I am ready to roll!  Winter Solstice is when I like to have my party and today is no exception.  I have tons of food to prepare and need to cut my eight batches of Irish Soda Bread into squares.  It's a party, and I'm in the mood.  I love to see my friends and open my house and heart to all.

Old Age Day by Day December 20, 2013

I finished reading Ann Patchett's "This is a Happy Marriage" last night.  It's selections from her magazine articles over the years, and some are more interesting than others, but I did end up with a strong sense of who she is as a person, and her loyalty to friends and family.  It was a good glimpse into a writer's life, and how she manages to write and still be engaged in the world around her.  And I was intrigued by her struggle to not repeat her family's divorce tradition.  She did marry young and then divorce.  Then is avoided marriage a second time.  Then she was involved with someone for eleven years before agreeing to marry him.  Her determination to not have children never faltered.  Did that help her have the time to write?  It does seem very nineteenth century, to give up marriage and children to be able to have a creative life.  But it is also true that having both is challenging, and many of my successful writing friends waited until they had a couple of books under their belt before they had kids.  It's clear Patchett thought the two were incompatible for herself.  Her last piece is about a nun, and one suddenly sees how Catholicism, renunciation, and devotion have shaped her life.  She could have been a nun, she was a kind of writing nun for many years.  She admires the good and the simple, while being neither herself, and needs to believe in the honor of sequestering.  I'm sure I will think quite a bit about the book.

Her formula for a happy marriage?  She said when she was young a woman told her:  Ask yourself if you are a better person with him and he with you.  She has lived by that measure.

Old Age Day by Day December 19, 2013

My foster granddaughter was amazing!  She made quick decisions (no iron on patch on this, the cupcake patch on that), she stuffed pillows, she wrote all the gift tags, she packed, and like Santa, she had a huge plastic bag full of gifts for her family.  One final pillow she wanted to give to my granddaughter, and she labeled it and left it for when my granddaughter arrives.  And she wanted to include me in the "from" of the gift tag.  Very sweet, very mature. I can see her turning nine in six months, she's growing up before my eyes.

We had dinner with our friend last night at her house she just bought, and it was already cosy and inviting, with her dog and cat snuggled on their beds, and the living room set up.  In the dining room were boxes, but she's done so well with the transition.  She hasn't sold her house up north, but it's been watched and taken care of, so hopefully, next spring, there will come a buyer.  We had a comfort food meal of butternut squash, kale and chicken, with rhubarb crisp for dessert.  Her neighborhood was quiet and beautiful.  How happy I felt to see her all settled.

Today begins a lot of hard work for the holiday party, but mixed in with seeing my therapist.  I need my head screwed on straight, and she's just the person to help me.  The mind needs constant fine tuning, or the channels get crossed and static blares out.

Old Age Day by Day December 18, 2013

Yikes!  It's the 18th!  Christmas is coming around the bend like a runaway train.  I hope I'm ready.  Right now I'm concentrating on our holiday party, but it's also my foster granddaughter's piano and voice recital this week and her school choir concert.  Also, we're going to a friend's for dinner tonight, and there is grocery shopping and much cooking to do.  Oh, me, oh, my.

In the spirit of Christmas I watched "Lady in the Water" with my husband last night.  I can't stand the film, but my husband adores it.  This, in a nutshell, explains our marriage.  We are a marriage of opposites.  I like to read, write and see foreign films and eat ethnic food.  He likes to do puzzles, sudoku, watch Disney and Tom Clancy films and eat meat and potatoes.  We practically need an interpreter for conversations and each thing we do together is a negiotiation.  I feel I now have high diplomatic skills.  At least I've learned to be generous.  For instance, I saw "Catching Fire" with him, and he thanked me profusely afterward, knowing how Hunger Games is not my cup of tea.  I have seen a couple of Harry Potter films with him, being of a noble cast.  He has read several of the hundreds of books I've recommended, and even loves Craig Johnson's Longmire books now.  The ethnic food thing:  well, he always claims to have stomach upset after, so I now go out by myself or with friends for that.  He even thinks Chinese food is ethnic.  It makes for a limited palate.

But we've been together over forty years, so Mars and Venus must have some similarities. 

Old Age Day by Day December 17, 2013

What happened to M. Night Shamalayan?  Last night we watched "Signs", my favorite of his movies, and we own "Sixth Sense", "The Village", "Unbreakable" and "Lady in the Water" (my husband's favorite).  But then catastrophe hit.  He made the horrible one my daughter and I saw where everyone is committing suicide because of the trees revenge, then kiddie movies, then a vanity project with Will Smith and his son, which was universally bombed.  I have a theory that he ran out of ideas.  He should have stepped back from the screenplay and concentrated on directing alone.  It's sad.  Maybe too much fame too fast.  All the films depend heavily on the one idea, and perhaps that is dangerous.  For me every one of them seems thin except "Sixth Sense" and "Signs",  is redeemed by large doses of humor, the incredible acting of Mel Gibson, Joaquin Phoenix, Cherry Jones, and tiny Abigail Breslin. 

Every time I think of Phoenix, Rory Calkin and Abigail Breslin in their aluminum foil hats so the aliens can't read their minds I laugh.  Yet, the film is also about grief and forgiveness and faith.  It's beautiful.  It almost makes the viewer believe that everything has a purpose.  Gibson is now in shadow, and Phoenix has struggled with demons, but Breslin is in her ascendance.  What an array of talent in one movie!