Why do I keep turning down work?!

As you know, we need moolah! 

Twice within the past month, I have been offered work. Paid work!

And twice I have turned it down.

WHY?

I literally applied for that job at the library. I'm not afraid of work. Believe it or not, I've worked before!

Technically, this wasn't a job; it was a volunteer thing. But I worked!

But I didn't take either of these opportunities because I realized that I really just don't have time for a steady gig right now.

The first one was something that I could have done from home, but it would have required many hours of intense concentration, and it's a challenge to get that in my house. D has a room, Mal has a room, James has an office. I do have a bedroom, but I share it with James and it's kind of open for business when anyone wants to hang out. I don't really have a space where I can put up a "do not disturb" sign and get things done. So I had to turn down the opportunity for a gig in the writing field. I just wasn't confident that I could give it my best.

Then the other one was something here in town, walkable like the library, but would require a couple of full days per week. It was flexible; I could pick what days worked for me. But we have things almost every day of the week and, ironically, I've lined up even more stuff over the summer when Mal's friends are often out of pocket, and when some things like open gym take a break until the fall. He's still young enough that I need to be around at least somewhat during the day. And James's schedule is so random that we can't plan for me to work when he's off; we never know what that will be until a couple of weeks in advance.

I guess this means we're not desperate yet? I do have three mystery shops tomorrow, which is the most I've had in one day in YEARS. We'll get three free meals, and then there are actually shopper fees on top of that. That used to be the norm, but I guess the market is such that companies can basically say, "You'll eat this free food and you'll be freaking grateful!" until they can't get jobs scheduled and are willing to throw more money at it. 

I am also doing gimmicky things like opening a new credit card to get a bunch of on-board cash for the cruise so we save $300 on gratuities. It's not income, but it prevents outgo, so that's kind of the same thing, right? And it's not taxable! Huzzah! My credit score is suffering a bit, but it will rebound.

The Fifth Anniversary (yes, of that, but that's not what I'm talking about)

Five years ago today, I put in my earbuds and went for a walk. I even blogged about it a few days later!

Ever since then, I've walked pretty much every single day for roughly 2.5 miles. In the beginning, I mentioned being legalistic about it. I got over that pretty quickly. There are days when I don't walk because I do weights and balance exercises at home (once every 7-10 days). There are days when I know I'm going to be walking a lot or getting other exercise that I don't make it a point to walk. There are days when I have an early appointment and don't have time.

But I'm guessing that about 98% of the time, I roll out of bed, throw on my shoes (and sometimes an extra pair of pants, gloves, a hat, and a coat... but maybe not this winter??), and take off. I listen to podcasts most of the time. Sometimes I talk on the phone with my parents or my sister. Very often, I'm back from my walk before anyone I know is even awake. This time of the year, that means it's dark for most of my walk.

I've seen some gorgeous things on these walks. Sunrises, flowers, wild animals (raccoon, skunk, fox, coyote, armadillo), feral cats, free-range dogs, amazing clouds, the construction of home after home... 

Sometimes it gets tedious, walking the same few miles over and over. But I've noticed that on the days I don't start that way, I feel less focused and settled.

I've walked well over 4000 miles on these morning treks. I've gone through 4 pair of sneakers. I've learned that having a good pair of shoes is the difference between the blisters I mentioned in the first post and not even thinking about my feet at all. Hard lesson for a cheapskate like me, but I do enjoy being able to get from here to there without limping.

I've also learned a lot from the podcasts I listen to, from American History Tellers to Reveal to Maintenance Phase to various Spanish-language podcasts. Sometimes I just need some entertainment and will put on Handsome or Selected Shorts. Other times I want to feel inspired, so I listen to The Moth or Story Corps. Occasionally my brain just wants to be alone with itself so I just listen to the birds and my feet crunching the gravel. 

I don't like to carry water, especially when it's cold, so I usually chew gum to keep my mouth from drying out. There are mornings when I take a red flashlight because there's no moon and we don't have streetlights, but I also don't want to contribute to light pollution. On the rare occasion, I'll stop by a convenience store to see if any of their energy drinks are on sale and might pick up a couple of those.

I've walked the dry lake bed. I've gingerly made my way down steep rocky trails I'm not sure how they got there. I've come upon homeless people sleeping in a tent in the greenbelt or with just a blanket on a sidewalk near the bus stop. I've had to stop to catch my breath on a hill, then realized months later that it's not as challenging anymore. 

Another thing I've done is that everywhere we've traveled since January 6, 2021 (yes, that January 6), I've looked at Google Maps to plan where I'll walk if the occasion arises. I've walked all around Temple, where my parents live. I've walked through Wickenburg when we've visited James's mom. I've walked from a hotel to a nature preserve in the dark to watch the sunrise in Sonora, Texas, on a road trip. I walked the liminal underground passages in downtown Oklahoma City. I even broke tradition once and rented a bike in Montreal to bike across the Jacques Cartier Bridge to Île St. Helene, Île Notre Dame, and across to Habitat 67.

This kind of movement has become a priority to me for both my mental health and for the longevity of my mobility (hopefully). And often, for the sheer joy of seeing a bunch of vultures staring at me from their perches in the trees 40 feet above me in the Canyonlands Trail.

Happy anniversary to me! (But not to anyone involved in that other thing that happened on the same day this good habit started.)

I KNOW I said I wasn't going to do a whole post about my hair...

 ... but here's the deal: There's a lot.

First of all, when I realized I was getting some grey hair, back in late 2018, I decided that it was time to stop coloring my hair red and let it grow out. 

My rationale was that I didn't want to be one of those white-headed ladies with obviously fake red hair and shocking white roots.

It took about three to four years, but I was finally able to cut that last bit of dyed hair off and had my natural brown back, with some grey "highlights."

But THEN my hair had started changing into the wavy hair I mentioned a few posts ago. My hair had been absolutely straight, no body at all, my entire life. I guess it's perimenopause hormones, but it made my hair curly. 

Last summer, a hair-dresser misunderstood me when I said I didn't want layers and thought that I wanted my hair to match my "fringe," so she cut about 6 inches off of my length. 

What THAT did was to get rid of the remaining straight hair I had. 

Truth is, I needed that cut but was too much of a wimp to ask for such a drastic cropping.

It's so weird. This wavy hair came out of my head! New hair after half a century!

Well, I realized today that we're in another kind of "grow it out" waiting game.

In summer 2023, I started taking minoxidil. At the time, I assumed that I was losing hair because of perimenopause but now know that hair loss is a symptom of hyperparathyroidism. Regardless, my hair was thinning more than I was comfortable with when my hair was still mostly straight and very fine (it's still fine, but it looks thicker because of the volume).

Now, I figure we have about 18 months until my new growth catches up with the length I am keeping my hair these days.

I'm sure something else weird will happen by then and we'll get to start this process all over.

I used to be fun

I was sharing a funny old (14 years) photo with my family this week, and it reminded me of this old (30 years) song by Rockapella:

This song has always reminded me of someone specific in my life (from the picture that cracked me up) and it got me to thinking about something...

I used to be somewhat of a goof.

I had a reputation as someone who was funny, and in fact would often do unwise or immature things because they amused me.

I was never mean (except for maybe that one time I put toothpaste in a sausage for a specific person to eat, and if I had to do it all over again, I wouldn't) and usually the joke was on me, but... It was kind of my "thing."

Remember that time at my 20th high school reunion when I had gone to the trouble of memorizing the entire dance scene from "You Can't Stop the Beat" in "Hairspray" the movie and I requested the song and did the dance all the way through even though no one joined me? (If you watch it all the way through... yes, I was getting tired at the end, but that floor was SLIPPERY. The fact that I didn't land the cartwheel was a great personal disappointment that stays with me to this day!)

Or like that time that a cold snap hit the Sher-Den area and when I was driving by the newish giant bust of Eisenhower, I thought, "He looks cold. He should have a scarf." I told several people about my idea until it landed with a talented seamstress, Juanita, who took YARDS of fabric and made a scarf (wisely with weighted ends so we could put it on and it would stay), which another friend, D, Juanita, and I all tossed on the former President in the dark of a chilly evening.

The talented aforementioned Randy Sedlacek took this shot a day or two later.
Stately AND warm, no?

I don't know. My habit is: I have a stupid, silly idea and after I have it, I just do it. It happens because my thinking something odd makes it a reality that there's no denying.

Or at least that used to be the case. 

What happened? 

I was married to someone I embarrassed a great deal with my exuberance, mischief, and general loudness. Now I'm married to someone who would absolutely revel in any silliness I might come up with, and I just... don't? Why?

When I was mowing the other day, I had the thought that my life used to be similar to a person at a funeral: I absolutely should not have been laughing, but it was a coping mechanism. And maybe now I'm just happy and don't have the highs and lows? 

Or like when I had an eating disorder and LIVED for vacations, when I let myself be free and eat whatever I wanted: I'd plan meals down to the menu item, and almost cry at every meal because everything was so rich and tasty. Now that I eat whatever I want to, I still enjoy food, but not like that. The scarcity is gone, and somehow that blunts the joy of "forbidden fruit," I guess.

Maybe this is just a natural outgrowth of maturing, and if that is the case, I HATE IT. I can extend my sincerest apologies to the target of my ill-conceived meat/toothpaste prank while also acknowledging that most of the time, my humorous impulses were a lot of fun for me and the people around me.

Can't think of a good way to wrap this up, so... Mal's up and I'm out. Miss me!

The Struggle Continues

That sounds like an exciting sequel, but it's not. It's annoying and exhausting and I often feel like I'm over it, but then it sucks me back in, and this both disappoints me and pisses me off.

Mostly, I don't think critically much about how I look. I try to keep my hair brushed, my hands and face clean, and my clothes comfortable. Then I go about my day and it's fine.

But sometimes, especially at certain times of the month, and maybe especially especially because my body is making some midlife changes that I KNOW TO EXPECT... Sometimes, I just feel like I don't know the body I see in the mirror when I'm not expecting to see it.

The part about this that bothers me the most is that I am anti-feeling-like-crap about the way you look. I outgrew self-hate-speak years ago. I see pictures of myself from 15 years ago and think I look... insubstantial. I don't want to go back to that. Maintaining an artificially low (for me) body weight took up so much of my energy and attention that I have zero desire to go back to those days.

And yet...

My body is changing quickly and seems partially alien to me. I'm still flexible. I do the splits, I stretch, I squat, I bend. But now, when I try to touch my nose to the knees of my outstretched legs, I can't... because my belly is in the way.

I feel spry (mostly; I did a killer workout Friday and am just now getting over being sore about that on Sunday evening), and my body does what I want it to. I don't struggle with movement, and I'm strong enough to handle most tasks I set out to do on my own. In other words, I'm extremely functional, and probably more so now than I have been in years.

I'm proud of who I am, what I've learned, how I'm trying to improve, and of the life I and my people have built. It is absolutely profane that a chance encounter with my own reflection at an angle I wasn't prepared for threatens to send me spiraling.

Here's what I know: I'm not going to do anything about it. It's dangerous, mentally and physically. Usually, I just wait it out until the feeling passes. Fortunately, I guess, my life is generally too busy to get mired down in this sort of thing for very long.

Update: I'm past it now but wanted to go ahead and post this because... most of us end up in that space sometimes. 

Here's a picture of me walking last week. I have to go VERY late not to walk in complete darkness since Daylight Saving Time started again. I hate having no time to myself when I get home, but seeing sunrises like this *almost* make it worth it.

The Change (and no, I don't mean the SCC song)

In case you weren't deep in evangelical christianity in the early 2000s, the title is a reference to this. (I can't listen to much from these days without cringing, but this one aged okay.)

Now back to our regular programming.

We've established that I'm old. Like half a century old.

I have this very vivid memory from when I was a quarter century old:

I was dating a guy who was two decades my senior. He had this very intensive facial regimen he'd do every morning and night, and it had never occurred to me to do anything like that. Like, I washed my face, but when he cleansed, he left the wash on for a long time so it could "work." Then he'd moisturize. And do stuff for his crow's feet. It was the first and basically only time in my life that I started wondering, "Should I be doing something to keep from looking old?"

The answer I gave myself was "no," and I never looked back.

However, the pandemic did all of us who mostly wore make-up passively a big favor in that it normalized more fresh faces with minimal makeup. I've basically decided to buy into the conventional "pack light" wisdom that all I need is some eyeliner (I know, they say mascara but I can't wear that because it irritates my eyes... yes, even the hypo-allergenic stuff) and tinted lip balm.

My neighbor tells me that I'm lucky because I have "some natural color," whereas she's so pallid that when she was a small child, her mother wouldn't let her wear certain colors because she looked dead (also, she's in her mid-70s, so it was a different time).

I found a couple of similar pictures of myself. One is from today and one is from 12 years ago. I was mostly comparing a full face of makeup (the older picture) to me today. I have never worn heavy make-up, but in the picture from my 30s, I'm wearing powder, lipstick, eyeliner, eye shadow, and blush. Today, I'm only wearing eyeliner and lip balm. Oh, also, I don't color my hair anymore.

And, yes, I can see that I have some wrinkles around my eyes now that I didn't used to have. Also, my neck is probably wrinklier. However, I don't think the "even less make-up" takes much away.

The one concern I had is that I have a pretty high forehead (or what the kids called "five-head" a few years ago) that tends toward shininess. I'm using CeraVe Foaming Cleanser Bar in the morning and evening, and then moisturizing with an alleged "mattifying" lotion at night. I haven't noticed any matte effect, and my forehead is still glistens. I did get some oil-absorbing sheets... and I don't think it's oily. I don't know. I just glow, I suppose.

Anyway, something interesting has happened since I started washing my face twice a day instead of once and also moisturizing: My skin has cleared up. I mean, I've been fortunate to have pretty good skin, anyway, but had some bumps and just assumed that was what my skin was doing as I head into menopause. Turns out, maybe my face is tired after 35 years of having power all over almost every single day. 

Since I started drinking more water about a year ago (after GERD was massively negatively impacting my life so I gave up carbonated drinks for the most part), and have now started trying to "pack light" in my make-up life, I thought a couple of other things might be fun.

My feet have always been cracked and dry, and my mom has been on me most of my life to use lotion. It's always felt overwhelming to me, taking time to do that. I don't know why. I'm just not super fussy about my personal maintenance? Anyway, I've started doing that once or twice a day. The bottom of my feet will be okay for several hours, then it's a desert again. Will it ever stay better longer? Who knows. Will I tire of this and go back to having funky feet? Probably. Still, I always love a good experiment.

Oh, the other thing I decided to do was to stop biting my nails. I have always done it, and I don't care that I do it. But as long as I'm changing up my routine, I figured I'd throw that in, as well.

Finally, to address "the change" thing... For those keeping score, my current cycle has been 83 days. I've been fairly regular since I had D (and before that, I was on The Pill for 12 years, so it was like a clock), but in the past year, it's been slightly less predictable. Still 26-41 days. Once, it was 46 days, and then I was treated to 9 days of... um... fun? as a reward. No, thanks. This is definitely the longest by far.

I'm hoping maybe I pre-paid for this with all of the issues I had in my young adulthood and I'll be able to skate through to menopause without any major hot flashes or life upheavals. I have definitely noticed a change in my body shape, as explained in this paper, the summary of which is: "[G]oing through the menopause does not cause a woman to gain weight. However, the hormonal changes at the menopause are associated with a change in the the way that fat is distributed, leading to more belly (abdominal) fat."

Fortunately, I knew that was coming, so I was ready. And it's not even a big deal.

I've been walking at least a couple of miles a day for 19 months now, and have recently started breaking that up with doing core training every few days instead. I already see how my knees sometimes feel like they're weaker, so I'm doing lunges to give them more of a challenge. And when I started doing lunges, I realize that since I haven't done them in a long time, my balance was off a bit. So I'm also doing a few balance exercises to try to maintain as much mobility and agility as possible. 

Injuring my back ten years ago showed me what a literal pain in the butt just plain existence can be when you're not at 100%, so I hope to put any falls or breaks off for as long as possible!

Okay, now that you know way too much about me, I'm ready to go to bed.

Have a good rest of your weekend, everybody!

A Midsummer Night's... Sweat

You guys! Things. Have. Been. Crazy!

Nope. That's an Amber Ruffin bit.

What I mean is that things have been HOT. Yes, since I blogged a couple of days ago, it has continued. The heat.

But we can't hibernate in the house forever, so I've been out and about working most of the week so far.

Monday morning at 1:18 AM, I was awakened by... something. James was still awake (he had Monday off) and we met up in the living room. I asked him what that sound was, and he didn't know. As he looked out the front window, I looked out the side. It sounded vaguely like someone was running around on our wooden porch.

James saw a GIANT branch from our chinaberry tree go rolling off of the roof.

First, chinaberries drop limbs ALL of the time. Second, it's been dry, so I'm sure this one is parched as heck. Third, it SNAPPED. And the branch was huge.

I was pleased to find in daylight that our gutters had held, although I'm sure I need to go back and clean them again, even though I just did it maybe a month and a half ago.

Monday afternoon was overcast, and I took advantage of the shade to cut apart the branches to a manageable weight so I could move it off of the masonry. The branch did take out a chunk out of the top of one of the open patio posts, but it's only visible from the house side.

I ended up cutting three more iffy branches from the tree before I was done. Then I was DONE.

Kind of cool how so much of the growth was to one side of the tree. All of the cuts look like this.

Tuesday morning, Mal's friend's mom texted me to see if we wanted to meet them at the lake. Mal hopped in the wagon and we walked down there. It was only 10:30, so hadn't gotten up to 100 yet, but it hit that about the time we were coming home just before noon.

Mal, his friend, and his friend's brother had fun chatting about Minecraft and we moms had fun visiting with a grown-up who doesn't live in our house (hashtag social distancing).

Walking back up the hill from the lake required three water breaks for me. Mal plus the wagon is about 80 pounds, and even though the tires are AWESOME, it's still quite the work-out.

Then yesterday, we stayed in most of the day and Mal and I went on a walk once the sun started to go down. We looked at all of the construction going on around the neighborhood, and really enjoyed places where there are still just trees. We also saw this happy touch that's been on top of a nearby mailbox for months.

When we got home, I watered our poor apple trees (if they don't make it through the winter unscathed, and we pull them up next spring, we'll probably put in wicking beds instead and just plant gardens).

And, no, that's not gravel all over the yard. It's dormant grass. When we had our solar panels put on last year, one of the installers said, "You're going to have to re-sod this." I laughed and told him it was never sodded. It's just what's here naturally, and by October, it's going to need to be mowed again. It stays green all winter and goes back to sleep in June. Keeps our lawn guy (and me) from having to mow in the hottest part of the summer!

Then today, Thursday, I went to pick up a couple of rain barrels that we bought for half price through the Round Rock water district. Woo hoo! I was going to wait until it was evening to install them, but procrastinating is difficult for me.

Today was hot, but dry for a change. We've hit 100 every day for several weeks now, but this morning, we broke the record low for the day! The Austin airport registered 63 degrees, and I happened to be awake early so opened up the house for a couple of hours.

It could have been a worse day to set these puppies up, and I'm glad that I got it finished in time for a nice cool shower before dinner.

Now we just wait for it to rain! In December, maybe?

Here's hoping for a lazy Friday to round out a physically exhausting (in a good way!) week.

Have a good weekend, weird-os!

Believe me, I know you don't care about my hair

As if I haven't talked about my hair enough already, here are a few more things:

One thing I've started doing, that I have thought about often and recently saw is part of the Curly Girl Method (for which I am in no need, sadly), is sleeping in a satin sleep cap. I'd considered it this past summer as my hair was getting long enough that I was waking up with it wound around my neck and I was sweating terribly. I don't want to sleep with a hair tie in because it's bad for the hair, and it makes a "dent."

So I bought one for $15 from Amazon and have been using it for about a month. It's great! I brush my hair and kind of wind it up then put the hat on right as I go to bed. When I wake up, my hair feels like I JUST brushed it. This came in handy when I slept until the Walmart Grocery Delivery person rang my doorbell the other morning.

In addition to keeping hair from engaging in friction with the pillowcase, the satin lining does not absorb oil like a cotton pillowcase would, so it leaves those oils on my hair. That should help over the long term. As a matter of fact, I bought a second cap today.

Finally, weirdly related in that it's a hair thing... D's paternal grandmother passed away last weekend. I've been thinking about her a lot this week, and one thing I remember vividly about her (besides camp stew and how much she adored her grandkids) was that she would put about half a dozen pin-curls in her hair every night before bed. She had naturally curly/wavy hair, and just had the structured curls framing her face.

When I'd see her do that, I'd think, "That looks impossible," and "I could never sleep with metal pins on my head!" This was before I started using bobby pins as barrettes, so I had no experience on which to draw.

In remembering her this week, I decided to give it a try myself. I only did about 8 curls over my whole head, so they were super chunky sections. I didn't feel the pins at all, and my hair looked pretty cute the next day. It was a lot more predictable and consistent than when I wrap my hair around a headband.

The curls, of course, were downgraded to waves by the middle of the day, because I live in a super humid area. And living in Las Vegas got me out of the habit of using hair spray, so this is to be expected. But what I really loved was that the next two days, my hair had so much volume from the roots. It was very nice not to feel like my hair was just lying, exhausted, over my scalp. I'll definitely try that again.

My Eyes!

It was 1979, in second grade, when I began wearing prescription eyeglasses to correct mild myopia. I'd loved the fashion frames I'd seen at Osco Drugs, and often wished I needed to wear the cool accessories.

The novelty of actually needing glasses quickly wore off, especially as my vision deteriorated and the lenses got thicker. As I got older, I felt like no one realized how pretty my eyes were because they were obscured behind "Coke bottle" bottoms.

I became interested in the theater in 9th grade, when I ended up in an upperclassman production at my private school, courtesy of my having thrown up in PE after having begged my PE teacher to let me stop running as I was having an asthma attack and his insisting I "run it off." I guess the principal of the school decided at that point I'd be better suited for the dramatic arts.

In that play, I had to remove my glasses during performances so they wouldn't reflect the lights and hide my emotive eyes, as they did in daily life.

That performance was a roller coaster, because I genuinely cannot see without corrective lenses. Over that summer, my parents allowed me to get contact lenses, a year earlier than the previously-stated 16-year-old rule. Yay!

For years, I kept my contact solution in my bedside table, taking my contacts out right before I went to sleep, and putting my contacts in before my feet hit the floor in the morning. In college, I developed some eye problems and an optometrist told me that if I didn't start wearing glasses a few hours a day, I could expect not to be able to wear contacts anymore after another couple of years.

It's always felt like my eyes were a bit of a time bomb. Well before my dad was the age I am now, he'd had glaucoma, cataracts, and two of his three retinal detachments. I made it a point to wear glasses a few hours as night, and as long as I could in the morning, because I did not want to go back to wearing glasses full-time. I still had some self-consciousness about wearing glasses even that little; I didn't want my husband to look me in the eye and would often take glasses off to have a deep conversation, even though that meant having to guess at facial expressions.

One cool thing has happened as I've aged, and apparently it's typical: My far-out vision has improved.  Until I turned 46 about a year and a half ago, I never had a problem seeing things close-up, either. In fact, I made fun of James having difficulty with a game we played in Haiti that required reading a small word through a clear plastic window.

However, within weeks (maybe days?) of my 46th birthday, I suddenly found that it wasn't as easy to read magazines as it had been before. Whereas I could always make out print in low light, now I needed brightness. I eventually bought a couple of pair of cheaters at Walgreen's (Is Osco even a thing anymore?), and that was fine... until my close-in vision got bad enough that I thought I finally needed to get multi-focal glasses to wear.

When I have my contacts in, it's no big deal to put on reading glasses. But once I take my contacts out, when I need to read, I have to take my glasses off and hold whatever it is about two inches from my eyeballs. That doesn't really work with a laptop.

So I had a plan to set an appointment with an optometrist. I just didn't do it for the longest time.

THEN I started having problems with my eyes again. It always felt like there was something in my left eye. I'd take out my contact, wash it, put it back in. I'd switch contacts (they were the same prescription). I'd get new ones. But my left eye always seemed to have this greasy film, which I began to realize had nothing to do with my contact; it just bothered me more when I had my contacts in.

I was wearing my contacts less, and was afraid we might be hitting that "you're just too old for contacts" age.

And I set an appointment for the eye doctor.

The night before, I was lying in Mal's room with the lights off, looking in the general direction of the smoke alarm, when I realized that I couldn't see the light on it with my left eye if I was looking straight at it. When I looked away, my peripheral vision picked it up. I tried this with other light sources in the darkened room, to the same effect. Was it retinal? Ugh, I hoped not.

My appointment was the day before Thanksgiving. Several decades ago, my dad woke up on Thanksgiving day unable to see out of one eye. His retina had detached, and though he didn't know it, he did know he wouldn't be able to see a doctor until Monday. He also knew that my mom would be extremely worried... so he didn't say a word about it all weekend! And I hoped that this wasn't going to be a new family tradition.

At my appointment, we did all of the things, including having my pupils dilated for the first time in probably 20 years. Fortunately, the "thing" in my left eye is just a clump of floaters that piled up and are sitting on the edge of my macula, so whereas most floaters eventually... well, float out of my line of vision, these don't.

The optometrist did ask when I started noticing floaters, and that seemed like a funny question because I don't remember ever not having them. When I was a little kid and was bored in church or trying to fall asleep, I'd play "chase" with the floaters. If you don't have them, this probably makes no sense. It would look like I was just rolling my eyes and having a fit or something. Or watching a moth. Anyway, I guess floaters usually age-related, but it seems like I've always had them.

He said that it might take a few weeks or a few months, but eventually gravity would pull them down further, they'd break up, and my vision would return to normal. It's still annoying, but now I know I don't need to worry about them so it's easier to try not to think about it and eventually I stop noticing it.

Also, I have developed a pronounced astigmatism in my right eye, that has become worse than the one in my left eye that I've known about for decades. So he changed my prescription in my left eye, and it's the lowest powered contact I've ever worn.

I did get a prescription for multi-focal glasses for the first time ever. Mal helped me pick out some cool purple bejeweled frames, and now we're just waiting for them to come back from the magic glasses factory.

He did say that I have a bit more discoloration in my retina than you'd expect in a person my age (BECAUSE I'M SO YOUNG), which isn't a surprise given genetics. I'm going back in three months to see if it's pretty much the same or if it's changed, so we'll know what we're dealing with.

Otherwise, my eyes are really healthy, and that's good to know.

Oh! I did change to daily wear contacts, which I can only afford because James has a good job. If that ever changes, I'll have to do more extended-wear but I'm loving these. I haven't had to use allergy eye drops since I got them, and I was using them every other day or so.

This reminds me of a question I have: Why are daily-wear contacts so much cheaper per lens than extended-wear? Like, I get that extended-wear need to be more durable... but they're 20x more expensive, or more... and that doesn't make sense to this lay person. If you know, please educate me!

The Ravages of Time

In the past three years, I've changed. Physically. Like a lot.

I stopped restricting and doing exercise I didn't like years ago. Then I had another kid. And I breast-fed. A long time. I thought once I finished that maybe my, uh, chestral regions would go back to "normal" size, but they didn't. They didn't stay the same size, either. They got bigger! When I see pictures of myself from even just two years ago, the first thing I think is, "My boobs were so small!" So that's one thing.

But my face, too. I think it's a combination of weight set point being higher and my face finally catching up, and, honestly, age. I feel like my face is showing my age more now than it did a couple of years ago. For one, my features used to look like they took up a lot more of my face, and now they don't. It's kind of odd.

So when I see older pictures of me, I know it's me, but it almost looks like looking at a different person.

And, whereas before, I definitely would have pined over how "skinny" I looked in some shots, now I'm frankly alarmed at how much less room I was taking up.

I'm learning to view photos as memories frozen in time and to find the nostalgia in the moments they record, separating my ego from the process as much as possible.

It's definitely a process.

Once, after I'd lost a bunch of weight, we had family Christmas pictures taken. I'd agonized over what to wear, in the end choosing a black boxy sweater that was cute but not form-fitting in the least. When we got the proofs back, I kind of humble-bragged the truth to my ex-husband that I had thought about wearing something more body-conscious but went with something that would draw less attention to my "transformation." Unimpressed, he deadpanned, "No one's going to look at you in these pictures. They're going to look at our beautiful child." I mean, it hurt, but he wasn't wrong.

The biggest thing that I keep coming back to when I experience momentary surprise at how I appear in more candid pictures is to remember, "This is exactly what everyone else sees every dang day." I only see myself in front of the mirror or when having a posed picture taken (unless the front-facing camera accidentally comes on, then look out!!). So the mental image I have of myself is quite controlled. Everyone else sees me sitting, stretching out, double chinning it, etc. and so pictures of me aren't shocking to them... if they're even really looking at me. And they probably aren't.

I don't mind getting older. I don't mind looking older. I don't harbor fantasies that I can still pass as a co-ed. So it's fine.

I have a friend who was invited to a reunion recently, and she told me, "If I were skinny, I'd go. I could show them how fabulous and successful I am." I love her, and she IS fabulous and successful. And if she wanted to go, I wish she'd go.

I don't want her to be captive to presenting a certain body type in order to be pleasing to a critical eye (in this case, her own, but she's projecting on former co-workers), and I certainly refuse to be. If anyone has a problem with this, then I'm going to leave you with the wise words of one Ms. Edna Turnblad:

Getting Old(er), Changing It Up

My body is tired of some stuff, guys, and I'm going to have to do things differently.

Lately, whenever I wear eyeliner, I have to use eyedrops. My eyes itch, they're dry, and I just can't wait to take it off. Yes, all eyeliner. Yes, even THAT eyeliner. I've tried them all. And I LOVE how "awake" I look and how it opens up my eyes when I wear eyeliner. But I think I have to be done with it.

This week, I've just used dark eye shadow at the eyelash line, and, while it's not perfect, it's been fine. At least I won't have to worry about whether it's run or flaked off? Sigh.

Another thing is my hair. It keeps getting so dried out and I will find and use a fairly expensive shampoo/conditioner that I love... for about a year, then I have to move on because my hair goes back to being crunchy hay and it's just no good.

After three years of this cycle, I have actually purchased a product from an MLM, which, if you know me, you know I AVOID. My friend's house-cleaning wipes were a pleasant surprise, so maybe this will be, too.

Beyond that, I might have made a half-decision (like kind of made it, but not overly committed to it yet). After twenty years, I think I might stop coloring my hair. I am sure my hair won't take it forever without just falling right out. It's been a good, LONG, run.

I did take a two-year-break at one point because I was super heavy, and for some reason decided that not having red hair would draw less attention to my fat body? And I also decided that bangs might help me look cuter. IT. WAS. A. MISTAKE. If you're a person who doesn't have bangs, but you're thinking about getting bangs: DO NOT GET BANGS.

Also, "trying to look less fat" is a vapid and needless pursuit, but I won't get on that soapbox at the moment.

Anyhoo, the color wasn't bad, but I ended up going back to red a couple of years later (and after my bangs had grown back out).

The color I have now is fading so subtly, it seems like I *might* be able to just let it grow out? We'll see. It might be more noticeable when the roots are 2 inches instead of 1/4 inch.

Now... another thing. I love where we live. LOVE IT. That said, I don't think I ever want to buy a house again.

Last Friday night, at 6:48 PM, our lawn mower (a human, not the machine) noticed that we had a pinhole leak in the pipe in the ground right behind our water meter. We got it fixed quickly (yay!) but it was $400.

Tonight at 10, we noticed our air conditioner wasn't working. The repair guy came out, but guess what? It's an electric problem, not an a/c problem! The electrician can get here shortly after 10 in the morning, so it won't be *too* hot. But still. Ugh. Oh, and it was $150 for the a/c service call. For nothing. I mean, I guess we did get some information, And I don't begrudge paying the dude for coming out (with his wife in the car; she was his girlfriend last time he made a late-Friday-night call, back in September when we were at Disney World and my parents and D handled it).

In short, being old is kind of awesome, but comes with some "mature" expenses and weird body changes that I'm sure have only barely begun, since I haven't started menopause yet.

Good times.

The Benefits of Being "A Certain Age"

Yesterday, we were taking a friend to the doctor and I got pulled over by a Leander police officer. I had stopped at a stop sign and then turned right pretty much in front of him, so I moved right over to the left lane. I thought that's why he pulled me over, but he said it was because of the stop sign. I said, "I thought I stopped?" He then informed me that there was a difference in tapping on one's brakes and in really looking and considering traffic before moving on. Fair enough.

If I were in my 20s, I'm relatively certain (based largely on my experiences in my 20s) that I would have been given a ticket. However, a 46-year-old lady requires only a warning and a reminder to drive more cautiously.

Interestingly, he noted the small size of my car as a danger, saying if I got hit, I'd be in trouble. I wanted to say, a la "Crocodile Dundee," "You think THIS is a small car? Nah. My husband has a small car!" I fortunately digressed.

Also, in case you're my mom and you're worried, my car performs just fine in most crash tests (including the most important ones), with a US News rating of 8.5/10 stars.

Today was James's company's summer picnic, which was held at Typhoon Texas, a nearby waterpark. I last showered a couple of days ago, but today I just put on my bathing suit and walked out the door. I didn't consider shaving. I didn't paint my toenails. I am getting a cold sore, but still didn't think about wearing makeup. I didn't feel intimidated or wistful about any of the pretty young things we saw at the park. I just had fun and ate free food and enjoyed my family.

Yesterday when Mal got his Vampirina house down to play with it, he said, "Mommy! We need to dust Vampirina's bed so we can play with it!" I told James that I'd just been thinking the night before about how the 2009 me would totally judge that the 2019 me doesn't maintenance dust; I only dust when it's visible and bothering me. But I have better things to do than dust, and enough cats that being more fastidious about that wouldn't affect my allergies one bit, anyway.

Basically, I genuinely don't care what other people think (I've always not cared much, but still kind of preferred being thought of as attractive, competent, smart, etc.), I seem harmless enough not to warrant too much attention in public, and I am a lot more laid back. I'm not complaining about this age thing, even as I write this with reading glasses because just this week I've become unable to read my computer screen without them. It's all good.

The Subjugation of Pain

Today was fun. I mean that, actually. I was saying it sarcastically, but until it wasn't, it was.

Mal and I were playing one of his favorite new games, Scare and Seek. At one point, I'd hidden behind the laundry room door. Whenever Mal's looking for me, I "meow" to let him know when he's getting colder. I'd sounded for him just as Rudy came around the corner and meowed back to me. Mal came down the hall and said, "I heard it twice!" Rudy meowed again, and this time walked back behind the door, under my legs. Mal came around the corner and asked, "Rudy, have you seen my mom--- AAAH!" as he came face to face with me. It was pretty funny.

Later, though, we were playing Thunder Hollow Crazy Eight demolition derby. Mal rides on his little sit-on tricycle scooter, and I ride on a plasma car. Although you propel the plasma car by turning the steering wheel, to get started, I usually push off with my feet, otherwise Mal, who is totally foot-powered, gets away from me. Today, the car shot out from under me and I landed flat on my tailbone.

Have you ever injured your coccyx? Because I have. In high school. And I felt shots of pain for more than ten years after that injury, and after several months of chiropractic adjustments.

Anyway, suffice it to say that I'm pathetic right now. But the interesting part of all of this, to me, is another element of back pain.

For the past two or three months, I've been having increasingly strong sciatica down the back of my left upper leg, similar to where it was when I had a ruptured disc. In fact, I can feel in my back where the problem is. It's getting more debilitating, but I can avoid it by having my lower back well supported... Except when I'm nursing on my left side, which is how our beds are set up. Oh well. It's a work in progress.

Anyhoo, after I hurt my tailbone today, when I was sitting on the couch, I did an experiment, crossing my left leg over my right, in a position I know hurts the sciatica. I was vaguely aware of that stress, but the new injury "quieted" the previous pain in a noticeable way.

I'll be interested to see how it feels when we go to bed tonight. Don't worry. I definitely learned a few years ago to listen to my body telling me to cut out something that's hurting me. But I can do a little light experimentation, right?

This is Going to Make You More Uncomfortable than It Does Me...

This summer, I'm having a pretty big birthday. It's the one that will move me into a whole other echelon when I am filling out questionnaires. That's right: 45.

After the whole back injury thing that was ushered in with my 40s, my other effects of aging seem tame, but I'm experiencing some, nonetheless.

For instance: I'm probably within a year of needing reading glasses. Only when my contacts are in; correcting for myopia renders my close-in focus difficult. When my contacts are out, I have super amazing microvision. So, basically, I'm going to need to put on glasses to read when I'm wearing contacts, and take off my glasses ot read when I'm not.

My hearing is still right on, but you can bet that as soon as I seem to be losing it, I'll fix that right up with hearing aids. I have a young kid, and I don't want to miss a thing. I want to hear it all, not just pretend to kind of get what's going on.

My point, I guess, is that rather than stubbornly denying "signs of aging," I plan to lean in and use whatever technology is available to me to allow me to thrive as long as is possible.

And it's interesting to me how we, as humans, tend to treat these physical changes as something almost shameful. Why do we do that? We're persevering, but we act like wounded pack animals, seeking to hide any perceived weakness from everyone else.

All of this to say that what I'm about to tell you, some people are going to feel is TMI. If you're prone to wonder, "Why is XYZ talking about THIS?!" then you might just want to check on out right now.

Okay. Everyone else still with me? Great.

You might remember last year I ordered and reviewed Thinx. They've been remarkable. Really, as much a game-changer as the Diva Cup. So, I ordered this week from Thinx's sister company, Icon.

I have done a bazillion Kegels in my life, especially around the times of my pregnancies and deliveries, but a combination, likely, of having Mal and being in my 40s has resulted in a miscommunication between my body and my brain. It's like my brain will realize, "Oh, hey, I need to go to the bathroom" and something about consciously thinking of the place makes my body go, "Okay, so right now?" Nooo!

It's interesting: The only time we talk about incontinence is when it's in a medical context, or when it's being joked about. Like, "I laughed so hard, I peed myself a little" or if a comedian is riffing on getting old... However, when it actually happens, and especially as it becomes obvious that it's not a one-off or a two-off, it's not funny at all. It's confusing and frustrating and more than a little embarrassing. Because, like, yeah, I was potty trained for all of these years, so why is my body betraying me now?

When my Pepa was alive and I'd offer to get things at the store for my Mema, she'd ask me to buy two things usually: Ensure and adult diapers. After Pepa passed away, though, I'd offer the same and she might have me pick up several things for her... but once, the day after I'd gone to the store, I saw her at Walmart with adult diapers in her cart. She quickly threw her jacket over them and I, of course, didn't say anything. But why are we like that? Why are we shamed by what's obviously normal bodily functions?

So I bought the "pee-proof" underwear. Because I will need to start carrying an extra set of pants for Mal pretty soon, and I don't want to have to do that for myself. 'Cause stuff happens when you're out and about: You're heading to the restroom and find it's full, or one of the stalls is unexpectedly locked. You have to walk through the detergent aisle to get there, and you have a sneezing fit. Or you're just suddenly surprised by the realization that you really need to go. Like three minutes ago.

And I'm sharing this with you, why? I don't want it to be a "deal." Stuff is big and scary and embarrassing when we're trying to hide it. So I'm just putting it out there. I think it'll be great, and turn this into a non-issue. The Thinx really has! Which is cool, because it's freaking expensive. But it's cheaper and easier than the disposable alternatives.

You guys have to promise to tell me when I need to stop driving, too. I want to be graceful and easy on myself as I age. Actually, I probably should never have started driving. But it's too late to fix that now.

I plan to stay around as long as possible, and I want to be fully present in each minute, so here's to being realistic and leaning into the stuff that will help!