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Middle Age, The World’s End, and a Farewell to the Courtesy

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 THE-WORLDS-END

I love British humor, especially when it’s from the same minds that brought us Shaun of the Dead.  The World’s End was a bit different than what I expected in that it sort of hit close to home.  It was funny in that way peculiar to the Brits, but it also made me think. Here you have a guy (Gary King) wanting to re-live his one top-of-the-world halcyon moment- and you almost have to hand it to someone who has been able to keep that joie de vivre of youth alive past age 40.  I think the whole joie de vivre concept went down the drain for me pretty much by 21, and it was gone for good after my divorce.

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In the movie you discover that Gary King’s friends are a lot like me: washed out, sold out, burned out and resigned to the fact that the best of life is far behind them.  Gary hadn’t changed, but his friends had.   The world around them had changed too, thanks to the blue-blooded alien robots.  Orderliness, conformity, blah, blah, blah.  The difficult thing is that the older we get, the more we buy the neat and tidy, bland, unexciting life, even when it goes to extremes.

There is something to be said for responsibility and routine and stability.  Those things are boring, but at least they’re somewhat predictable and safe.  44 is a long, long way from 17.  I know better than to dream lofty dreams or to expect anything better than the status quo.  The saying that, “A young person wants a the world and a new BMW, but I’d be happy with just a good BM,” is pretty much true for me.

Detroit-2013-BMW-M6

I’m pretty sure the 1986 me would have drooled over this.

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2013 me is a lot more realistic.

I think for me the aggravating thing is that as far as I know, I’ve never had that top-of-the-world halcyon moment, and I’d probably not know it when or if I ever did- or ever will.

The sad part is I can identify with the blue-blooded robots- going through the motions, blending into a bland world of blasé days, one indistinguishable from the next, keeping things orderly and tidy and boring until one day you sort of drop dead.  Sometimes I think I dropped dead years ago, but just forgot to fall over.

On another tangent, the city of Marion lost an historical landmark, if you can call a motel turned cathouse an historical landmark.

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In 1960-whatever it was a nice little roadside motel with a pool and everything.

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In 2006 it was a pay-by-the-hour cathouse.

It was a little bit sad to see what was left of the Courtesy bulldozed over, although I think the only purpose it had served for the last couple of years was as a crack house.  The only thing is that half of the town or more would have to be bulldozed if they wanted to eliminate all the crack houses.

The main take-home I got from The World’s End is that you can’t really go home again, and you can’t really ever re-live your glory days, and I never really had any to begin with.  Perhaps my mistake is that I have to go back home again from time to time and what I see depresses me even though I don’t live in that sphere anymore.

I think that’s why my sisters avoid going to Mom and Dad’s like the plague.  That feeling of being misplaced and out of time is disconcerting enough, but add opening up the old wounds and bad memories and rivalries and so forth, and it can be downright abysmal.  Sometimes I don’t understand why I go back as often as I do, but then I remember that my son and my granddaughter still live there.  I can’t demand that my family meet me where I am, even if they could.

shit

I leave with the philosophical observation of the day.

Not the Queen of the Popularity Parade, and My Guts are Not Here for You to Love

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Sometimes it’s necessary to inform others that I do not suffer fools lightly.  Nothing personal.

There is a certain notoriety in holding a minority, hard-line viewpoint, but my guts are not here for anyone to love.  I’m sure if I just blithely and vapidly followed the mainstream in my social and political views I’d have a lot more friends, but in my mind, a lot less personal integrity.  As far as friends go, I’ll take quality over quantity any time.   If my views serve to “cull the herd,” so be it.  I don’t need, nor do I desire, much social interaction, so when I do interact with people I want those interactions to count.  If I’ve challenged your thought processes, contradicted your world view, shocked or appalled you, offended you, or perhaps even broadened your vocabulary, so be it.  My inciteful mission moves forward ahead (thank you, Obama, for ruining what used to be a perfectly acceptable word by using it as the slogan for your crappy, and hopefully unsuccessful re-election campaign.)  “Forward” indeed – over which cliff?  The Grand friggin’ Canyon?

For what it’s worth, you can probably find Obama on the golf course.

Granted, I’m no poster child for the goody-goody crowd.  I have my flaws, but I have to live honestly the best way I know how.  I’m not going to pretend to be something I’m not.  I’m not out to impress anyone, sway anyone to my point of view, or any of that noise.  For the most part this blog is for me, a place for good or ill, to speak my mind, organize my thoughts (easier said than done, that) and just plain sound off.

I learned many years ago that I’m not wired to please too many people.  I have a hard time pleasing myself (no, not that type of pleasing, pervert) in that I’m an incorrigible perfectionist, as well as I’ve got quite a flaming type-A personality.  I have absolutely no patience.  I’m into the instant gratification thing, believe that.  I buy things online (often) because I loathe actual shopping in stores, and then get impatient when I order something from the west coast and it takes me a week or more to get it.

This is what I used to get so pissed at Steve-o for doing.  Wash the damned pants already.  Or buy some new ones.  Go to the thrift store if you must.

I have even less tolerance than patience.  I try, I really do, but today my tolerance is whisper-thin. I’m being bombarded by bad country music blared from two points (and different stations, no less) in the room.  Dueling freaking banjos, oh holy shit- if only it were just banjos and not that horrible caterwauling that country artists call “singing.”  I do have good music on the MP3 player in the headphones to try to cancel it out, but I can still hear the oat opera and it’s damned annoying.  Then to add insult to injury, I’m trying to concentrate on getting my paperwork done, but it’s rather difficult to concentrate when I’m sitting next to our very own office freaking Typhoid Mary, who has been hacking up pieces of lung and snorting about all morning, like I need contagion on top of noise pollution. And she’s one of the bad country music blarers, to boot.

I’m just not a big fan of communicable disease.  Especially the respiratory ones. Been there, done that, way too freaking much.

Maybe I’m just being petty and mean and I really shouldn’t be like that, but dammit, we don’t need any diseases running through here.  Then people call off, and by that time, even though I usually end up being sicker than Jerry Sandusky at a Boy Scout Jamboree, (only not in quite the same way) since I’ve lingered on and done everyone else’s shit while they try to recover, I can’t call off.  If you’re going to hack and cough, take some damned shit to control your snorting and snots, and don’t get pissed when I Lysol the hell out of your area, and my own, to try to keep the germs from infiltrating my space.

Did I mention- I’m very user UN-friendly?

I know I can be the High Queen Bitch of all I survey, and today is sort of one of those days.  I’m trying so hard to be nice that it’s actually pissing me off, and that’s never a good sign.  It’s even more funny when I hit the random scramble on the MP3 player and I get:

“Sympathy for the Devil”- the Rolling Stones

“Gold Dust Woman”- Fleetwood Mac

“Skating Away on the Thin Ice of a New Day”- Jethro Tull

Ian Anderson is way cool though.  You gotta admire a guy who can stand on one leg and play the flute- in a rock setting no less.

Even a random sampling on an electronic device seems to reflect my angst today.  I shouldn’t be pissy about anything, and I shouldn’t let trivial things overwhelm.  But I do.  Yes, I did take my meds today, but today is one of those days when I wish it was OK to mistake Bailey’s for coffee creamer.

Twisted, Torrid and Tawdry, for the Love of Dirty Laundry, and Friends or Total Strangers?

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For being introverted almost to the point of being antisocial, I surprised myself in taking the initiative to go to my class reunion dinner.  There were activities planned for the entire weekend, but I know myself- a little social interaction goes a long way with me, especially in potentially awkward situations, and even more so in potentially awkward situations involving  other people and too much alcohol.   I can’t drink in public for a number of reasons, and I get enough of drunk-watching-as-entertainment at home.  I did party back in the day, but it lost its charm long ago.   Maybe I’m strange, but 25 years is a freaking long time, and I live in a completely different sphere than I did in the wonderful world of the mid-1980’s. 

Spuds is in the G&R, the stars are in the heavens and all that, but I’m not the same.  Me, circa 1986, would not even vaguely recognize me, today.  The 1986 me would probably be running for cover, screaming, “HOLY SHIT, I’ve become my mother!!” 

Some of the people I graduated with are almost exactly as I remember them.  Others have been dealt with even more cruelly by time and circumstance than I have been.  Some- or I should say most- I’d never recognized at all if not for the name tags.  Especially the guys.  I got there a bit early so I could watch people trickle in and perhaps gain my bearings.  I was shocked at how old some of the guys looked.  Jerry is 12 years older than me, but a few of these poor guys looked as if they had 20 years on him.  As cruel as it may sound, one thought that went through my head was, “Who are these geezers, and what happened to my friends?”

I don’t mean that in a malicious sort of way.  I know only too well that time has been rather cruel to me as well, even though I was never much to look at to begin with, and have always been proportioned like a mutant troll.  I am sure that not a few people looked at me and wondered what the hell happened.  I think in some ways we are all wondering just when we got so old.  I know I sort of expected everyone to look the same as I remembered, which isn’t terribly realistic. 

It is sort of sad in a way that I’ve really not kept touch with people over the years.  I do care, but I get busy, and I spend far too much time catering to Jerry and his high maintenance needs.  He made it very clear long ago that he really doesn’t want to socialize with any of my friends (frankly, I think he’s afraid of them seeing him when he’s shitfaced and acting like a horse’s ass) and I don’t socialize much anyway, so as soon as you know it, everyone I used to know is a geezer/cougar too, and their lives and circumstances have all changed. 

I made it a point not to get embroiled in anyone else’s scandals or juicy bits.  If someone were to investigate, and the more inquiring minds likely have, they can uncover all sorts of rather twisted, torrid and tawdry dirt on me. I’ve done my share of stupid things and made my share of really bad decisions.   Don Henley said it back in 1985- “We all know that crap is king, give us dirty laundry…”  The thing is I don’t have the heart to hold a 25 year grudge toward anyone, or to dredge up anyone’s sordid past. 

Over all, I think it was a healthy thing to reconnect for a moment, but above all, to be reminded that the past is exactly that, and for the most part, it’s a good thing.   I’m a lot more comfortable with myself now- although being in a room with close to a hundred people I’ve not seen in years did keep me more on guard than usual.  (Yet another reason why temperance befits me!) I did see some people in a different light which was also a good thing.  I may not have been one of the Beautiful People, but the line between me and them is not quite so well defined anymore. 

In some ways I like to think that I may have made some new friends. Even though I may have known them years ago, people change.  I am not the maudlin, huggy-kissy type.  I don’t  have the talent to just take up a decades-old conversation where I left off as if it were yesterday.  I don’t remember names well (I do a bit better with faces) and I know to some I might seem aloof, but even though I refrained from hugging and kissing, it was nice to see people again. 

I just couldn’t bring myself to swig on the community bottle of Boone’s Farm (acck) either.  I’ve had a pathological aversion to drinking after others (especially on a glass bottle) ever since I was about four, and my sister used to grab my pop bottle, take a big swig and backwash into it.   The thought of drinking other people’s spit and/or pre-chewed cud is one of the few things that just really completely gross me out.

I did have to take a pic of the “I Love Them Crabs” drink holder.  That is classic.  Some things do remain the same.

All That Really Matters, a Crack in the Armor, and Leash Training

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Sheena is a beautiful dog, but she is as stubborn and willful as she is beautiful.  We decided (or should I say Jerry decided, because I am not at all hyper like he is in the evenings) to take the dogs out on leashes, which we haven’t done for some time.  Clara and Lilo were not too bad, although Clara always does better on a leash with her harness.  I should have taken the extra minute or two to put Clara in her harness.  I refuse to use choke chains or pinch collars on my dogs, although I’ve seen a lot of people who handle Malinois use choke chains or pinch collars to keep the dogs under better control.   Clara simply wants to run.  The aim is to get her to stay back and walk politely which she does when she knows she has the harness on and I can pull her back if I need to.  Lilo was her usual self, laid back and trotting along with her peculiar little bow-legged, sideways gait.  I wonder sometimes if she tracks sideways because she’s cross-eyed or because she’s bow-legged, or maybe a combination of both.

The few times I’ve had Sheena on her leash she has been relatively obedient for me.  She does surprisingly well in spite of her lack of socialization and formal training.  Then again, Sheena is a bit of a cling-on with me anyway, so that makes leash training, even with a conventional collar, a breeze.  Until Jerry takes her leash.

Sheena did not want to be on the leash with Jerry.  I can’t blame her.  I don’t like it either, and he only has me leashed in a figurative way.  I had Clara, and without her harness she was enough of a handful.  So Sheena decided that if she had to be with Jerry, she was simply going to sit and dig her big, splayed feet into the ground.  I never knew this about Huskies until we got Sheena.  They have huge, insulated, clompy paws that are reminiscent of polar bears’.  Sheena is a huge klutz on dry land, but surprisingly graceful on snow and ice.  Sheena, however, does not do anything Sheena does not want to do. It’s funny.  She’s just as stubborn as Jerry is.

Yesterday was a very pleasant day.  Steve-o got rid of that monstrosity of a hoopty Mitsubishi that I had been hoping he would do ever since he ended up with that piece of mess.  Somebody was even dumb enough to give him money for that POS, which I welcome, but fail to understand.   Now all I need to hear from him is that he’s spending his weeks keeping up his GPA, and his weekends cooking up that taco meat and shoveling it into those tacos and burritos.  I don’t want him to work at Taco Bell forever, but a few hours or so on Fridays, Saturdays and Sundays- until  he finishes school- is not too much to ask.   If he could do 20 or 30 hours a week at $9 an hour, that would certainly help, and they don’t even have to train him because he’s worked there before.  Then he can worry about buying his own food and gasoline and cigarettes for a change.

Adding to yesterday’s pleasantness, I had an unexpected, but welcome, conversation with an old friend.  I still have a heart in there somewhere after all.  I know, I know, how things could have, should have been. Wish in one hand and crap in the other, which one fills up first- but it’s nice to know that old connection is still there, and that I do have at least one friend that is thicker than water.   Since my true friends are few and far between and delightfully rare, as I have said before, I should take care not to neglect them.

Memory and imagination both serve me well- probably too much so- but hearing a voice from the past and even engaging in surface-level pleasantries was a rare delight.  There are a lot of people I have to talk to and with out of necessity, but very few I enjoy talking with.  I hope sometime in the near future that we can talk in private over dinner and a drink rather than a little too publicly over the phone, but that might be a bit hard for me to take.  I would be the one in need of the leash instead of the dogs, and that’s not a place where I need to go.

Balance is the key word.  Usually I am quite the example of reserve and restraint, but it’s been a long time since- well, a lot of things- but I miss intelligent conversation the most.  I also miss being treated like a lady and not just someone’s housekeeper/babysitter/gofer/indentured servant.   There is something to be said for spending an evening in civilized conversation with a friend versus spending an evening effectively alone cranking up the MP3 player with the noise-cancelling headphones to drown out the lovely infernal racket of Drunk and Stupid meets Boxcar Willie. 

I have to be careful how far I let my mind wander, and I need to set some boundaries on just how much lingering in the garden of memory I’m allowed.  Still, there’s nothing like a bit of an oasis in a very hot, vast desert.

I have to find a balance between maintaining those relationships that challenge me and energize me (very few and far between) and tossing the albatrosses around my neck overboard.  I tend to forget when to toss the albatross.

I’m too old to start over even if I could, and whatever fiery passions of youth I once had are pretty well extinguished.  As the old joke says, “In my youth I wanted a nice BMW.” -” Today I’ll settle for it without the W. ” 

Besides, anyone interested in dinner and conversation with a crusty old cougar like me has likely long-since been relegated to the “coyote-style” crowd, so crossing the line in a carnal fashion is highly unlikely to occur.  It’s not as if I am still some horny teenager or twenty-something, and all of my friends are significantly older than me.   Hopefully the POMC is enjoying “Willie on Demand” while he can (even though in conscience I can’t approve of him fornicating) because there will come a day when Johnson won’t stand at attention any more. 

Unless of course, by the time Steve-o gets old, Medicare is still paying for geezers’ pecker pumps.  That would be his luck.

A Well-Deserved Rebuke, Losing Perspective, and Whiny Minorities

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I got a very pointed reminder today from one of my closest friends (who I’ve not seen in years) that I have been pathetically lax in doing the things that friends do- i.e. communicating…   He didn’t come right out and say that in so many words, but the correspondence he sent me certainly implied it, and I get the point.  I can count on one hand the people I actually consider to be friends versus casual acquaintances or family I have to tolerate because they’re blood, and he is one of the two human beings on Earth who know me better than anyone except for God Himself.  There really is no good excuse for me being so distant.  I can say that my health issues or work or Jerry’s high maintenance demands are the culprits, but to do that is a cop out.  It’s been over a year since the hysterectomy so that’s not an excuse, (my health has improved most markedly since then)  I used to work a lot more hours than I do now, so it’s not really about time, and Jerry always was and always will be high maintenance and jealous of every second I fail to spend kissing his ass.

So the thing that’s holding me back is the thing that always holds me back.  Fear.  I am afraid to make a simple phone call to my closest friend because I am afraid that he will tell me what I already know.  I’m getting used, abused and ran like a railroad, I allow it to happen, and I’ve allowed it to happen my entire life.  He has told me that for years even though I know it already and I’ve failed to do anything about it.   I am a rather pathetic specimen in more ways than one.  But I did make the call, and at least had the courage to leave a voice mail, for what it’s worth.

I’m tired of living in fear, and I need to break that particular bad habit.  I also have to have the decency and the just plain humanity to maintain the relationships and the people who have maintained me and grown my soul.   The caveat here is to maintain such relationships in an honorable and good way.  Running from them is not an answer.  Since when did I give a rat’s ass what anyone else thinks of me except for God Himself?  The touchy part of this is that in my quest to “do the right thing” I’ve gotten so hung up on morality and rules and conventions that I ignore people.  I’m afraid to maintain a dialogue with my friends- especially those of the opposite gender- because I am afraid that I will fall down the slippery slope.  I guess it’s hard to be bad to other people when you avoid them, but it’s also bad to avoid them because then you’re not doing any good.  I admit, I use Jerry as an excuse because he does make things difficult for me, but he will always do that.  Sometimes I forget that socially and emotionally he has a mental age of about four.  I’m not saying that to criticize because I am an emotional cripple myself.

I have lost my perspective and have come damned close to losing whatever honor I ever had.  I know emotions are a really difficult area for me, but running away from them and failing to be honest with myself regarding how I feel and who and what I deem to be important is not working. 

I have to admit, nobody does apathy like I do.  Then again, if I get something in my craw it’s hard for me to do or think of anything else.

Especially when the large groups are trucked in from Michigan and West Virginia to protest at the Ohio statehouse, so the media will think that most of the people in Ohio are all for continuing the status quo instead of actually addressing the graft and waste in state and local government.  Nice try, but I hope that the Governor as well as the General Assembly have enough sense to understand that the union protesters are a very small but very whiny minority. 

The tail has wagged the dog long enough.

That goes for every other whiny minority out there too, including any racial group who thinks they are owed reparations because their distant ancestors were slaves, including the litigation happy trial lawyers, including the special rights for gays contingent, and anyone else out there who believes they are entitled to special protections or perks that the majority is not entitled to.

The bottom line:

Anyone who goes back far enough in their genealogy will find ancestors who were slaves.  I have a good number of Scots in my lineage, but I really don’t feel compelled to go back on Great Britain to seek reparations for the Scots in my ancestry who were enslaved, oppressed or killed back in antiquity.  Nor do I feel compelled to go to the US government to seek reparations for their treatment of my Cherokee ancestors.

Anyone who feels compelled to sue someone else because of their own stupidity and negligence (remember the lawsuit over McDonald’s coffee being hot?) should be 1. laughed right out of court, and 2. fined for wasting the court’s time with bullshit.  The bottom feeding trial lawyers who make a killing on insurance fraud and frivolous, bullshit litigation should be fined also, and then required to make restitution to the honest part of society by picking up trash along the freeways and serving the homeless  who come to the soup kitchens.

I don’t really care what people do in the privacy of their own bedrooms, and I really don’t care if a person is gay, straight, bi, furry, whatever, as long as they abide by the rules and contribute to society.  However, getting special treatment because of one’s lifestyle choice is not only unfair, but it has been proven by medical science that the gay lifestyle leads to a  host of serious health concerns.  We also know from history that rampant homosexuality led to the decline of both the Greek and Roman societies in antiquity.  Do we really think that sanctioning homosexual partnerships and claiming them to be as good if not better than heterosexual marriage is a good thing for society in general?  How about a legal process in which one’s partner-be it a roommate, a business partner or a homosexual lover- is given the right to legally act in many of the ways that a spouse automatically is?  Marriage is for a man and a woman, with the implication that there may be breeding going on, but any two people can choose to be “legal partners” or something of that effect.  That sounds like a viable compromise to me.

I think I’ve ranted enough for today, but the lesson lingers on.  I cannot forget about and/or neglect my friends.  I don’t have that many to begin with.

Candy Coated History, Middle Age Cowardice, and Don’t Call Me by My Name

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I don’t remember seeing anything remotely like this anywhere in Marion, but then this postcard likely was from the early 20th century.  There were some most beautiful parks and avenues there back in the day, but by the time I was capable of conscious thought the decline was well underway. 

Perhaps I am as guilty as anyone else of viewing the past through a rose-colored lens.  There were definitely aspects of my past that completely sucked and I am the first to admit it.  Even so, I can’t help but to think there is something wired into our brains to make us see the past with a more positive slant that it deserves. 

“The grass was greener/ The light was brighter/ With friends surrounded/The nights of wonder” – Pink Floyd- “High Hopes”

I don’t think the grass or the light have been doing the changing.  I am the one who has changed.  My vision is dimming.  I don’t get to see the friends who were so much a part of my world, and as far as “nights of wonder” go, suffice to say that it’s been a very long time.  Way too long, even though I know that love is an illusion.  The moment was sweet, but the requiem is long and bitter and loaded with longing and regret. 

The suckiest thing about middle age is that it’s so easy to become blase and jaded.  I have to admit that’s partially my own fault, because I do tend to be guarded.  The drawback of safety is that it’s not all that much fun, but when you’ve been wounded in the ways I’ve been, stepping out and taking chances beyond the cycle of daily routine is terrifying.  I’ve seen more than enough rejection and failure in my lifetime, and that fear makes me wary.

Anything worth doing is worth sacrificing everything for.  I could only pray that I could get to the point where I could love without fear and where I could garner the courage to stand and not be tempted to run back to the ivory tower at every hint of a threat.  I am not even remotely close to that goal.

I’m a coward.  I admit it.  I’m afraid to fail.  I’m afraid to face up to my own inadequacies.  I’m afraid to stand up to those who would control me.  I put up with a lot of crap I shouldn’t because I’m afraid to stand my ground even when I know I’m right. 

I don’t have an easy answer.  In fact, I don’t have an answer at all. 

At one time I used to believe that if only I had enough money I could solve all my problems.  I think that’s the biggest lie that society attempts to drill into people’s heads.  Although I would have a lot less stress if I were in a better financial situation, money only buys one the misery one likes the best.  I see all these celebrities in the news and they are more screwed up than I am- in spite of their money, influence and power.  I don’t think I would refuse money if I would ever have the good fortune to come into it (it would be nice to go on a Cougar Cruise, it would be lovely to have all my superfluous body hair removed, as well as it would be nice to have an indoor pool) but I will still be the same unlovely, awkward, geeky kid that no one likes and everyone makes fun of.   I may not do much for the betterment of society, although if you stick around long enough, I may expand your vocabulary.

On the brighter side, I’m not much of a social butterfly to begin with.

One thing that does bother me about kids is they don’t show much respect toward their elders.  Granted, a lot of elders don’t deserve a whole lot of respect, but it’s the principle.  I can’t remember ever referring to adults by their first names when I was a kid.  So-and-so’s mother was always “Mrs. Johnson,” never “Gladys,” or whatever her first name was, even if you knew her first name.  Kids simply did not address adults by their first names.  Steve-o’s friends generally just referred to me as, “Hey, You,” or if they were feeling really formal, “Hey, Stephan’s Mom.”  I can only remember one of them referring to me as “Mrs. Price,” and I think that was only because he was in front of his mother. 

In some ways I can see where it would be confusing for kids because most of them don’t have the same last name as the parental units they are currently habitating with. They can’t assume that because Jeremy’s last name is Wilson that his Mom’s last name is Wilson.  Her last name could be Fartknocker, or Sanchez, or Wang,  for all the poor kids know, and she might be on Jeremy’s Step Dad #4.  I guess one can’t expect the kids to keep the other kids’ parents’ last names straight.  There are days when I’m lucky to remember my own name, but I have the advantage of being able to use my advanced age as an excuse for memory loss.

I guess I don’t care what the kids call me (one of Steve-o’s friends refers to me simply as “The Cougar”) as long as they pretty much abide by my rules and stay civil in my house.  Empty your ashtrays,  dispose of your Mountain Dew bottles and used prophylactics in the proper manner, and I’ll have no real problems with you whether you can remember my name or not.  I’ve never liked my first name, and being called Mrs. anything  just reminds me a.) that I’m old, and b.) to remind myself that I’m not my mother-in-law. 

It’s easier to say it than to live by it, but when all is said and done, the greater part of humanity is cordially invited to kiss my behind.  I know it’s human nature to seek approval, but it’s my nature to be selective regarding whose approval I care about seeking.