Tag: life

Posted on in life, sixty

My Dupe Era.

If you are shopping in high-end boutiques. Fantastic. Carry on and enjoy, but outside the happy bubble of high-end everything, the rest of society is hurting. So, don’t get judgmental. Prices on everything have created dupe mania, which is different from fake designers wares. I don’t promote copies or fakes, but I am at a point that $100 for just about anything from leggings to facial products is stupid, but I still want comfort and the overall style that designers create. So, I am duping. I want the look for less. Period.

It took me a minute to get comfortable with this Gen Z creation. I like designer clothes, bags and shoes. I have pieces and will continue to go in that direction at times, but as prices climb in all areas from food, airfare, housing, etc. Gen Z’s may have it right even if it costs the public new boutique designs and a life of faster fashion. In this day and age, the saving of money is more important than ever, and frankly, the direction of prices shows no sign of slowing.

So, dupe, my friend. You can find some of your old friends for less, and while not exactly, the same it is close as there are tribes of dupers that compare the products like scientists. Watch a few videos, and you can buy the closest products to what is now a few hundred dollars a jar, La Prairie vs. Aldi, yes, the grocery store price, please. Hey, caviar is caviar… and groceries are also available. Food plus a treat. It’s such a 1990’s way of life which I miss.

At 61, my dupes are selective and based on a true desire to save money for big ticket items, travel, and retirement. This economy has caused us all pause, or it should.

Posted on in life, sixty, travel

The Little Farmhouse

There is something to be said about hanging out on a farm when you go to pick apples or buy jams and jellies, lovingly prepped and packed. Now, take this a step further and live on-site. Yep, on a farm. A working farm, no less. We were lovingly granted this opportunity from a family that realized our predicament while our own river home (not farm based) is being built, and we are grateful. Now, this farmhouse is used yearly as a hunting cabin. It comes complete with many horns on the wall and a real landline with a rotary dial phone. No internet. None. Nada. No TV. We do have radio and the outside noises of the outside trees. That’s it. Peace but also a relection of slower times and the reality that while nice, I like the simple comforts that time and technology have provided.

The days are easy. Writing. Walking. Writing. Walking. Cards at night. Rinse and repeat. We have a DVD player, so old movies are the comfort of noise and the colors that jet across the screen that I take for granted. Dinner, for us, it is a frozen meal, as cooking for me is difficult in the real world, now mix in ancient conditions.  I can’t imagine. But frozen stays in tune with the diet I am on, so it works. No real-world fancy temptations at every corner. A simple life.

We are young for the island. Oh, there are others, but land was bought a century ago and handed down or purchased by family.  Our parcel was a gift. It is priceless as I have aged to the slowness of the island and the desire to try new things. Hiking. Boating. Maybe even golf (off island). Reading, definitely, and of course, writing. Gardening? Well, it’s a  maybe. Our home will have the trappings of technology, as working is still a must, as is the desire to stay relevant and entertained.  But a simple life it is to escape from the city expectations and a sanctuary to fully enjoy life.

Posted on in anxiety, education, fitness, goals, Peloton, sixty, weight loss

Just One

Sweat is dripping onto my eyelids and into my eyes, causing blurred vision. I wipe away my fluids only to have buckets seemingly fall from the sky. This was my longest ride, best PR, and mileage pee minute did not suck. I am breathless, but the type you want again, and my mind is clear. Yesterday, I took a cheat day in my 21-day habit forming exercise. I needed it and while my calendar notes a blank hole,  my guilt got the best of me and I did yoga for fifteen minutes after midnight. To me I am still on track, neurotic, but now understand a day off of exercise is not an option.

However, last night was pure perfection for this calorie counting, protein shoving, and daily spinning grandma. A burger and a glass of champs! Absolute heaven. I have been so great in the numbers and workout department, but I knew I needed a bit of a treat. I did not work out. Horror, and I ate food with saturated fat. It was yummy. Was it necessary? Yes. It delighted my taste buds and caused me to miss working out and feeling the after-effects of too much of a good thing. It was a testament to my newly built strength, habits that are forming, and the realization that this will take a year of my life, but a life filled with the new real focus of the mayo way health. Count calories and protein. Period, and move daily beyond from couch to kitchen.

While strides are happening, the food, drink, and workout break were fabulous. However, the guilt felt was and is miserable, and it is my job on my long-term lifestyle change to fully enbrace that guilt has no place in this scenario. So, today, I pushed, excelled, and realized that while I still love a culinary delight. I love the person I am becoming more!

Posted on in anxiety

Not My First Rodeo

Starting a new therapist always brings hope. Now, it has been fifteen years since I last needed this boost. But the adjective is the same. The first session insights of my new partner are boredom, and I am wondering if they are any more qualified than I am doing self-talk in the car. But I proceed through the session until they make sense and give me homework. I love homework because it gives me a sense of accomplishment, which I need daily. So if I already know this, why go. Why commit to a new dance partner? I actually have no answer, other than it chases the blues away, makes me feel less alone in the battle and causes me to go deep and forgive my parents and myself for a failure that still haunts me to this day. You need to find your reason, so your week two becomes a week three and beyond.

So, go find your why and start your own rodeo that will not start wild and rocking. Everything or anything might not be solved, but it will help you rope in your feelings and move to understanding  and hopeful guide to better days.

Posted on in grey hair, health, sixty

Tipping Over Sixty

Sixty was hard. I felt my age. Middle-age extras in all areas, a few injuries, comfort food, and a lazy attitude kept me feeling my age. My mind kept going to the elder thinking ways, as I lost a parent. That will make you think for a bit. My thoughts lasted too long, and every pang was an emergency. Finally, I woke up and dusted off my sixty years to embrace sixty-one and beyond. It’s never been the number it’s always been about life with the number and sixty stunk. Lots of lots. Leave it at that, nothing insurmountable, I come from strong stock. But the moments plus my looks that turned accelerated the feeling of old when anything but. Did I mention I am vain. Oh yes, and while no model beauty, the little I have, I treasure, and in my eyes, the slow crumble was devastating.

Until now, actually last week. I just snapped out of it, got on my bike, rejoined Weight Watchers, Oprah or not, and am doing things the right way for my body and my life. Of course, with my newer fluffy body in shrink mode. I made peace with the neck. It’s not going away. My thought is that if the other pounds slowly melt, fitness increases, and my grand buddy and I explore the world more. I don’t care. I want to keep up with him and enjoy. Nugget thinks I am pretty. All the time, except once when I herniated my disc and told me I needed a shower. But that is another story, and he was right.

So sixty-one has a few gadgets trying to minimize lines, better makeup on my weaker areas, simple comfy styles as I shrink and feel happy wearing, and my notation that size and weight do not matter, it is overall eating to live and moving to move everyday, without fail that is key. Sixty-one is enjoyment, love, travel, family, and feeling youthful per mind and body. Why not! Sixty-one is designing sixty-five, i.e., retirement to create a busy fulfilling next season. I have ideas. It’s a start, but no concrete plans, and I know I am blessed to be at this stage.

Bring on Sixty-one!

Posted on in anxiety, essay, family

It Was My Choice

Recently, I reconnected with a family member, while not estranged, we were never in the same zip code, and life moves quickly. A question asked with innocence crushed my soul. “Who are your people in the family?” I could not answer. I was baffled. All I could think about was my dad, my bridge into a world that was not mine. No one made me feel different or out of a loop, but 3,000 miles will do that to any relationship, no matter the level. He is gone. It is still heartbreaking as he was my person. I understood him like no other in my family. The link is broken, and again, I am alone.

I blamed the strength and oddness of genes for giving me a family at a distance, but yet my moving was never my choice. My far away western local was done for my grandmothers health and my own mothers attempt to hide from the mess that was created, not due to anything but love, but still much to clean with no guidance as the early 60’s were rather a socially neat era.  I listed off who I would love to see. But that’s all I have, that and a feeling of being detached from a clan, that innately I feel so attached to, but yet so far away. I have no bitter feelings, just an occasional sigh or feeling of sadness, all of which were stirred with one question. “Who are your people.”

The conversation led to my dads passing, and my trying to explain my missing his day.  While there was an actual reason for my no-show due to logistics, timing, and a huge chunk of change. Let’s face it, I made a choice. I did not go to my father’s funeral. I mourned at home and still do. So, why not go? Yes, money was a small part of the equation, but it became a scapegoat that I used to become my mother, running away from facing the truth.  Her running away from a life without him by her side, and my sprint away from his passing. I still struggle daily, not due to the missing of the service but the detachment I feel. The love I lost. The man I truly never knew, at his core, was the father I wanted, needed, and had in our own distant relationship. As odd as it sounds, perhaps the miles might have been for the best. Distance can never leave. It is already gone. Too many “dads” had come and gone in my life to have the real one, faults and all, leave me in this life. As such, I still can’t bear to say goodbye. It was my choice.

Posted on in anxiety, life, menopause, retirement, sixty

It’s My Cabana

It’s my cabana and I will cry if I want to, or take up the entire space, glaring at others that dare to share. I knew cabanas were an option at every resort, but never did I ever dare to reserve, I will now. They are meant for those of us who have spent lives in the chairs, sharing chairs, and schelping out the children focusing on their needs first. Truly parenting with juice boxes and cherrios in tow. It is my cabana time. I have arrived. Lululemon dupes and all. These two weekends have been devoted to bringing a smile to my face, the hubs is trying. I have struggled. Between turning the big 6-0, and my fathers passing without proper closure, life has become murky.

Wading through my clutter did feel better on a cabana. Perhaps it was our fabulous waitress, the perfect backrest, or the sea air and views. Or was it just the cabana with the only lacking accoutrement being a charging station for cell phones, or is that not the point of the cabana life? I dont know? A newbie here. But I will bring a charging pack next time, which while taking away my solitude, allows me to write and solves my huge cabana problem.

While embracing my new life fixture and enjoying every minute, I still clashed with my current status of coping with a life in transition. A life in the normal stages of 60. A life beyond empty nester and into the “one day retirement” stage. Don’t get ideas. Just one day. The day gave me clarity that served the day but the chaos bounced back today. It will continue. I can’t stay on a beach or any other metaphor for life perfected, forever. No matter how many trips, spas, and dinners my feelings will stay until I learn to manage them, without a cabana. But until then the memories and true joy I felt will help me along the way on this journey to find my peace.

Posted on in anxiety, education, family, health, life, sixty

Subtract Not Add

I went through one of the best first weeks of school purely absorbed by outlying tasks, chores, stuff. Some money-making opportunities others just life. My mind not on the focus of kids but a running to-do list that gave me an inner click when every task was complete. I was miserable and less accomplished, as I was worried about tommorow, the next schedule, how I could get home quicker to review turtoring lessons before I zoomed away. I can’t. Literally can’t. With every tick off the list, another appeared with the only loss column items becoming my family.

My need to add is a stuffing mechanism to keep busy, not focus on the reality of a painful past, and so I do not look at the alternative. Retirement. Creepy. An elderly life, and the unknown. But the more I stuff into the hours of the day and night, the more I lose out in life.

So I am going to keep subtracting and focusing on my present, my daily blessings of students, and my family before I blink and it becomes a memory of long ago. Will I retire. No. Stop trying to do everything for the sake of a couple bucks. Yes.

Posted on in family, german shephards, life, sixty

Nothing But Love

There were things I did today. Yes, but there was also alot of nothing. Silence. Occasional thoughts. Not many. Just sitting and watching stupid TV, a summer goal, and live with my thoughts that have been relatively reflective on a life level. Between just normal life, training our furry friends and introducing them into their new lives. I can’t help but think about my former life, as a young mom, and draw comparisons to my current summer life. Schedules, activities, meals, more activities, a ton of no’s, daily teaching, and a car ride or two. I love this summer. Not because it’s our dogs settling into life, but it brings me back to a time where there was a bit of mental nothing on a daily basis, but filled with plenty of activities for others. In that time of my young mom’s life, I got excited when the diaper did not fall off. My current situation of teaching the sit… down…sit…command, with success, was a highpoint of today. It came to me today that this is my final attempt at parenting. Furry. Yes. But parenting. Once in awhile, my real kid might need my advice and he will always have my love and worry, but he does not need what these two need. My furry friends are giving me exactly what I need at sixty. Not much. I got it all, well, not all. But everything necessary. So, these pups are giving me back my simplistic life and tasks from long ago. My days are filled with mental boredom but a complete focus on others, too much TV in the background for noise (drowning out other dogs) and great for breaks during their frequent naptimes. I get my mom life back one more time, and this makes this summer, while not exciting, and filled with trips. It is a walk down memory lane as I look at them and remember that while it is alot of nothing but daily groundhog tasks. It is filled with the unconditional love. This brings back my first set of memories, of pure love and the true importance of the daily mental nothings. While not I.Q. raisers, they are physically and mentally challenging, that simplistically thrill me in a way that brings back the best time in my life.

Posted on in book, life, non-fiction

This Thing Called Life

The book is to be completed this summer, and I have more on the burner. This blog is to keep me on track and remind the husband for money to self-publish. Yes, self does not mean self. It means money, money, money. I think he is good for this one. Then I will go onto the Neebish children’s book (no title), but I have already asked the kid for the photos, since my artistic skills are low, very. Also, I want him to be part of the process, as Neebish will always be part of his life. So, pictures will be first, then the story. Yes, also more money. Next up, “Mrs. L’s World, Stories from A Tired Teacher.” I got that one and have a deadline by the end of summer 2024. For this year’s summer writing haven, the original manuscript had to be lost than found. Next, I filed it, and today, a year later, having the guts to look up the basic format of a traditional book and creating time in my not so busy summer to sit and write. This was easy. Setting up page one and the file. Simple. Using just one space after the period. Difficult. I am actually going to have to count. I am so old-school. So, I have relatively high hopes for all of these writing ideas to come to fruition, if period placement and spacing is my biggest issue. Which of course it is not. The work is tremendous, but it is exactly what I need to force myself through. If I did it once. I can do it again, this time with the added editing and the making changes, which will be many. “This Thing Called Life,” is my life. My memoir. My sarcasm, in spades. I promise laughter.