LIGHTS ON BRIGHT NO BRAKES
Not unlike many of the sixty-something-aged women in America, I have spent my adult life taking care of others. A Husband. Children. Friends. Family. I moved from under my parents’ roof to a University dorm and into a marriage. Well, to be honest, more than one. Meaning marriages, as well as roofs. Since I first married, at the age of twenty, I have always, always been responsible to and for someone. Not that I am complaining. My life has sped by, chugging along through the years, often being side-tracked, sometimes veering off-the-rail. Being a Type A, “I Think I Can” Female, I’ve dealt with Life, its Pitfalls and Road-blocks, professional and personal, as time raced by.
This year, 2011, brings another one of life’s challenges. And, it’s a big one. For almost half of our twenty-five year old marriage, my husband has suffered that slowly murderous disease of the brain called Alzheimer’s. Until the past four years, when he moved to a luxurious independent-living facility, I was his only caretaker. For these four years, I’ve shared that responsibility with others. Two months ago, as his journey is about to end, Hospice joined us in his care.
However, when my husband’s journey ends, mine will not. But, it will be different. This is what My Blog will document: My journey, My story, and Mine, alone.
In greeting the New Year 2011, my quote-mistress/daughter, e-mailed me this quotation, “When I am old sitting in my rocking chair. I don’t want to be thinking about all I regret not doing, I want to think about what I regretted doing.”
Humorous, perhaps, frivolous, no. It feels right to me, a bold, slightly off-kilter, outside-of-the-box, bubble-off way to view the World at this point in my life. I intend to drive with my lights on bright, my foot off the brake peddle, and, like Yogi, when arriving at a fork in the road, I’ll take it.
For me, it’s the Fourth Quarter. I want to score, in my path ahead, touchdowns, not field goals.
A brilliant remark, to my thinking, made by an unknown Illinois woman named Bertha Massie, comes to mind. ”When they pass the cake, take a piece, ‘cause you don’t know if it’s gonna come around again.”
Bertha, I am going to try.