Nightmare at the matinee

John and I settled into our seats in the middle of the some fifty patrons scattered about the traditional theatre seating. It was the 2:40 Saturday afternoon showing of Young Victoria. After the advertisements finished, the lights were dimmed and we watched the previews. Then lights were doused, we put our cell phones on quiet, and the main feature filled the screen before us. Just minutes into the story, late arrivals shuffled across the back of the theatre, popcorn in hand, talking over the film voices.

"Well, where are you going to sit?"
"I don't know, let's look down here."
"I don't want to sit that far forward."
"Let's look over there, then."

Who are these people? Kids mouthing off? In unison with others around us, we turned in our seats to see, to our amazement, five puffy, gray haired women in thick parkas with assorted scarves dangling around their necks.

"Be quiet!" someone said from the seats.
"Shhhhhhhhh" said others.
But one intruder refused. "We have a right to get to our seats!" she demanded. Someone ducked and went for an usher.

Gripping the arms of my seat with white knuckle strength, I seethed. I was about to jump up, raise my hands in the air, turn my back to the screen and yell straight into their faces, "Shut the (*&^% up!" But, before I could act, my anger turned to fright. Those ladies weren't even ten years older than me. Was I trapped in a time traveler nightmare? Was I in the future --surrounded by retirement home escapees? --surrounded by rude, demanding people? John saw the look on my face. He turned to me, squeezed my hand and whispered in my ear, "It's OK, Honey. That won't be us."

I calmed myself as the theatre finally settled into a hushed quiet, but all the things my mother did like that -- so unaware of the impact on others -- flashed through my mind. The pointing with her cane from her wheel chair with demands to "take me over there" without a "Please" or "Thank you" bubbled up only to be quickly replaced with her the loud complaints about the food service during dinner and her callous remarks after a third double vodka. Will I become my mother? I shuttered. I whispered to John, "Just shoot me if I get like that, please?" "Guaranteed. Now watch the show," he said sweetly.

45th class reunion

The post card came in the mail two days ago. "Save the date for the NCHS 45th class reunion" it said. I immediately put the date on the calender. I will not miss it. We were the class of '65, the first big baby boomer class -- the rebellious, disco dancing, dope smoking, love making, risk taking kids, rebelling against our parents rules and expectations. For some reason, our class is special, we've reconvened every five years since '65. Something always draws me back.

At the 40th, Diana rented a convertible--we envisioned ourselves as Thelma and Louise willing to drive off the cliff. If reality we just drove through our home town -- now more than gown up, trying to remember what was there before the restaurants, the Gap, William-Sonoma and the rest of the upscale shops that had woven themselves into the fabric of the old town. The stone library and red brick YMCA building still face Washington Street , deying modernity to take them. But, the old department store and 5&10 cent store have been obliterated. The bank is now a happening now cuisine restaurant. It is could not be different, but we remember and tell stories.

At the 40th, twelve of us girls stayed at Dottie's for the weekend, sleeping in beds, bags, sofa beds and anything else Dottie could conjure up. As we sat on the deck in the morning after the initial get together at the VFW the night before, we nursed our coffees, acting as if we'd just gotten together the weekend after the graduation parties. Time had not passed despite that fact that time had passed and had taken a toll on our lives. We've been married and divorced, lost husbands to heart attacks, grandmothered, reinvented ourselves and played out our fantasies or not. We couldn't believe how the years had passed. We looked at each other as we were, not as we are. It gave us great pleasure to once again smoke cigarettes without guilt, tell wild stories, drink too much wine, and make each other double over in laughter.

Those years of wanting to be popular and never quite being on the A list have given way to a pleasant acceptance of who I am. What was important then, no longer matters. Nerdy guys have become handsome. Cool guys have lost themselves to invisibility. Average guys have become outstanding and class clowns have become powerful capitalists. We'd like to think any success was was our choice, but mostly it was a matter of luck. Who knows why one of us fell into depression and lost his future or another who saw no future became a dynamic success. Who knows why, after 40 years, I still wished Billy had kissed me when I crawled up the tree in his front yard and only at that reunion could tell him what a crush I had on him.

Everyone has a story to tell, a story that is worth listening to whether it's sad or happy in the end. It's a nice place to be. Most of us still refuse to admit to our encroaching elder status, but we gain strength from knowing each other, for what we were to each other and what we continue to be. I hope to see so many classmates on the weekend of July 30 and 31st.

Watching the Olympics

I've never been an athlete. In grammar school, I was almost always embarrassingly last picked to play dodge ball. The words said with great sighs by team captains, "Well, I guess we'll take Dorine", will ring in my ears for eternity.

In junior high it got worse. I sprouted above most of my peers in 6th grade, making me clumsy as well as not very swift. Defensively, I became the girl who, in gym class, always claimed to have cramps so I could sit on the sidelines and keep from getting sweaty. I hated the dumb blue one piece gym suits we had to wear and the even dumber "girls" rules for so many of the sports, like basketball where you could only dribble the ball for so many steps before you had to throw it. I couldn't stop breaking the rules.

In high school, sports went outside and I tried but failed again. I was too short (everyone grew taller suddenly) and still not swift, so track and field hockey were out. Tennis was a bust as well when I discovered my depth perception sucked. Balls curved around me, over me and far away from me. My racket was everywhere except where it was supposed to be. Then, in high school, one gym teacher took me aside after watching me lead my classmates in warm-up exercises. Running her right hand through her short bleached duck tail of a haircut, she stepped on the stair with her leg with its scarred knee, looked at me like a disappointed mother and said, "You just don't have what it takes to be a leader. You let the girls joke around too much." That was it. I was never going to enjoy any kind of organized athletics.

I'm not one to sit around lumping my fate, so, I turned to unorganized sports, things I could do outside of school without teachers or having to be picked by a team. I learned to ice and roller skate. I wasn't too bad either -- after many falls and bruises, I twirled and skated backwards through a crowd. There were were no rules and I was happy just messing about. In my twenties, I beat guys twice my age with bad knees at racket ball. I compensated for my lousy depth perception because the walls were close and it was a short hop to reach the ball as it came whizzing toward at me. Then, I picked up on running in my thirties, surprising enjoying pushing myself, alone, for the first time -- until I went to cross the street just a block from home and got hit by a car that was trying to beat the light. The bastard hit me and drove away, leaving me lying on the blacktop in the sun's glare on his review mirror.

So watching the winter Olympics -- is, well, nice watching handsome young men and women compete and risk serious bodily harm -- but after a while, it fades into background noise. Can you blame me?

Sunday Afternoon

The afternoon sun blasts its way through the sliding glass doors into the living room, heightened in its intensity by reflections off the snow covered roofs we can see from the balcony. The light exposes every dust bunny and piece of glass streaked with doggy nose smears. But, today the sun light can't intimidate me because, in a frenzy of energy, John and I cleaned the house Saturday afternoon. We couldn't take it anymore. We couldn't wait for the snow to melt. It was starting to look like the home of a recluse with no cleaning lady to visit regularly. There were dirty dishes stacked on the counters, toys strewn about the house and dirty clothes litering the floors. The towels and sheets were starting to take on lives of their own. All of this, very unlike us. Guess the four days locked in at home and sloshing through two feet of snow every six hours with the dogs took a toll on us.

Our cleaning work paid off. We woke to spend a lazy day at home. The dogs are sleeping on the floor (instead of the furniture for some strange reason). John just finished a bunch of expense reports and is getting ready to cook a lucious Sunday dinner -- a whole chicken roasted with root vegetables. He's trying to outdo himself after a mouthwatering, aroma room-filling herb and mushroom suffed pork roast served with lemon buttered asparagus. It's tough to admit, but we are foodies--we live to eat.

I'm watching the Olympics while I do my "social media" thing--uploading pictures from our trip to NYC last weekend, posting messages and pictures of my grandchildren on Facebook pages and making dinner dates with friends using Facebook chat. What ever happened to the telephone? I'm going to try that old fashioned device to reach my girl friend in Connecticut later today. I don't know which is worse -- that I'm adapting to the new digital world and actually liking it or that some of my friends are stuck in email or, god forbid, the telephone as their major source of communications. I even have one sister who is still on dial-up.

It takes effort for me to be this lay-back. I'm itching to get out to Annapolis and the sailboat. But I can't get excited about working out in our exercise room downstairs -- something is my body is saying, "Oh no, not when you walk up and down those many frigin' stairs going back and forth to work on the metro." I know better -- I've got sagging arms to prove it; but the exercise fairy has not touched with me her magic wand. I'm such a bad girl! Whip me!

Winter Wonderland

We left home Friday morning, February 5th, just hours ahead of the weekend blizzard. We missed it all while we indulged ourselves at the Friend's of the Groundhog (Fog) party. It's an annual bash thrown by our dear friend Ed. (His wife Carol just smiles and lets him do it). This year's party is very special -- it's the 40th year of the party.

New York City sparkled all around us from the 12th floor of a warehouse on west 31st street. Sixty of Ed's closest friends mingled drinking wine, scotch and margaritas while eating bits of Asian delicacies amongst white leather couches, glass tables, and white decor. Antique chandeliers splashed soft light on everyone--the men in their tuxedos and the women in silks. Afterwards small groups of us retreated to a very euro west side hotel in the fashionably hot meat packing district for story telling, more libations and baskets of pom frits. The morning came too soon as John and I woke to see, through our toes, crystal blue skies stretching across the horizon framing the sky scrappers on the Jersey side of the half frozen Hudson River. It was a quintessential New York kind of weekend. I wanted to stay the princess I felt like, but fantasies don't last forever.

Early Monday, after eggs benedict in "The Grill", we packed our fancy clothes, put on our sun glasses and drove home on cleared roads, refreshed and pleased that we had so successfully escaped the weather. I was ready to dive back into work, confident that the federal government would be open on Tuesday. But it was not to be. Before Tuesday was over, a second blizzard, as predicted, beat our area relentlessly. Hurricane force winds made the sky white, blinding our view from the balconies. It left us stranded, blanketed.
( John's video)

The snow is now higher than Fred and twice as high as JoeJoe. They must jump and plow themselves through the snow to take a pee. Down the street, there's a bunch of five-foot icicles hanging from the eaves of one building. They arch out toward the street, bent by the winds. Others drip onto the sidewalk laying down a layer of sheer ice, waiting for unsuspecting walkers to slip and fall. The saying "Nature is cruel" is certainly true in this case.

It's been four days now that the federal government has been closed. But there is hope for tomorrow. Men with snow blowers have cleared the sidewalks of the drifts. Men driving front loaders (every little boy's dream job) have made the street passable by pushing the snow into mountains that surround the buildings.

This weather takes me back to Chicago and those winter mornings when I threw a coat over my jammies and ran out into the snow packed parking lot to start the ol' Chevy Malibu so it could warm up while I finished getting ready for work. That's why I left the Midwest--to get away from all that.

Oh, well, this will all go away soon. I will keep focused on the spring. It's time to dress the boys in their sweet little monogrammed coats and take them out into the cold night air for that last pee of the day. Tomorrow is another day.

Naming our treasure

Naming a boat is not a simple matter. It's like naming a child. You want a name that's meaningful. I was named after my grandmothers. As the first born, it was important for my parents to honor their mothers. Luckily, I liked my name. My dad had a first name he hated, so he changed it from Colin to Andy, a take-off on his last name Andrews. But a boat name can't really be changed while you own it. It's appliqued on the transom declaring to all the world what matters to you. If it's silly, people will think you're silly. If it's dower, people will think you live surrounded by black clouds. You can't blame your parents either, because you choose the name.

A boat name must also be pronounceable and not embarrassing. When you call a boat over the radio, you say it's name three times over radio channel 16 and if someone calls you, you acknowledge the call by saying "This is [boat name]". "Sweet pea, Sweet pea, Sweet pea" sounds wimpy." "Ebenkinezer, Ebenkinezer, Ebenkinezer" has too many syllables to say both quickly and clearly. And, "Hot times, Hot times, Hot times," well, just shouldn't be said over a public radio channel. A guy who shouts, "Honey Bunch" over the radio will certainly blush.

Lastly, a boat name should not cause you to yawn. It should have a story to tell and make you smile. There must be thousands of "Rum Runners", "Just for Fun" and "Retirement" rocking in their slips. It doesn't have to be the only one around, as you always add your hailing port to it to make it one of a kind, but the name should surprise a bit and cause people to ask, "How'd you decide that name?" A name should not leave people saying, "What the hell is that all about" and walk away scratching their heads.

My first boat carried the name an Atlanta sailing club gave me. They thought I, a perky little blond, was amazingly brave to join a pack of strangers for a ten day charter sail in the Caribbean, sight unseen. I was mysterious even if it was pleasantly so. Six months later, I married one of the guys (it was a really good sail!). We christened her Mystery Woman. I still smile and remember those beginnings. And, I've never came across another Mystery Woman.

John and I chose our boat's name the day we bought her. Our choice was inspired by our dear friend who loves lower case text. It's only two syllables, easy to pronouce, and once you hear it, you'll never forget it. There's even a story that will make you smile. The sounds you hear when you say it will fill your mind with visions of soft blue skies, fresh breezes and full sails. Take a guess, but we won't reveal it until the christening in early May.

Slip #C52

Last summer during our hunt for a sail boat, we toured marinas in and surrounding Annapolis. Picking a marina is a practical decision for us. We don't have a bottomless pit of money and, because we are just getting back into sailing after many years as land lubbers, we want a place that won't be totally stress inducing every time we set sail.

We chose a marina in Deal, about 20 miles south of Annapolis. Deal is a bit less expensive than Annapolis, has a full service boat yard, and provides direct access to the bay across from St. Micheal's and the Choptank River. The grand kids will like it because of the pool. We'll like it because of it's lay back attitude and friendly service folks. It would be nice to be in Annapolis with all its city creature features, but, if you're sailing on weekends, the water traffic is akin to driving interstate 95 between DC and New York city. If you're sailing during the week, it's the ideal location.

So we woke to a steady drizzle and foggy gray skies this Sunday morning. But the rain didn't deter us from what we had to do -- procure slip for our new sail boat. The good slips go fast and since we're newbies, it takes some effort not to end up in too little water or with very little protection from the weather that whips across the bay.

A good slip is a slip that's not too wide, is deep enough so the keel doesn't drag in the mud, has a decent size finger pier so getting yourself and belongings aboard is not a major balancing act, and is easy to "slip" into and out of without banging into the neighbors.

This is pre-contract time for getting a slip. It is time to act. So with rain and wind a blowing, feeling like Goldie Locks in the house of the Three Bears, we walked the piers, list in hand, looking at available slips. One slip was too close to the shore for our liking. In a big storm enough water can be drawn away from the shore to leave a boat hard aground. Another slip was too wide. Our slim 11.6' bean could be difficult to tie up in its 18' width. Two other slips had short finger piers and we envisioned Fred and JoeJoe having panic attacks trying to get on and get off the boat. Then, we shuffled down to to slip #C52 splashing through puddles. C pier slips face out to the bay, but are protected with a bulkhead. It was just right! We will sit on deck with an unobstructed view, looking out across the creek out into the bay. We have a full length finger pier and an angled access with loads of free water behind it to make maneuvering easy. Our boat will have a lovely home starting this spring. We celebrated our find with a beer and crab cake lunch while we watched the Vikings - Dallas play off game. Today proves that a dreary day can have a silver lining.

My hero is Meryl Streep

What makes a sixties something-woman appealing? Most of my curves have migrated to places where they can best be defined as roll bars. Even if I had curves, my wrinkled skin telegraphs my age. If I had a face lift to get rid of the wrinkles, the moddled brown age spots on my hands and arms would give do the same. I can't wear a revealing swimsuit because moles dot the geography of my back, mid-drift and chest. I can't wear form shaping shirts and the best fitting pants I own are Not My Daughter's Jeans. What's a girl who reveled in her youthful perky blondness for so many years to do? Do I just accept a new image as lump in the corner of the room?

Well, ladies, there is hope. See the movie It's Complicated starring Meryl Streep. Here's a woman who took on a role where she defines what it means to be appealing in our fifties and sixties. The visible crow's feet around her eyes and mouth don't distract from the twinkle in her eye and the welcoming smile on her face. She wears well-fitting, but softly shaped clothes that subvert her heavier frame, but give her an alluring look when she walks into a room without embarrassing her grown children. She's energetic and athletic without trying.

Watching Meryl lightened my heart as I watch the youthful me slip away, never to be seen again except in the photo album. Instead of lamenting the loss, I now have the strength to look forward to the next phase, the phase where I can be attractive without trying to go back in time. I'm reassured that I don't have to turn into a woman who shrinks as I age--the woman who wears too much make-up, sits with shirt buttons popping across my swollen breasts or walks around in polyester knit stretch pants with with sagging ear lobes from wearing too heavy earrings. I know I'll look much more like my great grandmother - a small feisty woman who gloried in her white hair braided and placed around her head like a crown. She lived to 89 and always kept the twinkle in her eye.

Happiness - another perspective

As I put the final touches on last week's the blog entry, The Happiness of Daily Routine, I looked up at the TV occasionally, sneaking a view at the NPR program, This Emotional Life, which takes a scientific look at the source of happiness in humans. I learned my daily routine happiness runs contrary to what research is clearly telling us--the single, largest source to human happiness is the positive relationships we share with people. The largest contributor to sadness and depression is isolation. In other words, our network of friends and family have the ability to bring us more happiness than intelligence, fame, fortune or sex.

I slapped my forehead with my hand and sighed -- Am I wrong? Isn't the inner contentment I feel from the routine I've brought to my life happiness? Or is it something else? I sighed again, looked down at Fred who lay beside me. He raised his head and made a noise that could only have been a belch. Obviously, for a dog, the source of happiness is not a concern. He has a dog's life -- regular meals, regular walks and a warm bed to sleep in every night. Is my emotional state equal to that of a dog? I shook my head and went to bed.

As I fluffed my pillow last night and thought about a blog comment, I remembered my first day in first grade at Ellsworth school. I was seven and had just moved north from Alabama. It was recess. I didn't know anyone. I was the outsider who talked funny. But, Holly and Susie took my hands in a game of Hi Diddle Dill and I was happy. It was the beginning of the network of friends I have today. I've had my share of humorless and hurtful experiences (aka marriages) have come close to breaking my spirit--my ability to feel happy. But, when that happens I often a friend or a sister. A Joycean stream of consciousness on my part and a good listen by a her always works to calm my churning stomach, restore my confidence, and start me on the road back to happiness.

There are times when I've found myself reaching out beyond my network to find other supportive relationships. When I found myself in a marriage to an alcholic who didn't think he was one and was not about to do anything about it (It was my problem, he declared!), I went to Alonon meetings. Through a network of positive relationships I was able to sooth my broken heart, make the tough decisions, find joy in being alive. I was not alone, obsessing in isolation. My confidence returned as I discovered that I don't have to live in chaos, crisis and conflict.

My conclusion -- Happiness is not about laughing a lot. Happiness is about feeling good about yourself and others. The two go hand-in-hand for me. And, my happiness from daily routine comes my ability to get rid of the negative drama that comes into my life now and then and knowing that I have a deep network of friends and family upon which to rely.

The happiness of daily routine

Home with my boys -- Fred and JoeJoe -- while John is working in Memphis this week. Although we miss John, we're enjoying our days together as we repeat the routines of waking, walking, cooking, eating, and snuggling together.

For those of you picking yourself up off the floor in shock because you know I'm a person who never does anything the same way twice, I say "Even old' girls can learn new tricks." When John is home helping with the boys and cooking and serving up interesting conversation, I still enjoy my daily hike up the hill to the Metro, the crowded commute to work, and the computer work in my cubical. It's something I can count on. I'm not bored a bit -- well, not hardly .

This week's been icy cold and windy morning through night. It's the kind of cold that reminds me why I left the mid-west in 1972. I had to put my Santa Fe "Chinese" bells on the balcony floor. The gonging was keeping me awake at night. With this climate change extreme, my first reaction was to stay inside until the boys jumped up and down with crossed legs thrusting me into action. But that's not what's happening. Each morning I rise early, slip the boys slip into their matching light blue cable-knit sweaters, bundle myself up in a white snow-bunny parka, multi-colored stripped mittens, red scarf and mohair hat and then, together, we head off into the dawn as it creeps over the horizon. We are energetic fashion statements as we bound out the door.

The wind whips Fred's and JoeJoe's ears back as we march up the hill to their favorite potty spots. It's amazing how much they like taking the same route every morning. If I try a different route, Fred gives me the evil eye, saying, "Mom, that's not the way we usually go. What's the problem?" I relent and let him lead. Little blond JoeJoe follows, dancing along, oblivious to what is going on as he scarfs up acorns along the way.

When I go off to work after feeding them and eating my own bowl of cereal and blueberries, I turn on the music and wish them a good day. They wink at me from their perches on the sofa, perfectly content to have me out of their hair for a while. When I walk down the hill after work, they greet me at the door with jumps and kisses as I read the note from the mid-day doggie walker. The note reassures me that the boys had a wonderful walk and were wonderfully fun to be with. It makes me giggle. We dress up again, just like in the morning, and off we go marching up the hill. However, now I get my way -- a longer walk that takes us around the around the area. The last walk at 10 pm is short and fast, and then we all jump into bed. I pick up a cross word puzzle, put glasses on the end of my nose, and begin to fill in the spaces as I listen to Native American music softly playing. Before I'm half way through, they're snoring and I'm guaranteed to join them in just a wink of the eye.

This daily routine makes me content and inner contentment is happiness. It's all I've ever really wanted. The boys have always known how important it is. Don't faint, but I'm learning!

Will eyebrows make a difference?

One way to age is to fight it with a frontal attack on the body--Botox, skin abrasion, and "procedures" that start with cutting the skin away from your face bones or sucking the fat from under your skin with what resembles a vacuum cleaner. I admit that I enlisted for the battle and got my PFC stripe, but I'm coming to the conclusion that it is a war that will not be won and that I should seek an honorable discharge before I get seriously wounded.

Why? It's too much effort for too little return. It's expensive and short-lived and, in many cases, painful. I've had Thermage (radio signals shot into your face stinging what collagen's left into rigid attention), Botox (needles in the forehead and eyes wrinkles to relax the muscles), and Juvederm (bigger needles that push fake collegen into cheek lines and leave big puffy bruises for a week). Some of the stuff is made from horse urine or something else disgusting. The treatments lifted my wrinkles and sags for a bit, but in the end, the only solution is the big bad invasive face lift surgery now that gravity is winning out over skin elasticity.

Instead of war, I've decided to work with what I've got--to paint instead of construct (or reconstruct as the case may be). Like highlighting my hair to easily keep the gray at bay, I am highlighting my facial features. It's all done with a tried and true technique used by sailors and studs for centuries -- tattoos. Only instead of tattooing pictures in empty spaces, I am filling in the spaces that make-up once filled using tattoos.

Why even bother with make-up anymore or permanent make-up (that's what they call these tattoos)? I've been with my husband for 17 happy years? I achieved what I set out to achieve in business and life. And, we've got a plan for retirement that should engage us for some years. One simple reason -- make-up gives me definition and helps me project my personality. Without make-up I am invisible. My face disappears. I am a person who, without makeup, is a person without features. With a make-up free face, friends and strangers often say things to me like, "Are you OK? Have you been sick? You look a bit tired." All my life, I've been a person who "lights up a room". I want to keep it that way, even with wrinkles!

The first step is eye brows. The procedure hurts less than getting an upper lip waxing (yes, mine is blond, but it's still a post menopausal mustache) and takes less than a week to heel). Today, I lost the last of the little scabs and, instead of scars, I have perfectly arched light brown eyebrows that won't disappear when I wash my face or sweat a wee bit.

I love them! Never in my life have I had eyebrows that look like eyebrows instead of misaligned pencil marks over my eyes. How have they changed my face? To quote a friend who saw them, "My but you look happy. What a great hair cut." You can draw your own conclusions, but I think it's the eyebrows that make my hair look so right.

I'm going for the eyeliner next. Imagine sailing this summer and not having to worry about big brown smears around my eyes at the end of the day.

Conclusion -- eyebrows do make a difference. Tattoo make-up doesn't get rid of wrinkles, but helps me look as good as I feel, is not expensive, doesn't torture, and last for years.

This is the year my father dies

One late spring day in 1979, Dad slumped across his desk, crossing his arms in front of him to hold his head. He was waiting for my mother to come home from grocery shopping. "I don't feel good. Better take me to the hospital." He'd had a heart attack and would recover; but to be safe he agreed to stay in the small town hospital for observation and recuperation as the docs called it for a few days. By the end of the first week he was getting "cabin fever" as he called it and wanted to "get back to work". He started walking the halls, ate the tasteless meals put in front of him with gusto, and irritated the nurses and my mother. But, as he sat on toilet ready to prove to everyone he was ready to go home, reading the Wall Street Journal and wishing he had his smokes, he suffered a fatal blast. After 16 unconscious hours, his heart stopped and caught up with his dead brain. His aorta had become a sold out condo community for cholesterol. He was 63. I am 63. Need I say more about how I feel about my mortality?

Dad didn't drink (not because he didn't want to, but because he got horrific headaches). He wasn't overweight (he's the only person I ever knew who could loose weight just thinking). He hated fatty meat and ate all protein, from chicken and eggs to beef, shoe-leather dry. I drink (and get those headaches sometimes), have a BMI over 25, and lust after fatty almost raw red meat.

But Dad was also a control freak and work alcoholic (why else would he be at his desk on a fresh sunny Saturday afternoon and never let my mom contribute to the family income?). He smoked from sun-up to sundown (I remember waking to the click of his engraved silver WWII anniversary lighter as he grabbed a cigarette from the top of the dresser as he walked from his bed to the bathroom). He hated exercise. A favorite line was, "My idea of exercise is walking to the couch for a nap".

Can I overcome this behavioral and genetic heritage? Will I succumb to the same fate? I've got a few things in my favor. I stopped smoking in 1986 (thanks to a previous husband who didn't smoke -- one of his few attractive traits. The other one was sailing.) I've been fanatically exercising at least every other year and just bought a boat to return to sailing--a great source of exercise. I sold my last business to get off the rat race and even tried retiring several times since in the past ten years. My blood pressure is that of a teenager--no blood pressure drugs for this old girl! I've only got 5-10 pounds to loose depending upon how you define "slim" at my age. And, I swallow a Lipitor daily to keep my arteries from clogging up.

But, will that be enough? I keep wishing to get back into my athletic mode (I'm not sure hiking a hill to the metro five days a week counts as exercise). I cut the fat off my meat (except, of course, for grilled lamb chops which just aren't the same without that crispy rim around the edge). I've got a great job that has absolutely no responsibility associated with it, yet gives me a creative outlet.

I've got until November 19, 2010 to beat the odds and live to 64.

How it started

I wore my white shorts with black piping that January Monday after New Year's when John and I joined my sister, Karen, and her husband, Tommy, on their 29' Sea Ray for an afternoon of power cruising in the Gulf off Sarasota. I was determined to get a start on my tan and reconnect with my Scorpio. I raised my arms to the sky absorbing the salt air and sun.

The sun's rays sparkled on the water against the robin's egg blue sky as we motored out of the Venice waterway to the Gulf past "take your breath away" homes, docked yachts, and lawns planted with exotic rich green plants. We went north to Sarasota city harbor for lunch at Captain Jack's and then a pleasant motor south down the inner coastal waterway back to Venice.

The wind was less than 10 knots, but the boat flew over the silky Gulf's surface creating a sensuous breeze that tingled our skin. As guests, we sat in the aft seats, put our heads back and let the wind blow through our hair while the sun slightly singed our thighs.

Lunch was tasty. We sat surrounded by tourist family and local elderly retired guys who sat under on the patio under sun shade umbrella sipping martinis while they harrumphed at each other and discussing tee off times-- oh, to be retired, tanned and wrinkling in place!

We stetched one last time on the dock after lunch then w cast off and headed out to join the inter coastal as the afternoon sun began to edge its way across the afternnon sky. Half-way home after passing an old basscule bridge, we passed a coast guard team inspecting a boat they had pulled over. We chuckled and speculated about how it must have been caused by a druge tip-off.

No sooner had we passed the two boats when we found ourselves being followed with the same coast guard boat flashing lights and making short bursting siren whistles. They pulled us aside and commanded our captain, that's Tommy, to idle while they pulled their boat to our beam and threw us lines. It was time for a full safety and documents inspection (and training exercise for the new crew members. It went very well (Tommy keeps the place very ship-shape), except for one detail. We couldn't find the above-board fire extinguisher. It took all of us rummaging through every hold to find it. We were getting nervous and the coast guard guys were sharpening their pencils to write up a violation when we miraculously found it behind the fishing poles in a small storage space on the port side. We were saved. We succeeded. We were left at peace. A meandering, lazy day on the water had become an adventure as well.

As the sun softened in the western horizon late in the afternoon, we pulled into the harbor, our trip complete. We swabbed the deck and wiped it dry. As I leaned over doing my drying chore, Tommy whispered in my ear, "You know, at our age, you probably shouldn't wear those shorts anymore."

I stood up in shock, twisted my head around to inspect my 62 year old thighs. "What do you mean?" I asked. What's wrong with my thighs? They aren't that fat. I'm still a size 8 and my cellulite is not really evident."

Tommy stood up, twisted his chamois in his hands to squeeze out the water he'd just soaked up. The sun reflected back at me from his sun glasses as he faced the sun. He smiled, chuckled gently and winked. "It's not that they're bad, but who's going to look at them anymore?" It was then that I realized life was never going to be like it used to be.