Trying To Grow Old Gracefully:
For some one that will be turning 74 in September my mind
tells me I am not that old but my body quickly reminds me oh yes you are.
LOL
On Monday I will be having my second back surgery. I had
major back surgery in 2011. The pain before that surgery was excruciating. The
pain was from Spinal Stenosis. I am not having that kind of pain this time but
the stenosis is coming back again so I decided to go ahead and have the surgery
before it gets back to where it was before.
Before my first surgery the surgeon asked me
questions about my past as far as activities I had
participated in the past. I told him I had played just about all sports and
played them hard. I told him I had rode ATV's, wave runners, horses, probably
lifted things the wrong way over the years etc. He asked me if I had it to do
over would I do anything different. I told him NO as I had too much fun to look
back and complain about it now. As I am getting older I've become more kind to
myself and less critical of myself.
I have had too many family and friends leave this world
too soon before they understood the great freedom of aging.
My thought is I can't stop from growing older but I can
delay growing up and that is what I try to do. That's one reason I try to spend
so much time with Carter & Griffin as I can, they help keep me young. I also
try to avoid negative people as much as I can because they will drag you down. I
try to hang out with crazy people as much as I can, for me that is pretty easy
as most of my family and friends are crazy. LOL
I am some times a little forgetful but there are things
in my past I want to forget any way. Actually I tell myself I drive the bad
things out of my mind to leave more room for the good memories.
Has my heart been broken? Of course many times. How can
your heart not be broken when you have lost as many family
and wonderful friends as I have. How could I not have been heart broken that
after being in bad health his entire adult life my Dad passed away when I was 12
years old.
My wife passed away also after a lot of health problems
at the age of 55. My daughter had a major stroke at the age of 45. One year after Joan and I were married her beautiful daughter Janet
was killed in an automobile accident on Christmas Eve, 2002.
These are just a few of the times my heart has been
broken. But you know what when I look back over my life I realize that even with
all that the ups in my life far out number the downs. And for that I am very
grateful.
Dear family and friends the advice I would like to give
you and I only wish I had started doing it a lot sooner in my life is to
dwell more on the good things you have experienced and a lot less on the bad
things.
If you have a family and friends that love you, if you
have reasonably good health yet, if you have laughed a lot more in your life
than you have cried, then count your blessings.
As I grow older I actually find it easier to be positive,
you get to a point where you don't care what other people think of you. I don't
berate myself nearly as much as I use to, I think I have earned the right to be
wrong once in awhile. LOL
When I look in the mirror I am often taken aback by that
old person that is looking back at me. LOL
The secret is and it is not easy to do is not to agonize
over your problems to long.
When I go to the pool or the beach in a swim suit that is
stretched over a bulging body and I see the jet set giving me those pitying
glances, I just laugh to myself and say you are going to be like this if you are
lucky enough to live this long.
I am not going to live forever, but while I am still
here I will not waste time thinking what could have been or worrying what will
be. And if I feel like it I will eat dessert every day. LOL
Notice I use a lot of LOL's when I write. that's what we
need to do, the motto I try to live by is:
LIVE, LAUGH, & LOVE
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