Gettin' Old Ain't for Sissies

di and bob

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The part I hate about getting old is thinking about how long you have left. At almost 61 I think I only have 10 'good' years left before everything really starts going to you know where, hopefully 20 more years. All my grandparents and parents were in their 80's and 90's when they passed, my mom is 83 and still going. I've been married 39 years this June, and that is a REALLY long time, we look like babies in our wedding pictures. The thought of your own mortality is scary. I guess I'm like my cats, I hate change. We truly have to live each day as well as we can,and love as much as we can too, there is no guarantee of a tomorrow. 
 

Winchester

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The part I hate about getting old is thinking about how long you have left. At almost 61 I think I only have 10 'good' years left before everything really starts going to you know where, hopefully 20 more years. All my grandparents and parents were in their 80's and 90's when they passed, my mom is 83 and still going. I've been married 39 years this June, and that is a REALLY long time, we look like babies in our wedding pictures. The thought of your own mortality is scary. I guess I'm like my cats, I hate change. We truly have to live each day as well as we can,and love as much as we can too, there is no guarantee of a tomorrow. 
I understand. Both my parents died when they were in their lower 80s. I'm 62 now and I think of how long my parents lived. OTOH, my great-grandmother was 98 was she passed, so hopefully I've inherited those genes as well. Rick and I will be married 46 years in April and we were babies back then. Heck, my "little" boy will be 46 years old in October. Geez. That's really scary. I try to eat healthy overall and I try to get enough exercise, but in the whole scheme of things, I might have 20 years left. And you know what else? Those 20 years will absolutely fly by.
 

1CatOverTheLine

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The part I hate about getting old is thinking about how long you have left. At almost 61 I think I only have 10 'good' years left before everything really starts going to you know where, hopefully 20 more years. All my grandparents and parents were in their 80's and 90's when they passed, my mom is 83 and still going. I've been married 39 years this June, and that is a REALLY long time, we look like babies in our wedding pictures. The thought of your own mortality is scary. I guess I'm like my cats, I hate change. We truly have to live each day as well as we can,and love as much as we can too, there is no guarantee of a tomorrow. 
Embrace your Mortality.  If we died on Friday, we'd wake up on Saturday without all these aches and pains !

.
 
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Mamanyt1953

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The part I hate about getting old is thinking about how long you have left. At almost 61 I think I only have 10 'good' years left before everything really starts going to you know where, hopefully 20 more years. All my grandparents and parents were in their 80's and 90's when they passed, my mom is 83 and still going. I've been married 39 years this June, and that is a REALLY long time, we look like babies in our wedding pictures. The thought of your own mortality is scary. I guess I'm like my cats, I hate change. We truly have to live each day as well as we can,and love as much as we can too, there is no guarantee of a tomorrow.
I am at peace with my mortality.  I dread losing my mental capacity.  I do, however, have very good genes (although my jeans are a bit ragged).  My great aunts and uncles on BOTH sides were active and sharp as a tack WELL into their 90's, and a few of them made it to triple digits with nary an issue other than sight and hearing.  One great uncle, my favorite, dropped dead unexpectedly at 106.  He went out "juking" with two little ladies in their 80s, stayed out ALL night, decided to take a nap before supper and never woke up.  Those younger women got him!  I hope I'm just like him!
 

neely

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I've got severe spinal problems, so I'm in so much pain when I wake up in the morning that I can hardly walk. The cats jump all over me, excited that they're getting breakfast, but sometimes I have to sit down for a few minutes twice on the way to the kitchen. I'm going to have surgery for this in March, and I hope it relieves the pain. I've dealt with it off and on for over 20 years.

The nice thing about senility is you can read the same book again, and it's all new the second time.
I'm just catching up on this thread and would like to express my sincere concern for your spinal problems. 
  To put it mildly, back pain sucks!  Both my parents were cursed with lumbar stenosis.  My sister and I pray it won't affect us but unfortunately we are both starting to have problems.  

I've always said I want to look like Bette White when I'm 95.  She's my inspiration. 
  Have you ever watched the Today Show when Willard Scott reads the name and age of the people on the Smucker's labels?  If I make it to 100 and join the rank of centenarians I'm going to attribute it to drinking coffee.  If nothing else, it helps me take a licking and keep on ticking! 
 
 
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Margret

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Who are you people again?  
Quote:
"Y' know, some people say smoking marijuana makes you lose your memory.  But the TRUTH is...{long pause}...I forgot what I was going to say."

Tommy Chong (of Cheech and Chong fame)
The thing that makes me feel really old is every time I realize that some of my good friends have never actually seen a man walk on the moon, except in old videos.  It used to be that the thing that made me feel middle aged was realizing that I had friends who didn't remember the assassinations of Kennedy, and King.  One of these days I'll have close friends who don't remember 9/11; I'm pretty sure I already have some who don't remember Timothy McVeigh and the Oklahoma City bombings.

A while back I was watching a made-for-T.V. movie.  One of the characters was talking about a young woman he had met and said, "Well, she's a nice enough person, but when I asked her where she was when Kennedy was shot she said, 'Ted Kennedy was shot?!' "

Margret
 

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I am at peace with my mortality.  I dread losing my mental capacity.  I do, however, have very good genes (although my jeans are a bit ragged).  My great aunts and uncles on BOTH sides were active and sharp as a tack WELL into their 90's, and a few of them made it to triple digits with nary an issue other than sight and hearing.  One great uncle, my favorite, dropped dead unexpectedly at 106.  He went out "juking" with two little ladies in their 80s, stayed out ALL night, decided to take a nap before supper and never woke up.  Those younger women got him!  I hope I'm just like him!
Amen. I hope to age as gracefully as possible.
 
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Mamanyt1953

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Quote:

The thing that makes me feel really old is every time I realize that some of my good friends have never actually seen a man walk on the moon, except in old videos.  It used to be that the thing that made me feel middle aged was realizing that I had friends who didn't remember the assassinations of Kennedy, and King.  One of these days I'll have close friends who don't remember 9/11; I'm pretty sure I already have some who don't remember Timothy McVeigh and the Oklahoma City bombings.

A while back I was watching a made-for-T.V. movie.  One of the characters was talking about a young woman he had met and said, "Well, she's a nice enough person, but when I asked her where she was when Kennedy was shot she said, 'Ted Kennedy was shot?!' "

Margret
Amen to the moon thing!  And I remember where I was, exactly!  My dad had bought a little mini-tv that operated off of batteries.  Tiny thing for those days, with a 4" screen.  I took it outside under the moon, which was, if I recall correctly, either full or darned near it, and watched the landing while looking at the actual moon.

Vertigo...it is vertigo season.  Almost.  I had a preview.  More annoying than anything else, but a taste of things to come.  I MUST get the money saved for the daybed before I need overnight care!
 
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DreamerRose

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Mamanyt1953 - Take a Benedryl before you go to bed. That will relieve the vertigo. I've got vertigo really bad, and the Benadryl keeps it at bay.
 

neely

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Vertigo...it is vertigo season.  Almost.  I had a preview.  More annoying than anything else, but a taste of things to come.  I MUST get the money saved for the daybed before I need overnight care!
Another Vertigo sufferer here and migraines too, it seems like they go hand in hand sometimes.  My migraines are triggered by weather and my vertigo seems to go along with allergy season.  The joys of aging - Not! 
 

Margret

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Quote:

The thing that makes me feel really old is every time I realize that some of my good friends have never actually seen a man walk on the moon, except in old videos.  It used to be that the thing that made me feel middle aged was realizing that I had friends who didn't remember the assassinations of Kennedy, and King.  One of these days I'll have close friends who don't remember 9/11; I'm pretty sure I already have some who don't remember Timothy McVeigh and the Oklahoma City bombings.

A while back I was watching a made-for-T.V. movie.  One of the characters was talking about a young woman he had met and said, "Well, she's a nice enough person, but when I asked her where she was when Kennedy was shot she said, 'Ted Kennedy was shot?!' "

Margret
Amen to the moon thing!  And I remember where I was, exactly!  My dad had bought a little mini-tv that operated off of batteries.  Tiny thing for those days, with a 4" screen.  I took it outside under the moon, which was, if I recall correctly, either full or darned near it, and watched the landing while looking at the actual moon.

Vertigo...it is vertigo season.  Almost.  I had a preview.  More annoying than anything else, but a taste of things to come.  I MUST get the money saved for the daybed before I need overnight care!
Second the Benadryl suggestion, if you have any, since your vertigo does seem to be caused by allergies.  Just avoid taking it too frequently; it can cause dry mouth.

When Neil Armstrong stepped on the moon, I was at work, delivering supper to patients in the hospital where my mother worked.  I was pushing the food cart down the corridor, delivering trays to each room, and the television in every room was turned on, people waiting to see him step out of the lander.  Then a woman a ways down the corridor began calling for help, standing in her doorway.  The nurses were ignoring her (she probably did this fairly regularly), so I walked down the hall and asked her what the problem was.  "It's supper time.  I can smell it.  I can hear the food cart.  And I don't have any!"  I told her that she was in luck, this was something I could help with.  Then I got her tray and gave it to her, answered her question about the meaning of the little card on the tray that said "Push Liquids," and stood by her bed and we watched Neil Armstrong step onto the moon together.

http://www.ecologicalart.org/april22.html

Margret
 

1CatOverTheLine

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Second the Benadryl suggestion, if you have any, since your vertigo does seem to be caused by allergies.  Just avoid taking it too frequently; it can cause dry mouth.

When Neil Armstrong stepped on the moon, I was at work, delivering supper to patients in the hospital where my mother worked.  I was pushing the food cart down the corridor, delivering trays to each room, and the television in every room was turned on, people waiting to see him step out of the lander.  Then a woman a ways down the corridor began calling for help, standing in her doorway.  The nurses were ignoring her (she probably did this fairly regularly), so I walked down the hall and asked her what the problem was.  "It's supper time.  I can smell it.  I can hear the food cart.  And I don't have any!"  I told her that she was in luck, this was something I could help with.  Then I got her tray and gave it to her, answered her question about the meaning of the little card on the tray that said "Push Liquids," and stood by her bed and we watched Neil Armstrong step onto the moon together.

http://www.ecologicalart.org/april22.html

Margret
Nice memory.  Do you recall what you were doing seven years before that, when John Glenn splashed down in the Atlantic after those three successful orbits in Friendship Seven?

.
 

Margret

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Second the Benadryl suggestion, if you have any, since your vertigo does seem to be caused by allergies.  Just avoid taking it too frequently; it can cause dry mouth.

When Neil Armstrong stepped on the moon, I was at work, delivering supper to patients in the hospital where my mother worked.  I was pushing the food cart down the corridor, delivering trays to each room, and the television in every room was turned on, people waiting to see him step out of the lander.  Then a woman a ways down the corridor began calling for help, standing in her doorway.  The nurses were ignoring her (she probably did this fairly regularly), so I walked down the hall and asked her what the problem was.  "It's supper time.  I can smell it.  I can hear the food cart.  And I don't have any!"  I told her that she was in luck, this was something I could help with.  Then I got her tray and gave it to her, answered her question about the meaning of the little card on the tray that said "Push Liquids," and stood by her bed and we watched Neil Armstrong step onto the moon together.

http://www.ecologicalart.org/april22.html

Margret
Nice memory.  Do you recall what you were doing seven years before that, when John Glenn splashed down in the Atlantic after those three successful orbits in Friendship Seven?

.
My mother woke me and my brothers up early that morning, and we all climbed in bed in between my parents and watched the television at the foot of the bed.  I noticed that all of the grownups (including Mr. Cronkite!) seemed extremely worried, more so than seemed justified, and I asked my mother why.  She lied to me.  She said that no one was certain that it was actually possible to breathe without gravity.  I knew at the time that it was a lie -- they had sent dogs and chimps up, after all -- but I didn't challenge her on it.  I figured that if it was something she was willing to lie about (and my mother almost never lied) she must have a good reason.  I was fully adult before I found out about the series of launch pad explosions that were the real cause of worry.

Oh!  No, that must have been Alan Shepard's flight.  However, I was in the same place for John Glenn's flight, so that part of my answer stands.  That's where I was for all of those very early flights.  And on Christmas Eve 1968 I was in the living room, sitting on the carpet in front of the television, with the room lights turned off but the Christmas tree twinkling away, and we watched and listened to the astronauts on Apollo 8 read from the Genesis creation myth, all about "the good earth."  I have the both the Apollo 8 and the Apollo 11 DVDs.

I remember further back than that, in fact.  One night in the middle of the night (probably more like 9:00 or so, but it seemed like the middle of the night to me), shortly after my youngest brother was born, my father came into my bedroom and woke me up, and told me to get dressed very quietly so as not to wake my mother, and to put on my snow suit and boots; we were going into the back yard.  Then he showed me the stars, the constellations, how to find the north star, and finally he said "Do you see that star that seems to be moving, while all the others are staying still?  That's called Sputnik.  It's the very first man made satellite."  October, 1957.  He wanted me to be able to tell my children and grandchildren that I was present at the very beginning of the space age.

Margret
 
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Mamanyt1953

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Nice memory.  Do you recall what you were doing seven years before that, when John Glenn splashed down in the Atlantic after those three successful orbits in Friendship Seven?

.
And that is actually the memory I probably have.  I'd have been older for the other.  Margret and I are close to the same age.
 

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Quote:

The thing that makes me feel really old is every time I realize that some of my good friends have never actually seen a man walk on the moon, except in old videos.  It used to be that the thing that made me feel middle aged was realizing that I had friends who didn't remember the assassinations of Kennedy, and King.  One of these days I'll have close friends who don't remember 9/11; I'm pretty sure I already have some who don't remember Timothy McVeigh and the Oklahoma City bombings.

A while back I was watching a made-for-T.V. movie.  One of the characters was talking about a young woman he had met and said, "Well, she's a nice enough person, but when I asked her where she was when Kennedy was shot she said, 'Ted Kennedy was shot?!' "

Margret
That's funny. I was 13 when John Kennedy was shot. I was in my 7th grade history class and I remember teenage girls walking through the halls crying. 

I saw him in person once. It was 1962 and when we found out he was at the Mayflower Hotel we went over there to see him come out. There was a small crowd of people there and everybody cheered and waved when he came outside. He waved to everyone and he gave us that wonderful smile of his. He was so handsome.
 

neely

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That's funny. I was 13 when John Kennedy was shot. I was in my 7th grade history class and I remember teenage girls walking through the halls crying. 
I was a few yrs.younger than you but I remember it vividly.  It made such a strong impression on me that if I went back to my school I could tell you exactly where I was standing in the room.  I was literally in shock! 
 
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