fade into obscurity

Soooooo how did you get through Christmas and New Years?  Sounds like a trick question.

Christmas and New Years  are gone.  Christmas and New years have faded into obscurity.  A great built up but then the blah afterwards.  It's time to get to work you guys.  I need that SS check sooooo I can afford to play pickle ball, golf, go hiking and eat out here in AZ. It ain't cheap!  Sooooo get after it.  I have high expectations of you guys!!! 

At a meeting of the Socratic Club in Oxford, England, in 1945, the Christian apologist C. S. Lewis said, "I believe that the Sun has risen not only because I see it but because by it I see everything else." In his biography of C. S. Lewis, Alister McGrath explains what Lewis meant: "We can look at the sun itself; or we can look instead at what it illuminates -- thus enlarging our intellectual, moral, and aesthetic vision. We see the true, the good, and the beautiful more clearly by being given a lens that brings them into focus."  This picture I took at our retirement community.  AZ sunsets are beautiful.

Fade into obscurity!  Old age will do that toooooooooo folks alright.  The last church service I went to before leaving IA, I visited with a friend after the service.  He's 90 years old and can't hear worth a darn.  He does pretty good but does use a cane.  In fact when he talked to me he had the cane point on my foot the whole time!  It made me laugh.  ANYWAY Blake asked him about one of his sons as they are the same age.  He said--The kids are all sooooo busy.  They use to come and visit us on Friday night and leave Sunday night.  Then they would come Saturday afternoon and leave Sunday afternoon.  Now they come Saturday morning and leave Saturday afternoon!  And during that time, they spend most of the time on their phones!  Such is life.

After Christmas, a teacher asked her young pupils how they spent their holiday away from school. One child wrote the following:  We always used to spend the holidays with Grandma and Grandpa. They used to live in a big brick house but Grandpa got retarded and they moved to Arizona. Now they live in a tin box and have rocks painted green to look like grass. They ride around on their bicycles and war name tags because they don't know who they are anymore.  They go to a building called a wreck center, but they must have got it fixed because it is all okay now. They do exercises there, but they don't do them very well.

There is a swimming pool too, but they all jump up and down in it with hats. At their gate, there is a doll house with a little old man sitting in it. He watches all day so nobody can escape. Sometime they sneak out and go cruising in their golf carts. Nobody there cooks, they just eat out. And, they eat the same thing every night---early birds.  Some of the people can't get out past the man in the doll house. The ones who do get out, bring food back to the wrecked center for put luck.
My Grandma says that Grandpa worked all his life to earn his retardment and says I should work hard so I can be retarded someday too. When I earn my retardment, I want to be the man in the doll house. Then I will let people out so they can visit their grandchildren.

Suggestion!  Look up...not down!  So we can say with the psalmist: "My voice You shall hear in the morning, O LORD; in the morning I will direct it to You, and I will look up." Whatever is happening in your life today, look up. When we turn our eyes heavenward and celebrate what we see, our hearts will overflow with joy.  CadillacJack says--Don't waste your time on feeling sorry for yourself.  Sometimes you're ahead, sometimes you're behind.  The race is long, and in the end, it's only with yourself.  Such is life.

It only last soooo long!  We rent a condo in the Fountain of the Sun retirement community.  Our phase is all condos.  Our street is all condos.  Every year there are for sale signs on our street (i.e. about the same percentage each year it seems).  Ya, folks get sick or die and folks just fade into obscurity.  Such is life.

I read in the paper soooo it must be right that as of 1/1/14 there are 317,297,938 folks in the Unicted States.  I wonder how many of those 317,297,938 know me or even care about me.  I wonder.  It doesn't make me feel very important let me tell ya.  My mentor would say to me--erv, folks are born and folks die every day; it's been that way for a long time!  Such is life.

SusieQ says--Enjoy your life no matter where you are or what your situation is; if you are a senior, you are probably playing the back nine and in the middle of the round somewhere.  ItchieBitchie says--And don't expect anyone else to support you.  Maybe you have a trust fund or a retirement fund.  Maybe you have a wealthy spouse.  But you never know when either 'em might run out!  Ouchy ouchy!

We can't always control the length of our life but we can impact the quality!  No doctor can predict when life will begin or when it will end.  Therefore the only choice we have about our lives it what we choose to do between our first breath and our last.  Once we recognize that we're never going to be really good at anything...especially golf, life is more enjoyable.  We live in a highlight-reel world but if we can realize that we won't make the highlight-reel, life seems to work better.  Such is life.

Have you ever been a star?  A role player?  A bench player? Or never made the team?  When you get to be a senior adult, very few if any folks care what you were.  They just don't remember you. Many folks are younger than you and don't really care much about you.  Most of your peers really don't know or don't care.  BUT at the time it sure seemed sooooo important now didn't it.  It's sorta kinda like SeniorProfessorAlfred who lives down the street who says----I'm sorta kinda worried; Doc gave me three pills that I have to take the rest of my life---and it says no refills.  Joesixpack says--Whatever you do, don't congratulate yourself toooooo much or berate yourself either.  Your choices are half chance.  Soooo are everybody else's.  No matter who you are, we will fade into obscurity.  Such is life. 

Much of life is mental conditioning I think.  What do you think? A old geyser was bothering the waiter at the Superstition Saloon and Restaurant at Tortilla Flat.  First, he asked that the air conditioning be turned up because he was toooo hot, then he asked it tooooo be turned down cause he was tooooo cold, and sooo on for about half an hour.  Surprisingly, the waiter was very patient, he walked back and forth and never once got angry.  Soooo finally, a second customer asked him why he didn't throw the the old geyser out.  "Oh, I really don't care or mind," said the waiter with a smile.  "We don't even have air conditioning."

Sadness!  Some of you might have had folks missing at your Christmas dinner table.  Some have moved far away, some are divorced, some are no longer welcome, some don't want to come, some have serious illnesses, some are present only by absence and some have been replaced by obituaries.  All of those reasons cause emotions (i.e. mixed emotions).  Folks after time sorta kinda fade into obscurity.  Life does go on folks!  

Toast!  I was getting a few groceries at Frey's the other day.  My credit card is worn and over used (i.e. like my body at times).  It doesn't always work when it's swiped.  I have to use a plastic bag to make it work.  It still didn't work.  I said to CheckoutPeggy, you try it, you know all the tricks.  She said--Ya gotta do it fast with the plastic bag; I don't know why but you gotta.  Bingo, she got it.  CheckoutPeggy said--It takes a lot of years to learn all the tricks and then when you seem to learn most of them, you're toast!  Such is life.

SeniorSnowbirdFromND says--Eventually we all become old clunkers!  OurNeighborSonny came over the other morning and sat with me in the sun.  I asked him if he gets up early--no, I sleep late; I go to bed early and sleep late!  Listen Sonny, when you're 80, you can do whatever you want guy.  OurOneEyeHouseCheckerLila from back home has this sign in her utility room.  She is a real person with a good heart and a positive attitude.  My kind of person.  

Happy New Year to ya!  Happiness can be thought, taught and caught--but not bought.  Such is life.

Have a FUN day my friends unless you have other plans.  (-:

erv

MyFriendJean says--I hope you rise above the little things!

This is a story of a personal friend as well as a family friend.  He wrote this for a running web page.  Some real good stuff folks by a good person (i.e. a real person a.k.a. genuine with a good heart--my kind of person). Very inspirational.  https://www.facebook.com/rodsracers/posts/714139451943074