I've done quite a bit of posting, writing, blogging, and more posting today. More than I've done in quite a while for a change. It just seemed like since the weather is making its turn here in my neck of the woods for what sounds like worse for wear, the dreary, rainy, cloudy, soon to be falling sleet and freezing rain shall cometh as the day gets into the late afternoon and evening.
I've put some things up here, on my blog, along with some posts on Facebook, several "Tweets", and some Pinterest postings along with the entire thing also have kind of brightened up my pages on those places that were beginning to feel more staggered, than normal. Of course I go through sometimes even a week or possible almost two weeks, that living daily life, tends to be erratic, errand filled, running hereth, thereth, and yonder... and feeling too worn for wear, when it comes to being online, or even on the computer to write in my book. It comes with the territory of having some of the chronic illnesses I live with. They at times seems to inhabit more of my body, mind and spirit, than just "my own self".
That may sound a bit crazy, and with the amount of issues lately with brain fog, pain, forgetfulness, and sometimes feeling just beyond the point of lazy thus I see at a breaths space, that without my watchful eye, Lupus, RA, Sjogren's, Raynaud's and the rest can slip up behind you when you least expect it and take over your body, heart, and mind much like some alien force that presented itself from a foreign planet.
As I was taking a shower earlier this afternoon, and thinking about my life, it dawned on me how things are so very different now. When I say that I mean more of my own perspective about my life in a very personal sense. When I was growing up in the 60's and 70's... little did I know how much influence my younger years would have on me, when I was 50 and over.
Back then I never gave thought to "money". Of course I knew my family were not "rich" or even very affluent. I always lived on the "other side of town". The North part of my hometown is where the larger homes were built, mostly brick, and were a great deal much more expensive than the small little 2 bedroom, 1 bath room wooden home I lived in. In fact, I was born, raised there, and my Mom after all these years still resides in that exact house. So, it is truly "home" for me.
Mom was about 25 years old when I was born. I get the impression she never really "dated" all that much before her and Dad met. He happened to be almost 13 years OLDER than her. I guess back then, age like that was not all that huge of a factor. Most women in the 50's and 60's were home makers. They took care of the kids, house, cleaning, cooking and so forth. The Dads, Husbands were the "bread winners". They went out into the world and make a living for the family. We always had two vehicles. We usually had a "good" used car for Mom to drive me to school, to the market and errands. Or if we went on vacation we usually went in the car. Dad just about always had a truck. He began with a Chevrolet and the last one Mom traded in after he passed away was also a Chevrolet. Dad bought a brand new pickup about every 5 to 7 years. Mom had worked until I started school. When I began 1st grade she stayed home and Dad as I said was the provider. Dad and Mom were both born and somewhat remember the very "harsh" times of the Depression. Dad of course, much more than Mom. He was born in 1923. He remembered outhouses, no indoor plumbing, wells, hoeing cotton, having a farm, garden, chickens, cows you milked, flour in huge cotton sacks (Mom remembers that also. Her Mom made them underwear out of the flour sack material)!
As the years went by, of course my entire "adult" life was somewhat different than my parents. I worked almost the entire time, from the day I graduated early from High School, until the day I resigned my last job in Seattle due to health issues, I always worked. If I had relied on money coming in from either of my first two husbands, I would have never financially survived. So, things that my Mom never taught me much of, working outside the home, clothes, makeup, and all of the "girlie-girl" things... having your nails done, having your hair cut differently, even having a bit larger home, a new car, 2 kids, rather than like myself an only child, and then allowing my kids to kind of "learn their own way" around the world. I taught them how to take care of themselves. I wanted my daughter to be able to be "her own woman". Never did I want her to have to rely on some guy to take care of her. I never wanted to feel she had to "stay" in an abusive relationship, or put up with someone not treating her like a woman should be treated, due to thinking she "had to" stay. Of course I wanted both of my kids to learn how to stand up on their own two feet. But, all the time I worked and was out of the house, I also needed them to be responsible enough to come home after school (when they were old enough), do their homework and chores, and be there when I came home from work, college or both.
My Dad never wanted me to "play in the band", or try out for any type of extra things in school. He was so strict, he never allowed me to go to football games like the other kids did on Friday night. And by the time he finally DID allow me to do a few things, he would either have to drive me there, pick me up, and was just so very overprotective of me. How I ever learned anything as far as taking care of myself... was either through an innate nature I was born with, or because I had the dearest next door neighbor who took me under her wing, and taught me so much, from crocheting to being a candy striper at the hospital... all of the things I learned were from her, or from my own trial and error.
I guess I thought life was kind of the way Mom and Dad lived it. He came home from work for dinner (he worked nights for the most part when I was a teenager), and unless he "okayed" me going to my cousins house for the weekend, or her coming over, I was alone with no siblings anywhere near close to my age. I have a half-brother who is 18 years or more older than me. My Dad was 37 when I was born, and my Mom 25 years old. So, I guess they decided that after Mom had a couple of miscarriages after me, that having one child was in their cards.
As I had said in the beginning of this, being "affluent" or having money was something as children we don't think much about. Or back then all of that type of thing was not talked about around me. I raised my kids so much differently. They knew the "value of a dollar" at an early age. I wanted them to be ready when the time came to face the world head on. Not like myself, who was hit right in the face by the time I was 19, had my son, and was paying all the bills myself.
I don't resent that my parents did or did not do things a bit differently. But, I do often wish, they would have given me "eyes" and a "mind" earlier in life to accept so many of the things that life hands us, and if we don't have the understanding, we are not able to deal with it so well.
Dad hated doctors, and hated medications. He just refused with the exception of when he was extremely ill, to see his doctors, and just would not take the medications they gave him. He thought it was all a bunch of bull, and any medication you got on was almost like a sign of weakness. So, when I began to have severe migraines at 17, little did I know just how horrid the next 15 to 20 years of my life would be. From doctor to doctor, from time lost from work, medications that did not work, and Dad never really suffered a "headache" of any kind. So, he could not "get" what a "migraine" was, and why I needed medications for them. He would get almost mad if he knew I was on medication. His Mom back when he was very young, had been ill probably with cancer back then. The only thing they could do in those years was keep someone comfortable, and that usually meant morphine. I those times no one knew that "morphine" was habit forming etc. They knew it helped with pain relief for bad pain, and the doctors gave it out to those that were in bad pain such as cancer. Well, I guess probably my Dad watched his Mom go downhill, and then between the medication and the cancer she was not "lucid" at times. So, he thought that "any" medication could cause you to "lose your mind"... and he definitely did not believe in taking any type of pain medication. So, there were times I just could not even tell him about me being home sick with a severe headache, or the many times I was in the ER with one so bad they had to give me IV medications just to get rid of it.
Even back then, as young as I was, I had joint issues. It began with an accident playing baseball with some of my cousins, and I got used for "2nd base"... and the torn meniscus had to be repaired in that knee. I spent 7 days in the hospital in traction after that surgery at 15. By the time I was 21, I had a 2nd surgery on that knee, and even then I was showing signs of arthritis. Yet, the doctors just didn't put two and two together... to see there was probably much more going on that just a knee injury. After that I began to have various joint problems. Pain, stiffness, severe pain, freezing up, until I had a shoulder, an elbow operated on, and after that, I underwent several more scopes on both shoulders, knees, and then of course replacements of my knees and my right shoulder.
Life for me as a child was days of playing alone outside in the good months, with my dolls, my table and chairs, and as I said, not knowing what really was going on through those years. Even in my teens, I just knew I had an overly strict Dad, that never allowed me to "spread my wings"... he didn't even "encourage" me to go to college... yet I did go and finally got my Associates Degree after years of going at night after work, to get my degree. I am told I am an incredible oil painter, and loved taking those lessons. I took piano for years, and loved that. Even the vacations that my parents took me on, they were nice, and I am glad they took me, but after I was grown I got to go snow skiing, go to Vegas, went to concerts, to Hot Springs, and did many things that my parents never would have tried or done.
We always want to love and "shelter" our kids from the harms of this world. But, if we "shelter them" too much, then they are not prepared for what the world holds later... and all of us know now it just gets worse with each passing year.
My Dad never understood cable TV or Dish, he never understood a cordless phone, or a CD player or DVD player. He certainly did not get a cell phone, computer, or much of anything that was "electronic" in nature at the time all of the digital, cell, and those types of things came out.
I will end this for now, on a note, that I am not upset, nor do I blame my Dad or Mom for where I feel I may have not gotten as far in life as I wanted, when it comes to things I wanted to do, places I wanted to go... and thank goodness I didn't raise my two like that. They "get" the world... but I just hope that people give their kids what they need, that will help them grow into caring, loving, and knowledgeable adults, that can "conquer" anything, and not be scared to do things in life. I felt kind of "shut off" from the real world back then...
