Tag Archives: Middle Age

You’ve Come A Long Way Baby……

Humor, , , , , , , ,

My mom has become obsessed with creating photo albums for her six children from the hundreds of photos in her treasure chest.  She must make 6 copies of almost every photo, or at least as the photos progress and a child is added to the history books. I have no idea why this project might be frustrating for her 88-year-old self, do you? Duh, comes to mind.

Every once in awhile, when I’m in the mood for a little frustration myself, I stop over to my mom’s house to call the VA, or fix her iPad, or fight with Verizon.  Invariably, we start to look at the pictures together.

Yesterday, she showed me this photo.

 

My Nana is the one circled in yellow. She is about 35 years old in this picture. Her name wasn’t even Nana yet, as my mom is the cutest little 8-year-old circled in pink. I made my mom go find a photo of herself at around the age of 35.

Adorable me second from left! Even tho that’s not the point.

Then I came home and looked for one of me around the same age.

Please Note: 80’s fashion is not helping me make my point.

I would like to posit the following: Rather than continuing to punish women for adopting a youth culture look, perhaps we are actually just trying to enjoy life, look like we are having fun, and present a ‘picture’ to the world of what we actually look like, at the age we are at. Perhaps over the last 50 years, we started rebelling against being portrayed as “Nana” before we were even done having children. Perhaps, just because we have children doesn’t mean we have to wear orthopedic shoes, bras with no support, dresses made from tablecloths, or a hairstyle that would confuse us with Grandma Moses.

Perhaps my mother’s generation actually clandestinely started a revolution where women got to enjoy their youth, even if they had 6 youths of their own running around. Maybe that’s what began way back in the ’50’s and ‘ 60’s when no one was paying attention to the everyday housewife. And maybe that’s what’s still happening today to women in their ’50’s and ’60’s when no one is still paying attention.

Just sayin………

My Nana apparently didn’t change her look for 60 years. My mom, on the other hand, created generations of hot tomatoes! Yay, Mary Ann!

 

Photo by Dani Almond Photography
Photo by Dani Almond Photography

“You Just have to Laugh…………..”

©2017 Cathy Sikorski

Check, please!

Humor, Uncategorized, , , , , ,

My girlfriends and I decided to meet for a drink. We hardly ever do this. Now I know why.

We were finding it difficult to get together and one of the girls was heading down South to see her new adopted grandson, so we wanted to wish her well and just catch up with each other.

Two of us had an adult beverage and two of us tee-totaled(is that a verb?). Our waiter was a very solicitous gentleman. Younger than us, but not a young man. He patiently waited for us to chat and returned a few times before we were ready to order.

When we told him we were through, he kindly, without one look of exasperation or even surreptitiously rolling his eyes, went for the decaf coffee pot when we changed our minds and decided to have coffee.

We gals had a great time showing pictures from recent weddings, talking about vacations taken and vacations to come, sharing yet another story about our Moms…yes even at our age, we still kvetch about our Moms!!!! And passing along those not-so-fun anecdotes about other friends and relatives that seep into a middle-aged conversation about health, wellness, and mortality.

TestWhen the check came, the first intrepid woman just asked the waiter to put her charges on her credit card, which he did. That left the rest of us to do the math from the check which, by default, included her charges as well.

This is the problem when people trust you or worse think you’re smart.

Even when the waiter told us the club soda was free, we still just threw in a bunch of bills when we couldn’t make sense of what was owed. I told the waiter: “if the tip is inappropriate, please come back and tell us.

He came back alright.

“Did you kind ladies really mean to leave a $14.00 tip on a $11.00 bill?” he inquired.

NOW, what do you do?

Flirtatiously and adorably for a gaggle of women in their 50’s we said, “Sure!”

From a former waitress, every once in a while you just need to leave a ginormous tip for your server. It will make their day, trust me. It would be nice to know, though, that that is what you are doing, so you could feel good about it.

After more than 40 years of friendship, I am no longer allowed to look at the check, or in the alternative, I must have a drink first. I may be sharper with an adult beverage.

“You just have to Laugh……”

©2015 Cathy Sikorski

Hello? Hello? Anybody there……?

Caregivers, Humor, Multiple Sclerosis, Uncategorized, , , , , , , ,

For a few years, I have been telling my girlfriends  (yes we old people still call our friends who are girls, “girlfriends”), that we should consider bank robbery as a new career since no one is every looking at us or paying attention to us. Pretty sure that was Diane Keaton’s idea in the movie, Mad Money…and then realized it was because it was written by Callie Khouri of Thelma and Louise fame.

So yesterday, when I went to the hospital to find out the status of my brother-in-law, I was still taken aback by events clearly attached to my age, and my apparent Invisibility Cloak that  I forgot to remove.

Weirdly, I was very dressed up because I had just been interviewed on a television show

Killer Caregiver on the Loose and On TV!
Killer Caregiver on the Loose and On TV!

about my new book: Showering with Nana: Confessions of a Serial (killer) Caregiver. Sure why shouldn’t I give myself a shameless plug here in case you missed it!

So when I went to the nurse’s station asking for information, I was told he was being discharged in two hours.

Imagine my surprise, as no one had called me to discuss his medical condition, I had no idea why he was in the hospital let alone leaving the hospital. I was informed that his nurse would come to his room to discuss all that with me in a few moments, as she was busy with another patient.

Okay.

A young woman walked into his room in scrubs.

“Are you his nurse?” I asked, hopefully, as time was ticking by and his transport was coming and I still had no idea about his medical status.

“No,” she said a bit bewildered, “I’m a doctor. I’m here to look at his wound.”

“Well, you better hurry because he’s leaving in an hour and you can’t do it yourself as his wound is on his backside and someone would need to help you turn him over.” Translation: I’m not the one who is going to do that.

Never saw her again.

His nurse arrives and I ask, ” I understand he is going back to rehab in an hour, I just want to know what was determined about his medical condition. Are they changing any of his meds and what did they decide as to what happened to him?”

“Well, I don’t know that. You’re going to have to let me go get his discharge papers.”

“Okay?”

When she returned, she started reading his med list to me. And I would ask what is that for? How long will he take it, etc.

“Ugh, you will JUST HAVE TO LET ME READ THIS TO YOU.” It was like she was reading aloud and just discovered that someone was actually in the room with her.

Stopped her right there.

Very quietly and calmly I said to her: “You need to stop talking to me this way. Your attitude is hurting my feelings. I can’t “hear” you if you can’t stop being mean. ”

“I’m sorry if you feel that way, ” she countered.

“I do, and you need to get the attitude out of  your voice.”

AND THEN,  we were able to have a medical discussion about our joint patient.

Regardless of the adorable hot pink dress I was wearing, that clearly does NOT make me look young, hip and in-the-know like I had imagined, I was at least able to demand some respect, if I couldn’t get it by default.

Since when did ‘middle-aged woman (okay  maybe a bit OVER the middle part) equal stupid? Please see this article below, which is a much more erudite, clever and a possible workshop for those of us navigating these waters!

The insults of age

A one-woman assault on condescension

BY HELEN GARNER 

 

https://www.themonthly.com.au/issue/2015/may/1430402400/helen-garner/insults-age

 

One thing many of us seem to  have in common is that we know:

“You Just have to Laugh……” You can tell by our laugh lines!

© Cathy Sikorski 2015