Monthly Archives: March 2016

25Mar/16

Ten Reasons to Stop Exercising..Now!

Seriously, it’s dangerous…

cute walking sneaks

cute walking sneaks

This is meant to be funny, so don’t get all excited and think I am giving you the go ahead to stop exercising. I’m not! But here are some very good reasons why maybe you should. Or at least why I should…

  1. I have been faithfully exercising at least 5 days a week for over a year now. Cardio, weights, sit-ups, lunges, planks, hula hooping and walking…and guess what? I’ve gained weight and added a few inches. So if I didn’t exercise would I be skinny and fit in all my old clothes? Not sure, but it might be worth a try.
  2. I am really feeling great and so I am thinking ok, maybe it is worth it and all this exercise stuff must be working. Think again, I did some gardening for a couple hours last week and my body hurt for 3 days afterward. So why bother exercising if you are still going to hurt after a little gardening?
  3. I am spending way too much money on cute work out clothes. I needed a jacket for walking that would whisk away the perspiration…at least that is what the tag said it would do. You have to look good while exercising, that is evident by all the fashionistas I walk by every day. You can’t just wear any old thing while walking and please, can I just say this now…”say no to sweatpants!” And of course you can’t just have one pair of sneakers. I needed to go buy another pair because you shouldn’t  wear the same ones every single day. I mean this is a known health thing, right?
  4. I am trying to eat healthier due to all this exercising. So I decided to give up potato chips and snacks. I KNOW, right? How can someone be expected to give up potato chips? I think I may have to buy some soon, as I think this may be affecting the economy. I honestly don’t want to hurt any local company by my non support of their product.
  5. I was hula hooping the other day and dropped the hoop and then fell over it. I could have broken a leg or arm or something. How is this even good for you?
  6. Also while hula hooping I broke 2 nails. Are you seeing a problem here with this hula hooping thing? It is dangerous and maybe I should just stop while I’m still alive.
  7. I do oil pulling(will do a post on this at another time) while exercising some days to save time. On one such day I had to sneeze while doing the oil pulling, but held it in. You really shouldn’t hold in a sneeze. This is not good for your health at all. I think it could damage your brain.
  8. Squats make your knees crack and hurt. Nuff said..
  9. If I got too fit and skinny I would have to go buy a whole new wardrobe. Wait, how is this a negative?
  10. I am using way too much water taking more showers and doing my hair more often. Well, this may not be a valid reason, I think I am taking the same amount as I was before I started exercising. But it sounded like a good reason and I needed one more.

So there you have it..ten reasons or good excuses to stop exercising. But, I have a couple good reasons to keep doing it too. My grandson and I have plank contests when we are together and sometimes I win. So there’s that! And I have a group of girlfriends that chat every day on Facebook and we give gold stars to each other when we complete our exercise for the day. I wouldn’t want to let them down. So I guess I will keep doing this exercise thing…however I may have a few potato chips with lunch afterward.

I read this quote below the other day, and it made me laugh. I did Google it to see who wrote it but couldn’t find anything. So if you are by some chance reading this and you wrote it, let me know and I’ll give you credit.

“Losing weight makes you look good in clothes, exercising makes you look better naked.”  Since no one ever sees me naked, maybe I can stop.. But then again in reality I guess I exercise so I feel better and also so I can eat chips…and ice cream…and..

18Mar/16

My Sister, My Friend…

and now she’s gone…

on the boardwalk

on the boardwalk

I have been putting off writing this as I knew it would be painful for me. Next week would be my sister Rhonda’s 60th birthday and she won’t be here to celebrate it. 60 is a big milestone and I know we would have done it right, lunch or dinner and of course our favorite thing, shopping. But that is not to be.

I was 6 when Rhonda was born and I really didn’t want a sibling. I enjoyed being an only child and all that goes with it and I had plenty of friends and I didn’t want that to change. But she was so cute and she idolized me.. so it was ok.

Don’t get me wrong, we had our moments… and they weren’t always good ones. She followed me around like a puppy. Always wanting to be included in my circle of friends and what we were doing. But we were grown up kids and we didn’t want a little kid following us everywhere and getting in the way. But of course Mom said we had to include her and so we did.

I was a little rough on her at times(ok, a lot of times) but it never deterred her from loving me and being my best friend and supporter. She had this little dog that you would wind up and it did flips. She was deathly scared of it so we kept it in the basement. I would tell her I needed her to come see something and I would make the dog jump at her as soon as she came down the steps. She would cry and run back up to tell Mom what I had done. Five minutes later I would call her to come back down promising not to do it again. I told her I had hid the dog and begged for her to just come down and play. She would of course and I of course had the dog out and she would run screaming back up the stairs. This would go on for hours sometimes. And the worse part(or the best part depending on how you look at it) is she truly believed me when I said I wouldn’t do it again. She loved me that much.

Rhonda was always the “good” one. I was the bad one. I got in trouble and she never did. I was always jealous of that. It didn’t matter who did anything, I was the one who got blamed for it. Mom would say, “you are the oldest and you should know better.” So I would get in trouble and Rhonda would not. I hated that I had curly hair and she had beautiful wavy hair. I hated that she got to do things I was never allowed to do. I hated that Mom dressed us in matching outfits. I thought she was my parents favorite. I asked them much later in life and they said definitely not, but I still think she was.

matching outfits

matching outfits

I got married very young and left the house. That was a hard time for her so I had her over to our place a lot and she helped me with my daughter who by the way was only 10 years younger than her. They were very close, friends instead of aunt and niece and always remained that way.  My husband at the time worked nights so she was my companion and confidant during those long nights. We would make spaghetti and drive around town in my VW. When I divorced my husband, Rhonda was there to help me with the kids. We took them to the beach and she helped make things somewhat normal and fun for them at a time when they were very confused. We had great times together back then. I miss those days. And I miss her.

When she got married and had her own two girls she was truly in heaven. All she ever wanted was to be married and have a family like me. She talked about it all the time growing up. At night in our bedroom upstairs we would share stories about what we wanted our lives to be like some day and her story was always about getting married and having kids. She loved kids and kids loved her. So when she finally had her own she was the happiest person ever. Rhonda loved her girls so much, more than her own life. We spent many family vacations together at the beach, our parents, her kids and mine. I was happy for her and enjoyed seeing her girls grow up into beautiful young women. Rhonda was so proud of them. They were all she ever talked about. One of our last visits together she spent talking to me about her girls.

Rhonda was the best person I ever knew. She never had a harsh word to say about anyone and always had a friendly hello and smile for everyone she came in contact with. I knew this about her but it was at her funeral that I truly found out just how much she was loved and how many people’s lives she had affected. Their shared stories overwhelmed me and I vowed after she passed to try and find the good. I knew she did and she proved that over and over. So every day I post a “good story” on my Facebook page in her honor. Some days they are hard to find amongst all the political junk and the terrible things happening in the world. But I find one even if it takes a few hours. I do it for Rhonda. And I do it for me, I need to see that there are good people out there doing good things every day.

She was the best friend you could ever have or wish to have. She was not just my sister, she was my friend. She also had one special person in her life besides me that was like a sister to her. It was a neighbor and they grew up together. Since I was older and married she needed a friend to be there for her and that friend was Connie. I was glad she had her.

I miss my sister so much. I miss being able to pick up the phone and talk to her. I miss the fun times we had together laughing at something stupid until we were crying and not even remembering what we were laughing about in the first place. I miss her smile. But most of all I miss her laugh. There are so few really “good” people in this world. And the world is less without her.

Have you lost someone that made a big impact on your life?

“The best thing about having a sister was that I always had a friend.”

~ Cali Rae Turner

 

 

11Mar/16

The Past, it’s a good place to visit….

but I just can’t dwell there.

me back in the 50's

me back in the 50’s

I really don’t know what’s wrong with me lately, I find myself dwelling on the past so much and it is depressing me. I am even dreaming about the past. This isn’t me, I am a normally happy person and so it makes me mad to feel this way.

This month is a bad month for me due to the fact it is the anniversary of my Mom’s passing and my sister Rhonda’s birthday, who has also passed. So it brings up all kinds of memories and while it’s ok to think about them and move on, I seem to be dwelling on them.

Maybe it’s due to the fact I have too much time on my hands. After the loss of my job last year and then my recent retirement I was so excited to have time..time to do whatever I wanted. This has been wonderful on one hand, but having all this time also gives me more time to think. I think about all the good times from days gone by, people who are no longer here and times that will never be again.

I never had the luxury of having a lot of time on my hands. I was working, sometimes 3 jobs and raising 3 kids by myself. Then after the kids grew up still working and helping with grand kids. But always working towards something. This has been a real adjustment for me, this having “time” thing. And I must say I love the ability to go to lunch with friends or take off at the spur of the moment for the beach. But it has also given me down time and sometimes like this month, having that time to think isn’t good.

I give people advice all the time. Ask anyone, they will tell you I can dish it out. But I guess I am not good at taking my own advice. I know what the answer is and I know how to go about changing things. I’m just not doing it. I am not just visiting my past, I am dwelling there. I recently read an article that said you shouldn’t have items from your past all around you, that it causes you to live in the past and not move on. I am not going to get rid of the pictures and items from my past. That just isn’t going to happen. They are a part of me and what made me who I am.

Really this hasn’t been happening ever since I lost my job…it’s only been this past month or so. I think all the birthday’s and anniversaries and some other things going on in my life have brought it to a head. My writing has been a wonderful “job” for me and allows me to get things out…just like writing this post. But this week I didn’t even want to write. And then I thought, why not write about why you don’t want to write. And it is helping… even as I type these words.

I’ve lost so many things that defined who I was, it has forced me to look at who I want to be going forward. I lost my parents, my sister, my job, my friend and my pet. I can’t even keep a plant alive these days. Seriously, I don’t know what that’s all about but every plant in my house is dead or dying. So I kind of feel a little lost myself. Don’t worry, I’m ok. I think I am just trying to figure it all out. I always had a focus, something I was working towards and I don’t have that now. I didn’t realize this would happen and wasn’t prepared for it when it hit me.

When I go outside on a warm sunny day like we have been having lately or have lunch with good friends and laugh until we are crying, it makes me realize I am doing what I am supposed to be doing. I need to focus on the moment and I need to focus on me. That has never been my focus before and I don’t quite know how to go about it. So I will continue to do this and I have made a list of things I want to do and people I want to see. I will be fine. I need to realize that I will have times like this and be ready for them when they come.

The past is a good place to visit now and then but we just can’t live there. We must live each day like it is our last because it could be. This moment, it is the only one we truly have. I am going to make it joyful. What will you do with it?

“We do not heal the past by dwelling there; we heal the past by living fully in the present.” ~ Marianne Williamson

03Mar/16

My Dad, A Man of Few Words..

but the words he spoke left quite an impact

Dad%20on%20a%20fighter%20plane

Last week was my Dad’s birthday, he would have been 89. I miss my Dad more with every passing day and his death has left a void in my life that no one can ever fill. Dad was a strong, quiet, hard working man who loved his family…and golf.

Back in his day working hard and providing for your family showed how much you loved them. That was all you needed to do. You worked and worked and when you finally got home you were so exhausted you couldn’t do anything else. Dad worked 2 jobs, 6 days a week so there wasn’t a lot of time left at the end of the day. Most nights he would just fall asleep on the couch watching tv.

He played golf on Saturdays after work and sometimes on Sundays. But Mom didn’t like him playing on Sundays so that didn’t happen very often. We would have family picnics in the back yard and Dad would be the one who tended to the grill. There was always a problem getting the charcoal to light and there would be a few words spoken that we pretended not to hear. But he got it lit and the burgers were great! I sure do miss those times. This is the only time we ever saw Dad cook. When Mom was in the hospital having my sister, my Aunt had to come and feed us due to the fact my Dad was making us cereal…cold cereal.. for every meal. Funny thing is when Dad was in the Navy, he was a cook on the ship. Guess he got tired of it and vowed to never do it again.

I learned a lot from this man. I certainly got my work ethic from him. And I saw his respect for my Mom and the way he treated his own mother. Back in the 50’s and 60’s most women didn’t have a voice. Men ruled the house and what they said was law. But that wasn’t the case in our house. Mom had a voice, boy did she ever. And Dad let her have that voice. He would say his piece and then Mom said hers and basically Dad deferred to Mom. I remember a few times it went on a little longer, but I was very young and by the time I was in my teens, Dad had just given up and he would just let Mom win. He was a smart man.

Dad also had a sense of humor. You didn’t see it very often and most of the time a few beers were involved but he had a very dry sarcastic sense of humor and it cracked me up every time. I think maybe I got my sense of humor from him. I’ve been known to express a little bit of sarcasm now and then. It was always funny to see this side of him when we had people over to the house. My normally quiet father turned into a comedian. Everyone thought he was funny, especially him.

He never yelled at us except when we would have the refrigerator door open too long, which to Dad was anything more than a second. Lights were always turned off on us, even if we were in that room reading. “You don’t need a light on the sun is still out.” Heat evidently wasn’t needed either as it was always shut off to the upstairs and if we turned it on for some dumb reason… like maybe us seeing our breath…. it was off within minutes.

Since my sister and I didn’t have much interaction or playful moments with Dad, you can imagine how surprised I was at the way he treated my kids. He was so loving and played with them any time he could. I never understood why that was until I had grand children of my own. You have more time and you don’t have all the rest of the stuff that goes with raising them. You can just enjoy them. I know I do.

The only time I can honestly say that my Dad let me down or missed a moment to really connect was when he found out I was pregnant. I was only 15 and looking back on it now I can kind of understand his reaction. Especially due to the fact it he wasn’t a very touchy feely kind of man and didn’t know how to react. So he chose to not speak to me for several days and when he finally did he told me he was disappointed in me. I was already disappointed in me, I didn’t need my father saying it. I wanted him to hold me and tell me it would be ok. He didn’t do that then, but his actions the next several months and the years ahead proved that he loved me and stood by me.

The last time I saw my Dad, he and my Mom had come to Ocean City, MD to spend a few days with me at the beach. A few days later he was gone. Dad had recently retired and had more time to do fun things like go to the beach and play more golf. He played every single day…well maybe not Sundays. He always said when he retired he was going to play golf every day and he did. He was actually out playing the day he died. Something else he always said was that he wanted to die on the golf course and he did. Who wouldn’t want to go doing the very thing you loved most in the world?

A father shouldn’t just be a sperm donor or someone who just gives their last name to a child. My Dad proved this and my own son proves this to be true as well. My son didn’t have a very good role model in his own father but he is the best Father to his children I have ever seen. He teaches them with so much love and respect. He isn’t afraid to show them he loves them and as a result they are respectful and loving children in return.

I think how our parents treat us and others truly shapes our lives. Sometimes its good and sometimes it’s not. But whatever the circumstances of our childhood, we can’t continue to blame them for our problems. At some point we have to move on and take responsibility for our lives. I didn’t have a father that constantly talked to me, played with me or one who showered me with love. In fact, he never once told me he loved me. But I knew I was loved. He may not have said the actual words but he proved it by his actions.

My Dad was a wonderful man and I miss him. Happy Birthday Dad! He used to say it never rained on the golf course. So Dad, I hope the grass is green and the sun is shining and every hole is a hole in one!

The most important thing that a father can do for his children is to love their mother.” ~Theodore M Hesburgh

Do you have a great story about your Dad to share?