Resolutions

Who thought of this dumb shit anyway, is what I would like to know? New Year's resolutions, I mean. Talk about setting yourself up for a fall, this is the way to do it.

I don't make resolutions anymore. I have changed my behavior enough. I am old enough and mean enough to like myself pretty much as I am.

I try to treat everyone with respect. I smoke and that's my choice for now. When I get tired of smelling like an ash tray, I'll quit. But I have to want to quit first and I don't.

I have already resolved to get to a healthier weight. I have, oh gosh I'm scared to even commit this to paper, but what the hell. I have lost 23 lbs. since last year. Hoorah! Hooray! Yip yip yip yip yeehaw!!! I feel a little happy about that, as you can see. When they tell you its harder to lose weight as you get older, they are not lying. Its a sad and hateful fact.

I have no desire to rise to the top of the corporate ladder. I wish I did, but I'm not a material person. Poverty and I have become more than nodding acquaintances. We seem to get on pretty good at times.

I already feel like this country has become less of a melting pot and more of a shit hole. But that's not a resolution. We all should make our country, and its restoration to former glory, a top priority. And we all should be involved in the upcoming elections, probably the most important ones since FDR. My opinion, anyway.

So, everything that could become a resolution is something I am already doing.

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Last night a young lady sat in my living room, and said, "When my boys grow up, I'm gonna have my own house, and they can bring their wives home, and my grand babies, and I'll watch them while they go out. It will always be their home."

I said the same thing when I was one and thirty. I tried to say that these are the days you want to live. Don't live for the future, because who knows what will happen. Live each day to the fullest, and treasure it, always. But, being the oldest, my words fell on deaf ears. They have not learned that the oldest are the ones who have already experienced everything you ever will. Not necessarily me, for I fear the future a little now. I know how freaking unfair it is.

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An eight year old boy told us how cats mate last night. "They make out for a while, then they stick their tongues in the other mouths....." While I am always interested in learning new things, this one stumped me. The mom, instead of correcting him, after we all had a good chuckle, threatened to whip him.

Now here's where I went the opposite way as a young mom. I would immediately correct false information, and give them the facts, whether they believed me or not. I also had a high tolerance for curse words. But the boys only cursed around other boys and me....go figure.

I asked this young man, while his mother cringed, what a testicle was, and his response was an arm. What the hell is up with this? This country needs another sixties revolution, cause we've all become uptight about sex, again. An eight year old should know what a testicle is. Its part of his own body, for Christ's sake. And there is nothing wrong with the human body, or its functions.

Of course my young ones learned all about the circle of life from watching my female dog make a slut of herself with every Tom, Dick, and Hairy Hound that wandered into our yard. "Mama, Mary's stuck to that..." I know, I know....leave them alone, they'll be ok....God, my head hurts....Ok, so I exaggerated up there a tad. I didn't immediately correct them. But they knew the facts of life at 10 years old, and if they came up with something bizarre, "First the female dog lays eggs in a hole in the ground, then the male dog pees on them..." I felt the need to give them the real story. Usually. Seventy-five percent of the time.

I also learned that young boys may not know the meaning of the curse words they are saying. One night while my two young ones were "shitting" all over the place, I suddenly asked them, "Ok, what does shit mean? I bet you don't even know." "Yeah, we do. It means....what does it mean?" Poop. It means poop. "No, it doesn't!! Mama, that's gross, you're making that up!!!" It took my ex-husbands agreement, that "yes, Mama is right, that's exactly what it means" for me to be believed.

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I guess that brings me to the real gist of this post. I learned recently that my ex is very ill. Very ill. It's hard to believe, and hard to take. For whatever reason we didn't get along, that takes nothing away from the fine man he can be and is. I want him to be ok. Just that one call, and nothing else, he remains, as always, unreachable. I hurt more for my son. Its not so much a resolution as a prayer that he should be well and whole, and healthy again.

Or at least go to the doctor and get what needs to be done, done. Please, people, giving up is not an option, as I have learned this year.