"When I get older losing my hair,
Many years from now,
Will you still be sending me a valentine
Birthday greetings bottle of wine?

If I'd been out till quarter to three
Would you lock the door,
Will you still need me, will you still feed me,
When I'm sixty-four?"*

How about 54? Yep, I turned 54 today, one year away from double-nickels. Part of me keeps saying dear God, How can I be this old?!? Another part says, "Well, its a down-hill slide from here..." And, another part prays that I see another year.























Much earlier in my life I witnessed JFK's inauguration. Up until that time, I thought all presidents were supposed to be old and semi-ugly. And on January 20, 2009, I witnessed Barak Obama's victorious inauguration ceremony, via TV. I would have loved to have been there, but alas, I was not. But things went smoothly despite my absence. I say let's get behind this man and support him 100%! I feel a dark cloud has been lifted from the country. Or a dark force, perhaps?

















Bob update: Bob got a tattoo that says "King of Special Forces". He has also issued a challenge to Osama Bin Laden to meet him and fight him man to man, but the "stupid M********ck*r is too chicken...". If he does show up, trust me, I will let you know.

I have this tremendous need to volunteer somewhere. I don't know in what capacity, but I just have the feeling I should be doing something for others. Old people like me pretty well, and I have great respect for the aged in our community, hell, I am the aged in our community! HA! I'll figure something out.

Senility Prayer

God, grant me the Senility
To forget the people
I never liked anyway,
The good fortune
To run into the ones I do,
And the eyesight
To tell the difference.

"Midlife is when you go to the doctor and you realize you are now so old, you have to pay someone to look at you naked."

*When I'm Sixty-Four Lyrics
Artist(Band):The Beatles

I'm back

No, I haven't been writing much lately. Trying not to keep the phone tied up. Ok, that's a sorry excuse, but it's the best I can come up with now.

I want to send a great big shout out to my sister, Linda, in California, and all of her children and grandchildren. I love you Linda. The memories I have of you are precious. Growing up, you brought much needed laughter into my young life, and I will always be grateful for that. I hope you feel better.

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So, things have been quite lively in the old neighborhood since the new year dawned. A friend I have, Missy, began working with a man, oh, let's call him Bob, doing home repairs. While Bob told her he was always on call for the special forces, could speak 39 languages, and was good friends with Doc Holiday, she continued to work with him, and also let her two sons go hunting with him. Bob decided that he was Adam to her Eve. His words, not mine. I imagine during some conversation she had with Bob she mentioned being upset with her boyfriend and would just love to see someone kick his ass. Well, that is exactly what dear Bob tried to do for her late one night. I remember Chris, her real boyfriend came tearing in my house one evening about 11:30 at night wanting to use the phone. I just took it for granted that he was shirtless and didn't have any shoes on.

"Miss EJ," he asked, "can I use the phone?" "Sure," I said. "Did yours get cut off too?" (My neighbor Roger's phone got turned off.)

"No, that crazy M*******ck*r tried to choke me!" he exclaimed, and proceeded to call the PoPo, as we affectionately refer to them around here. "Then, I picked him up and threw him on the coffee table. That coffee table is totaled!" he went on. "I said let's take it outside, man, and, as soon as we got outside he grabbed a shovel, and said 'I'm going to kill you', and I ran..." I thought that was probably best.

At this point I am wondering if Bob is going to burst through my door with a shovel, and I start looking around for something besides a cat to defend myself with, but, thankfully he stayed away. While Chris waited for the police, EJ called from work and got to hear the story first-hand. The next day, Bob moved in with my neighbor across the street, the one without the phone, and is pining for his lost love. Evidently, after chasing Chris with the shovel, he went for a swim in the swamp, came back, jumped in his truck, and pretty well totaled that too. His family has given up on him, and I suppose he has no where else to go.
















Now, here's the rub: Bob is schizophrenic. And his medication isn't working. And he probably hasn't told his doctor. And he probably won't. I discovered all of this the hard way. He took me to the grocery store one day, and while we were driving, he spoke a few different languages and phoned his special forces contacts. He told me he could change his looks at will, and showed me one of his fake id's, that of a black man, who looked vaguely familiar. Bob is white. I found myself in a great hurry to get home, but kept my responses as neutral as possible. I started to wonder how in the world he got a driver's license. I started to wonder if he would let me drive.























EJ and Roger, the phoneless neighbor, were sitting on the sofa one afternoon, EJ waiting to go to work, and Roger killing time, when Bob came in and showed me some rocks. He told me they were diamonds and that he knew where the mine was. (If it were only true!!) EJ hid his face. Bob told me he had bought some new underwear and had checked in with the mental health clinic (and special forces) and he was good to go. While EJ and Roger hid their sorry faces, I tried my damnedest to be polite. But, God help me, I wanted to laugh. And its really not funny.

I am trying to stay aloof, but I can see me trying to help Bob, maybe even going to the doctor with him. But can I help him? And what is it like being Bob? He is always polite to me, and I have taken a motherly approach to my relationship with him. The cats? Roscoe runs and hides whenever Bob comes around, but Sasha loves him to death. I have found cats, at times, to be a good judge of mood. I do not like being choked.























While Missy says she is terrified of Bob, she has approached him since, trying to get him to admit to his wrongdoing. She doesn't seem to get the fact that Bob is wired a little different from the rest of us, well, most of us. All right, some of us.

She told me, "Miss EJ, I just attract crazy people. I don't know why.."

The funny thing is I do too. I don't know why either.

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On a different note, someone called my landlord, here at the park, and told them I had committed suicide. Roger said Mrs. M, the landlord, had called his mother, and he got on the phone, and Mrs. M wanted to know how my son was taking my suicide. Since I had just taken Roger to the store, he was a little confused. He said he didn't know whether to put down the phone and run down the street or what. He said Mrs. M got a call from a reliable source. When I called her, which I hate to do, and asked her about my apparent demise, she said her source was anonymous. I know this much, something is rotten in Smithfield and it ain't ham!

Just for the hell of it, I stayed up until after midnight and watched myself very closely.

Blessings!

Yeah, I know, I haven't been around much lately. No reason. Perhaps I am just perpetually lazy. I took my tree down already, and put all of the Christmas decorations back in the shed. I got to thinking, which is always a bad idea, and decided I wanted to ring in the New Year with nothing left, decoration wise, of the old year. Just another weird superstition, I suppose. What can I say? I'm a superstitious gal...

So, hopefully I will be around more in the New Year. Wishing you all the very best in the coming new year.

Ghost of Christmas Past

This year, more than any other, I am haunted by the memories of Christmas past. I don't know what it is about this year. We have not done any Christmas shopping, and like the Cratchets, are content to settle for a nice Christmas dinner. So many people I know this year are feeling the same it seems. They come to my house and see my few decorations, and complain about how they want to forget it is Christmas.

I can't forget. For me, growing up in rural West Virginia, Christmas was the time of magic. Just seeing the tree alive with lights, and singing carols to myself at night, laying in bed, filled me with promise and great, great anticipation. Not so much for gifts, though of course I did want them, but just a feeling that something wonderful would happen.

One year it began snowing on Christmas Eve, and the beauty of that snowfall was like a gift. Everything in my world was transformed into a fairyland, it seemed. Though I had no socks for my shoes, I stayed outside as long as I could to be in the snow and relish the peace and silence. All things seemed possible. Of course my feet burned like hell when I came inside, but it was the price I paid. I will always treasure that perfect stillness of a snowfall on Christmas Eve in the hills where I grew up.

My sister was a big part of my childhood Christmas memories. We always managed to put on our own version of the Christmas story, even if our only audience was my mother, and it was glorious. One year our ancient Christmas angel that adorned the top of our tree lost all of her "angel hair", so we glued yarn to the top of her head, and there she reigned, on the top of our tree, with her Christmas "dreadlocks!" But it was good.

This Christmas we are haunted by so many who have gone on before us. There are still little electrical glitches going on in our house-hold, little things, and my dreams are full of those I have loved and lost. But they are good dreams, happy dreams, so I am comforted. And somehow, we will make it through this Christmas, and it will be good, we will enjoy ourselves.

May you all have a joyous and blessed Christmas. They are with you, those you have lost. In spirit and love, I believe they will be with us all.

The tree is up!

Yes, the old tree is finally up. We haven't put our outside lights up yet. The man across the street decorated his lawn chairs with lights...oh, life in a trailer park...tis grand! Actually, the lights on the chairs look ok. I mean, whatever makes your Christmas brighter! Nobody I know has much money for Christmas this year. And a lot of people I don't know are in the same boat. At least we can celebrate the season. (I'm really, really trying hard here to get in the spirit!)

The other day, I left the house after putting up the tree, and distinctly remember turning off the tree lights before I left. This harks back to the days when I was but a wee thing, and the bulbs on our tree got hot as a fire poker after being on for a while. "Don't forget to turn off the damn lights on the tree, damn it!" was my mother's mantra at this time of year. She was afraid the tree, then the house would burst into flames. We always had a live tree, well, it was live when we chopped it down.

Anyway, I digress. I turned off the lights, and when I came home, alone, I was rummaging around in the kitchen when I noticed that the tree lights were on. I stood there a minute, knowing full well that I had turned them off. I even entertained the idea that perhaps the cats, who are fascinated by the tree, by the way, may have turned them back on. They never cease to surprise me.

But, I really thought of Travis. Weird, huh? This being the same son who once poured ketchup all over his hand and came running to me that he had cut himself. After I recovered from my mild heart attack, he laughed like a banshee. He loved his pranks. And this would have been right up his alley....freak Mama out with the tree lights.

Ah, what fancies we have this time of year.