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What came first, the wrinkles or the glasses?

3/5/2014

8 Comments

 
Everywhere you look there are ads and infomercials for fitness. I saw some things on FB the other day about flattening that middle aged tummy.   Of course all the models are 16 and wouldn’t know what body breakdown is all about.  If only they’d feature someone my age, my body shape and size,  but then how much would they sell?  We all know it’s a lost cause, the most we can hope for is not to pee when we laugh.  Flat tummy at my age my arse!  Well…actually my arse is about all that’s flat these days, it’s dropped and merged with the back of my thighs…and I won’t get started on my chest.   And that tummy area is more like the beginning of an inflated beach ball, growing larger every year.  These days it's soft enough to push down into my jeans but there will come a day when I'll have to buy high riser pants or deal with the muffin top.   Didn't we used to call that a love handle?   

Sure it's important to stretch and flex, do a bit of resistance training to keep our strength…improve the poor little neglected stomach muscles below the flabby skin.  At this point in our lives it’s time to throw away the bikini and the delusions that lie when we do mirror mirror…..  Be real….let’s face it, the only six pack available to the over fifty is at the liquor store.  The days of wrinkle free are over.  No matter how slim we might be the skin is loose and shimmies when we walk.  Bend over and look at your face in a mirror…I say no more….

I’m not trying to be a downer.  I’m fine with aging gracefully.  I wouldn’t go back to tight and firm for all the tea in China.  I am the happiest I’ve ever been.   I’m like wine, I improve with age and the stuff in my head far outweighs what’s going on below the neck. I don’t mean to say that we should ignore our physical selves, we have to keep that strong to carry around our developing brains, it’s just a shift from bottom to top in importance. 

Buying into all this fountain of youth stuff is just sad.  Ask the dermatologists, there is not one cream or electrical device that will slow down or stop the aging process, we’ve spending billions of dollars to halt something that will come no matter what…it’s like stopping a freight train with a feather.   We need to accept and be happy with who we are, no matter what our size, shape or age.  Really, would we trade what we have now for what we had back then?   Superficial, youthful vanity stuff?   We’re real now! Embrace it!  I'm so much happier when someone tells me they love my rug hooking than I ever was being wooed by a flattering man because I was youthful and firm, or maybe I'm just to old to remember the sensation.....? 

What we do have to look forward too is mental perfection.  We never stop learning. We throw ourselves into creative exercise, we expand our horizons and embrace new things that stimulate and excite.  No more 2o year old hormone distractions.  We are serious now, we want to unite with friends and do like minded things, share enthusiasm for what we love.    Someone hand me a cane so I can get down off this soap box....

Which brings me to the point I hope to make.  There’s no yin and yang when it comes to rug hooking and exercise.  They mix as well as oil and water.  It's a sit on your backside endeavor which does little for physical fitness.  Maybe your brain is alive and stimulated but this craft brings you as close to a being a couch potato as you can get.  Okay, so you sit in a chair, that’s just splitting hairs.....

This is the one thing I don’t like about rug hooking.  All the sitting!  I have that rule where I only cut what I can use in a ½ hour time-frame so I have to get out of my seat and move but it’s just a shuffle to the dining room table, not a 25 yard sprint.   Hooking is about as sedentary as you can get.  If only there was a way to strap the hooking frame to a treadmill or bicycle.  I hooked for several hours last evening and my right leg fell asleep, my fingers tingled at one point until I shifted position, my neck felt tight and my butt lost all feeling.   My body was sending me a message which I choose to ignore…between The Voice auditions and the hooking, I didn’t move.  

And about my face.....I must confess there were delusions going on in my head up until a week or so ago, but they were slammed to the pavement when I picked up my new glasses.  Shock wasn’t really the word to describe that first look in the mirror.  After my eyes left the contours of the new, dark plastic, frames they settled on the face behind them and I could see every crack, every crevice, every line skirting across my skin, swirling in circular patterns from my cheeks to my chin.  Laugh lines were more like trenches!   I had the same reaction to our very first High Definition TV.  You could see every flaw and pore on the actor’s faces and the pancake makeup trying to hide the zits.   So obviously my old frames weren’t doing their job, but these new ones are over-achievers!  My tongue engaged before my brain could silence it and I screeched rather loudly how old I was looking, throwing in a few OMG’s and one holy crap to stress the point.  

It's obvious the secret to looking younger is old prescription glasses
. Everything has a soft and fuzzy glow, like air brushing.   These new glasses added ten years to my face and I paid good money to find out I'm starting to look like a prune! 
 
Anyway, it’s a done deal.  There’s no turning back the clock, and no face cream that will abate this downhill trek.  It’s all about maintenance now, trying to keep what we have for as long as possible.  There won’t be any Joan River’s craziness performed on me.  I’ll age gracefully like my friends and all those that came before me.   I did reel a bit from the slap in the face of last week’s new specs and spent a lot of time in front of the mirror acclimatizing myself to the current truth of me, but now that my brain has caught up to reality I’m doing fine…..  

Yippee! Yippee! Yippee!
On another note……I am reaching a landmark on Facebook… maybe even today! I’m only 9 more “Likes” away from reaching 4000!!!!!   I’m very proud of everyone single one of those likes… I work hard posting multiply pictures and stories each day to entertain and inform.  If you would like to join me on this ride, please give me a LIKE to put me over the top!  I post more eye candy on Facebook than I do on my blog as there is a lot of stuff happening all the time so if you don’t want to miss anything you know what to do!  Thanks everyone!!!!!  If not for you I would not be here!   I appreciate and love you all!   Click the link to join me!
https://www.facebook.com/EncompassingDesigns
8 Comments
Adena
3/5/2014 02:13:52 am

This one is too funny, I reached that stage several years ago and felt exactly the same way. A reality adjustment indeed....

Reply
Anne
3/5/2014 03:32:36 am

I can relate to this post. Thanks for sharing and not suggesting ways to look younger...Won't happen. I, like you, would rather receive a compliment on my hooked piece. And my derrière is 'squabbed 'because of sitting so much. LOL!!!!!

Reply
Elaine
3/5/2014 03:33:08 am

Love reading all your blogs Christine!!!! You bring laughter into a long cold winter's day!!!!!

Reply
Charlene
3/5/2014 05:48:34 am

LOL. I have a pair of reading glasses by the bed so I am now thinking I should leave a pair of old prescription glasses beside the preening mirror so as to string on my self delusions for a little longer.

Reply
Doris
3/5/2014 10:47:45 am

Read one time that God dimmed our eyesight as we aged so we wouldn't see the wrinkles.

Reply
Christine
3/5/2014 11:56:33 pm

Interesting....I've read that they are the one flaw in the design of our bodies. They don't last like the rest of us!

Reply
carol butcher
3/5/2014 10:30:59 pm

loved your blog today. could so relate. I had cataract surgery 3 months ago and I loved how well and clearly I could see...until I looked in the mirror....OMG where did all those wrinkles come from????

Reply
Christine
3/5/2014 11:59:16 pm

Quite the shocker!

Reply



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