Lots of thinking*

*In reviewing this I have a lot of random thoughts in this. For ease of reading---and writing---the random stuff will be in green. Real stuff in black. And I use the word "old" in this a lot. I don't mean old, old, old. Just older than I am. Not young. Not 20. Or even 25. That kind of old.

The thoughts for this post have been swirling in my mind non-stop for the last week or so. Maybe it was Christmas that made me sentimental, or the miscarriage that just brought feelings to the surface, and probably it’s a variety of circumstances which will be reviewed in what follows, but I’ve been able to think about very few other things lately other than, well, getting old. The good and the bad.

I’ve said before that I’m excited to turn 30. I really am. But with that day quickly approaching in April I’m saying goodbye to my twenties. It’s hard to believe what has happened to me in the last ten years. All of the pageant stuff, getting married, having babies, all of my eye stuff. I feel like I lived a lifetime in the last ten short years. I feel like I said goodbye to youth and beauty with my eye removal. (And please don’t comment about how I’m still beautiful---it’s just how I feel; it won’t change.) With that comes a deep pondering for what the next 30 years will hold. And I’m excited for that.

However one thing I hadn’t realized is that with my aging comes the aging of everyone else around me. Now, my grandparents have always been old---to me at least. They seem almost ageless to me. But things are happening to them, and to other people in my life, that I’m not so sure I’m prepared for.

My mom and grandma-Christmas Eve 2010

My maternal grandma was born in 1916. She’ll be 95 in April. Taylor’s paternal grandfather is two months older. Lately it seems they’re in a neck-and-neck battle to get to heaven first. In October my grandma had her second hip replacement. She spent 7 weeks at a rehab center working hard at recovering in order to be home for Christmas. Just days after she got home---and on Christmas day, to be exact---she rolled over and broke something else in her back/pelvis. She was in immense pain. Hurts-your-heart-to-think-about-it pain. She had surgery yesterday to glue some of the bones back together. She’ll be out of the hospital tomorrow, but battling sundowners---an awful ailment that also hurts your heart to think about it. She says she didn’t want it to be like this. The other day she told my mom she always thought she would have just died in her sleep or choked on something. She never expected the pain; the endless days and nights;and really being hopeless for a better, pain-free future. I hate seeing her suffer. I hate having to see my mom as she sees her mom suffer. Grandma has had a very good, very long life. But this part of it; I’m just not sure what to think about it.

Taylor’s grandpa is much the same. I’ve only spent time with him a handful of times because he lived in Seattle until Novemberish. We moved him to Salt Lake so that Don could be more involved in his care. As I said, I’ve only seen him a few times, the last time being a few months after Kyle was born. But I was unprepared for how he had changed in three years. We visited with him on Christmas Eve also. He was a bit quirky before, but all the quirk was gone. He also has had a problem with Sundowners, and basically with just adjusting to living somewhere else after spending almost 95 years in Washington. He has good days and bad days, and has also been in the hospital with raging infections. Taylor’s mom insists that she’s really not going to make a point to eat healthily or be generally healthy because she doesn’t want to get old and have this happen. I’ll be the first to admit that rest homes have always freaked me out because I just leave thinking, ‘Not me. Not me. Please don’t let that be me.’ Yet. I know that we are called upon to endure to the end; and if that is the end I must endure, I guess I’ll cross that bridge when I get there.

I don’t mean to be a downer. I know there is a lot of joy in getting old. How cute were President and Sister Hinckley? And they seemed genuinely happy. And I’m sure they were and are. And Taylor’s mom’s parents are so cute, but they also have failing health (You don’t mind me saying that, do you Gramine?) And if I’m lucky enough to have Taylor by my side, then I know I’ll be fine. And I know our grandparents have been very happy, just quite afflicted lately. And I know that this is like three times my lifetime away. I just don’t like it---for them or me.

Another thing that got to me over Christmas was seeing a next-door-neighbor of my parents. He stopped over at their house to bring a Christmas present. He was the bishop of my youth; a strong, handsome man who had his share of trials and came through strong. I have always admired him and his family. But I hadn’t really seen him for a few years. He knocked on the door, and I answered. He was stooped and slow, really the shell of the man I knew. Mom said he had a stroke and hasn’t really ever recovered mentally or physically. He lives to take out the trash three times a day.

And then today I found out that my sweet friend, Laurie, who was in Young Women’s with me in Murray, has cancer that has spread to her lungs. She found out about the cancer a few years ago just after having a baby. She’s been on my prayer-list since then. She has such great faith. And she’s been so wonderful through the whole battle. But it just isn’t fair. And she’s not that much older than I am. Not that cancer cares how old its victims are. I’d just like to think that it does. She’ll continue to be on my personal prayer-list, and I know that the Lord can heal her.

Then---and this is funny, you’re free to smile at this, and roll your eyes, and it doesn’t fit well after talking about Laurie---my cousin Shayna facebooked about how she was at Disneyland and was next to Teri Hatcher on a ride. Remember how she was my teenage idol? Well, Lois Lane was---not Teri---but she is Lois Lane to me. Anyway, after I got past how completely jealous I was, and after I tried to convince Taylor that I would have been just as polite as Shayna, and I wouldn’t have bugged her for a picture, (and after he convinced me that I would have stalked her all day and insisted on having a conversation and picture WITH her) I wondered what she looked like now. (I don’t keep up with Desperate Housewives. Dumb as it is, if Taylor doesn’t remind me to watch a show, I don’t remember to watch it. Thus I see mostly what he is/both of us are interested in. Not that I’m interested in Desperate Housewives anyway…I try here and there, but I know my mom wouldn’t approve, so I can’t watch it!) Anyway, I wondered what she looked like. So I googled her. I found this (botoxed/airbrushed) picture:

And I wikipedia-ed (is that a word?) her and got this:

She’s 46. She looks great. And that’s great, I guess. She’s all glamour and Hollywood. Just not how Lois would look. But on the same hand, she’s not a spring chicken, and she lives in Hollywood, and I do not. However she looks like she’s trying to look young and hip. And I don’t know that I want that for me. I think as I age I just want to look my age and look nice---classic if I’m lucky. However if I have a body that great in 17 years maybe I’ll change my mind! But still, it made me sad as that just wasn’t Lois---because if Lois who was wonderful and headstrong and bold and beautiful, but wasn’t a slave to fashion, has to pretend to be young, will I have to too? (And why the long hair now? Sometimes I’m sure that her cutting her hair was the beginning of the end for Lois & Clark.)

Fortunately, apparently she played a small role as Lois Lane’s mom on Smallville a few months ago (how did I miss this!?) and it let me know how Lois would have looked now, 14 years later with the same-ish hairstyle as before.

It made me feel better to see “Lois” that way. And I decided that I won’t be as jealous of Shayna. Lois can forever be young and vibrant in my mind. And besides, if she wasn’t with Clark, it probably would have broken my heart. Of course I could have pretended that Clark was just out doing a job for Superman… And now I’m totally off the point. She got old. And I will too. And the people I have loved for so long will get old too. And some of them will leave this earth. And for some reason some of them will stick around for what almost seems like too long.

So where does that leave me? It leaves me on the edge at age 29. (And as deducted from wikipedia today, ironically the same age Teri was when she started playing Lois back in 1993---a lifetime ago.) It leaves me with a rededication to be better. To live better. To love better. To take care of my bones better. To live each day better. To really, really, really, try to not focus on the physical.

And to be honest, it just leaves me with a lot of feeling and a lot to think about. And, with hope, something to do about it. (I was hoping I’d have a better conclusion for you, but that’s it. That’s all I’ve got.)