I am addicted to the 'On This Day'
feature on Facebook.
I crack myself up reading my mostly
ridiculous posts.
I get teary eyed at some of the photos
and events that prompted certain comments.
I wonder just what was going on in my
cerebral cortex when I come across some of those cryptic updates.
Apparently April 29, 2009 was not a
good day. There was a huge thank you from a previous co-worker, who I
miss every single day, as well as a plea to stock up on coffee for
the following work day – posted at 1am. I worked 10am-1030pm back
in those days.
In 2010 I was on my way to a Jimmy
Buffett Concert – my second as a Parrotthead and the first tailgate
we participated in.
In 2011 my Mom and I got up
freakin' early to watch the Royal Wedding via our respective computers
and Skype. It should be noted that we live about 2.5 miles away from
each other. It should also be noted that Mom put on make-up, her
fancy robe and we each had tiaras.
Light up tiaras.
 |
| The blob on the computer screen facing outward is my cat Lord Irwin Joseph Stalin. He used his full title for the wedding. |
The following years, up to today,
included two blog posts - 2014 and 2013, food posts, work posts. But it was the 2012
post that caught my attention and brought me to this little trip down
memory lane.
April 29, 2012 was a Sunday. I complained
about house cleaning, eating Snickers with Almonds, watching
Lawrence of Arabia. My final thoughts for this day were posted as a Facebook Note. I had not yet discovered blogging. The note was about a lovely evening Rob and I had on
the deck. It was a very, everyday event but it just had that special
something which makes the everyday extra-ordinary. This is for all of
my nearly legendary contemporaries. Thanks for all the support,
encouragement and insane inspiration.
Dinner on the Coast
of Illinois
Of late, I have been suffering from what some
'Genius' in the 1970's labeled 'empty nest syndrome'. And, while
closing up the first year of my official 'midlife', I am no where
near the Sandwich Generation. Because not only are our children self
sufficient, so are my parents.
Which brings me to my very non-creative Sunday.
Weekends are my time to forget what I do for an actual living and
pretend to be someone I am not...or only hope to be. I want to write;
be a writer. Yet, the past few weekends have betrayed me. Abandon
hope all who enter here, there are no original thoughts to be had.
This Sunday was no different. Children and their plans for their
future ricocheted through the phone lines and my text messages. A
small storm of gigantic hail proportions made it quite clear that the
clean up job I was hoping to skip would be addressed. Laundry and
groceries only cemented my feet more firmly in the roll of
wife-slash-mother.
Then suddenly in a flurry of veggie prep and fish
marinate, I was sitting on the deck with my husband enjoying a crisp
glass of Chilean white wine and the near sixty degrees at six thirty
in the evening at the end of April perk of Global Warming. He was
reading a book by a contemporary of Hemingway, I was reading a much
more fluffy article in one of the many magazines I had dog eared in
hopes of getting to. We pondered the lifestyle that could bring such
interesting people together in such amazing places. I told myself the
article – about the closing/remodeling of the Ritz in Paris – was
research for a future novel. In actuality, it was a pipe dream. I
will never get to stay in the Ritz, in Paris, in the 40's with
Hemingway.
And then my husband did something extraordinary. He
raised his glass in a toast to the day, to our dinner...to the Coast
of Illinois. We clinked to the fact that the people who are the most
important to us are healthy and happy. And it was clear to me that
while I have never stayed in the Ritz in Paris, I have stayed in some
pretty swanky hotels. I have eaten and prepared some five star meals
and my contemporaries – writers, photographers, musicians,
artisans, athletes - are just as legendary as those of that bygone
era. They just don't know it yet.
And so it goes...on this day in April, on
the Coast of Illinois.
May every day be an extraordinary ordinary day.
Only one more day in the A to Z challenge!! So close...
