The Scoop And Other Things

Anyone who walks their dog or has a yard dog knows about the importance of the scoop.  My husband brought one home about 3 weeks ago and gave it to me.  He actually bought it for me.   I was too cheap to buy one and remarked often enough that I would like to have one that he bought one for me.  We have 6 dogs.  They create a lot of stuff to scoop.

Now comes the fun part.  All of you young people out there (everyone under 30) repeat after me.

"When I grow up and get married, some day I will be happy to have my spouse buy me a poop scoop for no reason at all except that I wanted it."

"When I grow old, I will be just like the other old people and discuss my surgeries, my aches and pains and exchange doctors' name with my friends."

"When I grow old, it won't matter if my spouse forgets my birthday or anniversary because I have probably forgotten it as well."

"When I grow old, I will do what my parents do now and embarrass my own children.  I will pass gas in public and not seem to care.  I will wear outdated and sometimes tattered clothes.  I will speak my mind and say things that surprise, maybe even shock, my children."

Few, if any, will believe that you will do any of those retched things when you grow older.  I know I did not.  My husband and I are both in our sixties and the ravages of time march on.  When we were young and in our prime, we thought that we could fend off those telltale signs of age.  For a while, it appeared as though we were succeeding. 

Then one day, I go to the doctor and when the nurse says the scale reads 170 I am in shock.  I knew I had gained some weight, but not 20 pounds.  I now would like to be as low as 170.  My husband goes to the doctor and within 2 weeks is having open heart surgery.  That was 3 years ago. 

We cannot hold back time.  It sprints past us regardless of what we do.  We can only live life one day at a time.  Those dreams of aging gracefully and never looking nor acting like "old people" are just that - dreams.  Try as we might, we can only do so much.  We can tuck, color, snip and suck in the exterior, but we are still aging.  And in a society that practically worships youth and all its trappings, it is difficult to look upon the aging process as a good thing, but it is.

We learn as we age and sometimes it seems we have repeated the same error so many times that we are learning nothing, we have learned a great deal.  We have also taught others, if only not to repeat the folly of our own disastrous decisions.   What we learn, or should learn, is that if the heart is right, it matters not what the outside looks like anyway.

Shalom.  Pray for the Peace of Jerusalem.