Changing Places

There are no ancients before me,
No followers behind:
Only the vastness of heaven and earth
On this mountain terrace.
Though heaven may know the ultimate,
Joy or sorrow is our own will.

We stand alone in this life. No one lives our life for us. Neither drug nor sorcery can remove us, even for a moment, from our own life. We can deny it, but it is useless : We are here alone, to engage every precious moment according to our wills.

The precedents of the ancients may be helpful, but in the end they are only references. The thought of those who will follow after us is likewise merely a consideration. What matters is being, pure being. Accept who you are. Be who you are.

If there are gods in the heavens, maybe they know the future. As a human being, I can only say that the future is yet to be made. Let us go forth and make it, but let us make it as beautifully as we can. The degree of elegance is determined by our will and the perfection of our own personalities. Therefore, do not sigh over misfortune or adversity. Whether you are happy or sad is entirely up to you.

Deng Ming Tao, 365 Tao

The Tao cannot be sought from others; it is attained in oneself. If you abandon yourself to seek from others, you are far from the Tao.
– Huainan-tzi

The experience of solitude, of the trembling beauty of a swaying pine or twinkling star, or a bird call, is our self reflecting the infinite Tao and becoming, in that moment, conscious of being part of it and not apart from it. — Hermitary and Meng-Hu

It is easy in the world to live after the world’s opinion; it is easy in solitude to live after one’s own; but the great man is he who in the midst of the crowd keeps with perfect sweetness the independence of solitude.
– Ralph Waldo Emerson, Self-Reliance

We must reserve a back shop all our own, entirely free, in which to establish our real liberty and our principal retreat and solitude. –Michel de Montaigne

I am tired of frivolous society, in which silence is forever the most natural and the best manners. I would fain walk on the deep waters, but my companions will only walk on shallows and puddles. — Henry David Thoreau, Journal

Solitude and nature are absolutely necessary for the proper development of a human being. It is an admixture of natural life, lived in solitude, amid beautiful surroundings of nature and what we call an arboreal life, which is absolutely necessary for the poise and harmony of the human mind. –Gopi Krishna

Never less idle than when wholly idle, nor less alone than when wholly alone.
–Cicero, De officius

I need time and space, and solitude, but it keeps being denied to me. Retreating into inner stillness is the only answer today.

Aging Boomers at 40th anniversary Jethro Tull Concert

“In the foundation of our hearts, none of us sees ourselves as old. Mentally we are all teenagers—teenagers who happen to be trapped in increasingly unreliable bodies.” – James Gurney

I think most of us form our most definitive image of ourselves in our teenage years. In those year we are no longer just children of our parents, but becoming adults with our own ideas about life and our own way of dealing with it all, and we carry a lot of those thoughts and feelings with us throughout our years. My basic personality seems to have remained the same in many ways since I was around seventeen or so. I noticed on joining facebook that a lot of the people who connect with me there are those who I was close to in high school and those who I know now. I wonder where are more of the college connections, but perhaps those people just didn’t make the strong connections that were made in high school, or perhaps we’ve drifted apart more through the years. High school friends are fun to catch up with, and we are either reaffirmed in our view of them or learn new things about them that might surprise or shock or delight us.

This year will mark the 40th anniversary of Woodstock, which I was certainly too young to go to since I was 10 then. I’m sure we’ll hear a lot once more about the aging boomers. I wonder if the reason we fight aging so hard is because we really do actually mentally see ourselves as younger people, and not just the push of society to retain the appearance of youth.

I see my folks, they’re getting old, I watch their bodies change…
I know they see the same in me, And it makes us both feel strange…
No matter how you tell yourself, It’s what we all go through…
Those eyes are pretty hard to take when they’re staring’ back at you.
Scared you’ll run out of time. — Bonnie Raitt, Nick of Time

Now as the years roll on
Each time we hear our favorite song
The memories come along
Older times we’re missing
Spending the hours reminiscing
– Little River Band, Reminiscing

The music I listened to as a teenager still affects me, but differently — some things make more sense now, looking back. I think even then we all realized of course we would get older, but didn’t fully get what the experience would be like. At fifty, I’ve already had cataract surgery on both eyes (second youngest patient they had ever seen), have arthritis in several vertebrae of my neck from an accident as a teen, have high blood pressure, and have had several surgeries as a preventative measure for colon cancer — and all this since turning forty. But I also do yoga, pilates, and strength training and am probably in as good or better shape than I was at forty. I’m certainly in better mental shape than I was a few years ago.

These days I read a lot of blogs by elders — especially Ronnie’s wonderful Time Goes By which provides links to so many elder bloggers. I suppose I’m looking for clues as to what the experiences ahead will be like. I also volunteer with my dog Darwin for pet therapy visits, and so have many elder friends at various care facilities. But I’m sure as I go through my own experiences I will still be surprised — and will still feel like somewhere inside, I’m really about seventeen.

Headline of the Day…

Half of Americans Use Vibrators, Study Claims

via Half of Americans Use Vibrators, Study Claims | LiveScience.

Oh, really?

Or as my son put it in the ecard he sent me:
Happy Internet-Wide pictures-of-cute-animals-and-their-female-parent day!

My best mother’s days were always when their Dad took the boys somewhere else for the day….

I know I feel much better when I don’t consume HFCS and my digestive system thanks me for not eating it. I started avoiding it years ago, but it was in everything, so I had to get really picky about what I eat. A big problem is that many artificial sweeteners upset my system as well. So I’m happy to see companies switching back to sugar, although I avoid a lot of that, too. The nice part is having things taste like they are “supposed” to again, like I remember from when I was a kid, instead of tasting like ass. I don’t know why but HFCS even tastes different to me, and I dislike the flavor.

High-fructose corn syrup first started trickling into our food supply about 40 years ago; by 1984, it was flowing from just about every soda fountain in the country. These days HFCS accounts for almost half of all the added sugars in the U.S. diet, but the corn Niagara may soon be over. Last week, PepsiCo became the latest manufacturer to turn its back on America’s sweetener, introducing three new soft drinks—Pepsi Natural, Pepsi Throwback, and Mountain Dew Throwback—sweetened with a “natural” blend of cane and beet sugars. Next week, Snapple will roll out its most expensive advertising campaign ever to promote a “natural” line of tea drinks brewed with “real” cane sugar. Pizza Hut, Kraft Foods, and ConAgra have also made the switch in recent months. Not even a $30 million multimedia campaign from the Corn Refiners Association has done much to reverse the trend.

The case against HFCS comprises the three cardinal claims of food politics: Like other villainous ingredients—trans fat and artificial food dye come to mind—high-fructose corn syrup is accused of being at once unhealthy, unnatural, and unappetizing. (These might be described as the Hippocratic, Platonic, and Epicurean tines of the foodie movement.) While none of these claims is completely wrong when it comes to corn sweetener, none is quite right, either.

Our fear of high-fructose corn syrup seems to have arisen from some very real concerns over the health effects of fructose, one of its principal components. The ingestion of glucose, another basic sugar, is known to stimulate the release of body chemicals that regulate food intake. Fructose, on the other hand, does little to suppress your appetite, and it seems to be preferentially associated with the formation of new fat cells. A growing body of research has led some scientists to wonder whether the increased consumption of fructose over the past few decades might be responsible for rising rates of obesity.

via The decline and fall of high-fructose corn syrup. – By Daniel Engber – Slate Magazine.

Putting together a playlist for a friend going through a divorce today — this is the closer.

Count on me through thick and thin
A friendship that will never end
When you are weak, I will be strong
Helping you to carry on
Call on me, I will be there
Don’t be afraid
Please believe me when I say
Count on….

I can see it’s hurting you
I can feel your pain
It’s hard to see the sunshine through the rain oh
I know sometimes it seems as if it’s never gonna end

But you’ll get through it
I know sometimes it seems as if
we’re standing all alone
But we’ll get through cause love wouldn’t let us fall

There’s a place inside of all of us
Where our faith in love begins
You should reach to find the truth in love
The answers there within, ohhhh
I know that life can make you feel
It’s much harder than it really is
But we’ll get through it (we’ll get through it)
Just (just) don’t (don’t) give in…

Dragon of anger
Calls for us to take action
Anger is the fire

Nurture the darkness of your soul
until you become whole.
Can you do this and not fail?
–Tao Te Ching, 10

Been feeling angry about a lot of little things lately. Part of it is politics, with all the torture memos coming out this week. Most of it is just small things annoying me. But it’s quite unusual for me to be feeling it so strongly. I’ve been doing a lot of shadow work, though, trying to get at some issues that still nibble at me from time to time and that have popped up more frequently lately. I suppose I should go see my shrink, but these are the things he’s never really been able to be helpful about, because of basic worldview differences (he’s Jewish, of course). I think I lost a bit of respect for him when he mentioned he stopped talking to his mother — I just thought that was a bit weird for a shrink to say, and shows a lot of avoidance of shadow issues. I guess they have their own problems too though, of course.

So anyway, I’m kind of looking for more of a Jungian approach rather than Freudian, and a good Jungian analyst seems to be hard to find. The do it yourself approach is tough with Jung, since I do understand it, but it takes a lot of time. And the shadow is a trickster, so it’s just tough to deal with in general anyway. And since I don’t want to inflict this on others, I’m staying more to myself, so I’m a bit lonely from that.

Ah well, this too shall pass…

“When you are feeling depreciated, angry and drained, it is a sign that other people are not open to your energy.” — Sanaya Roman

“There is nothing more galling to angry people than the coolness of those on whom they wish to vent their spleen.” — Alexandre Dumas

“The world needs anger. The world often continues to allow evil because it isn’t angry enough.” — Bede Jarrett

“In certain trying circumstances, urgent circumstances, desperate circumstances, profanity furnishes a relief denied even to prayer.” — Mark Twain

“Do not teach your children never to be angry; teach them how to be angry.” — Lyman Abbott

“At the core of all anger is a need that is not being fulfilled.” — Marshall B. Rosenberg

“It is wise to direct your anger towards problems — not people; to focus your energies on answers — not excuses.” — William Arthur Ward

“In the beginning the Universe was created. This has made a lot of people very angry and been widely regarded as a bad move.” — Douglas Adams

“Anger is a great force. If you control it, it can be transmuted into a power which can move the whole world.” — William Shenstone

“Anger is not bad. Anger can be a very positive thing, the thing that moves us beyond the acceptance of evil.” — Joan Chittister

“Try as much as possible to be wholly alive, with all your might, and when you laugh, laugh like hell and when you get angry, get good and angry. Try to be alive. You will be dead soon enough.”
– William Saroyan

“I would not look upon anger as something foreign to me that I have to fight…I have to deal with my anger with care, with love, with tenderness, with nonviolence.” — Thich Nhat Hanh

Dr. Buddy Rydell: Dave, there are two kinds of angry people – explosive and implosive. Explosive is the type of individual you see screaming at the cashier for not taking his coupon. Implosive is the cashier who remains quiet day after day and then finally shoots everyone in the store. You’re the cashier.

Dave Buznik: No, no, no. I’m the guy in the frozen food section dialin’ 911. I swear.

– Anger Management

Oh yes. I could do that, too. My voice coach in college wanted me to try out for the San Francisco Opera, but I never did. I wish I had her courage.

Everyone has talents. Everyone can do things you can’t imagine. We are all extraordinary, really.

Go Susan.

There was a time when men were kind
When their voices were soft
And their words inviting
There was a time when love was blind
And the world was a song
And the song was exciting
There was a time
Then it all went wrong

I dreamed a dream in time gone by
When hope was high
And life worth living
I dreamed that love would never die
I dreamed that God would be forgiving
Then I was young and unafraid
And dreams were made and used and wasted
There was no ransom to be paid
No song unsung, no wine untasted

But the tigers come at night
With their voices soft as thunder
As they tear your hope apart
And they turn your dream to shame

He slept a summer by my side
He filled my days with endless wonder
He took my childhood in his stride
But he was gone when autumn came

And still I dream he’ll come to me
That we will live the years together
But there are dreams that cannot be
And there are storms we cannot weather

I had a dream my life would be
So different from this hell I’m living
So different now from what it seemed
Now life has killed the dream I dreamed.

“We are too cynical,” Amanda said, addressing Boyle after her performance. “Everyone was rooting against you.” It was as if Amanda expected this one moment where art conquered all, where the sincerity of song and execution softened every heart, to allow us to believe we had somehow been purged of all our cheap, superficial ways. Susan sang, and shrugged her shoulders and tossed her gray locks, and now we were changed, changed utterly by this transforming performance. Now Piers and Simon and Amanda and you and me, we were all going to move forward with openness and acceptance in our hearts for all kinds of people in all kind of packages. As if by approving of this one dorky but brilliant outsider, this world would be granted forgiveness for all the meanness, bullying and tawdry acceptance of the third rate that is its usual fare.

But instead of changing us, Susan Boyle’s explosion into fame is much more likely to change her. Already she has appeared on Scottish television with her hair seemingly darkened and somehow forced into submission. Please please please, Susan! The vintage women of the world beg you: Don’t lose a pound. Don’t buy a new wardrobe. No highlights! No Botox! Don’t touch chin one, or chin two.

Remember Ella Fitzgerald, and just keep singing.

Jessie’s post on “sacred” today reminded me of this posting from 2007, and how I need to restore the sacred space in my life:

Sarah Susanka – A Sacred Space: Home – Feature Article on Sacred Space, Architecture and Home

Joseph Campbell wrote of the need for such a place. He said, “You must have a room or a certain hour of the day or so where you do not know what is in the morning paper. A place where you can simply experience and bring forth what you are and what you might be. At first you may think nothing’s happening. But if you have a sacred space and take advantage of it and use it everyday, something will happen”. Such a place does not need to be large. It can be an alcove off a bedroom, an unused corner of the basement, or an attic, as in my own home. Take time to make it beautiful, make it an expression of who you are, whether simple and unadorned, or filled with treasures collected over a lifetime. And make it a pattern of your daily routine to spend time there each day, in meditation, in contemplation, or in creative exploration. We are amazing creatures, every one of us, but we forget so easily, when we don’t take the time to listen to our inner being.

Other posts centering on the word sacred here:

Sanctity

Trickster

Having had my own brief brush with colon cancer, this hits hard today. Fortunately mine was caught really, really early. But this is a reminder that I’m due for my checkup again soon.

Get those colonoscopies done, people. Colon cancer kills WAY more people than breast cancer even it it isn’t as sexy to wear your brown ribbon or walk those colon cancer three-days.

Former Bush press secretary Tony Snow dies

Tony Snow, a conservative writer and commentator who cheerfully sparred with reporters in the White House briefing room during a stint as President Bushs press secretary, died Saturday of colon cancer. He was 53.

“America has lost a devoted public servant and a man of character,” President Bush said in a statement from Camp David, where he was spending the weekend. “It was a joy to watch Tony at the podium each day. He brought wit, grace, and a great love of country to his work.”

Stubbed my little toe this morning, at least sprained and maybe a hairline fracture. So not much going on today except lots of Intertubing.

Sigh.

Maya’s Granny is no longer with us.

Sadness…..

Go read some of her stories there if you hadn’t. She was an amazing storyteller, and will be deeply missed….

Tears…

Goodbye, beautiful lady, and fabulous blogger….

Joycelyn Ward
April 23, 1942 – June 15, 2008

We mourn the loss of Lilith Joycelyn Ward. She leaves behind her daughter, Julie Asregadoo, her son, Richard Ward, her brother, Forrest Ward, her sister Loretta Beaver, her mother, Virginia Ward, her Aunt Florence, and her many nieces and nephews, and their children. And of course, she was Maya’s Granny.

Joycelyn was born in Oakland, CA, and moved a great deal in her lifetime. She lived in California for much of her life, most recently in Sacramento and Citrus Heights, but also spent many years in Stockton and Berkeley. She lived in Juneau, Alaska from 1993 until February of this year.

She devoted much of her life to helping children, from her early days as a Montessori teacher, to her days teaching parenting classes and working one-on-one to help parents who were at risk of losing their children. She also worked as a volunteer coordinator, as a research analyst, as a secretary, and at an organization working to prevent teen alcoholism.

She was a voracious reader, loved to write and tell stories, and found great joy and satisfaction in her blog, Maya’s Granny.

Her wisdom and wicked humor will be greatly missed.

Donations can be made in her memory to her favorite charity, Heifer International.

No One But Us
by Annie Dillard

There is no one but us.
There is no one to send,
Nor a clean hand,
Nor a pure heart
On the face of the earth,
Nor in the earth
But only us,
A generation comforting ourselves
With the notion
That we have come at an awkward time,
That our innocent fathers are all dead –
As if innocence has ever been –
And our children busy and troubled,
And we ourselves unfit, not yet ready,
Having each of us chosen wrongly,
Made a false start, failed,
Yielded to impulse
And the tangled comfort of pleasures,
And grown exhausted,
Unable to seek the thread,
Weak, and involved.
But there is no one but us.
There never has been.

From the book Holy the Firm by Annie Dillard

One of Darwin’s friends at the Casa where we do pet therapy turns 106 today. Here’s hoping she will have a wonderful birthday!

I’m pretty sure I’ll never make it to her age, but if I did, I would hope to be as bright and alert and lovely as she is. She had a lap full of birthday greetings yesterday when we visited and plans for a big party today.

Nice thoughts on creating life versus getting stuff from Christine Kane.

Creating vs. Getting | Christine Kane

The laws of creativity apply to everything – not just to works of art.

The gift of practicing art is that it teaches the creator how to create, and how to be a creator. Over and over again, the artist learns the process of making things – including the obstacles that arise, the futility of forcing the flow, and the joy of allowing inspiration. This practice has been nothing less than revolutionary in my own life.

That’s because I grew up learning more about Getting than I did about Creating. And I’m not alone in that. Most of the life lessons we’ve all learned are about Getting.

We gotta get rich, get approved, get things from people, get a job, get a life, get laid, get publicity, get someone to do something, get approval, get high, get married, get a loan, get good grades, get a clue, get into college, get up, get down, get out.

Get it?

Getting is an epidemic. It makes us grab at life. It takes us out of the present moment. It makes us powerless. It forces us to manipulate our own spirits so that we can manipulate the situation. Getting requires that we use our precious creative power to get, rather than to use it for its primary purpose, which is to Create. When we misuse this power, we become contorted. We block the flow. The focus is on “out there” rather than “in here.”

When we become Creators, we turn the whole thing around. Everything becomes an inside job. We experience true power. We create our lives.

Man, I wish I was still in this good of a shape…. I do pilates and yoga, but was never a runner. I can sprint pretty fast, but distance running just never was a good thing for me. Run, Joan, run!

Marathon Matriarch Is Still in the Race – New York Times

She keeps a home for her husband, Scott, who was her college sweetheart and is now a marketing executive. She keeps an eye on her 20-year-old daughter, Abby, a sophomore at nearby Bates College, and her 18-year-old son, Anders, a high school senior.

She confers with neighbors on how to replace an old neighborhood bridge that was recently closed. She makes speeches and appearances.

And she runs an hour or two a day in preparation for the women’s United States Olympic marathon trials next Sunday in Boston, which raises questions:

Why would a 50-year-old woman (51 next month) want to run 26 miles 385 yards against potential Olympic medalists?

Why would she compete as the oldest of the 160 or so starters? (The next oldest are four 46-year-olds.)

Because she is Joan Benoit Samuelson, the matriarch of American distance running, the winner of the first Olympic marathon for women in 1984 and a pioneer in bringing acceptance to women’s distance running.

In a recent interview at her home, she said she would be running “just because it’s an Olympic trials and I qualified. But if the weather turns up terrible, I might not run and just race in the Boston Marathon the next day.”

The first three finishers in the trials will qualify for the United States team for the Beijing Olympics. Can Samuelson make the Olympic team?

“Oh, God, no,” she said. “It’s just me against me. I want to run 2:50 at age 50.”

If she averages 6 minutes 30 seconds a mile, she will reach her goal of 2 hours 50 minutes. Her career best is 2:21:21, but that was 23 years ago over Chicago’s flat course.

“This will be my fourth Olympic trials,” she said. “I qualified for all of the previous six, but in 1988 I just had Abby and in 1992 I had a full mother load with two small children. But I’ve always had the urge to run.”

Samuelson said she used to run 120 miles a week. “Now I’m down to 70 or 80,” she said. “That’s all I can do.”

This is one of my early Tao postings, from November 2004.

_______________________________________________________

Beginners acquire new theories and techniques until their minds are cluttered with options.

Advanced students forget their many options. They allow the theories and techniques that they have learned to recede into the background.

Learn to unclutter your mind. Learn to simplify your work.

As you rely less and less on knowing what to do, your work will become more direct and more powerful. You will discover that the quality of your consciousness is more potent than any technique or theory or interpretation.

Learn how fruitful the blocked group or individual suddenly becomes when you give up trying to do just the right thing.

Tao of Leadership

____

I think a lot of people are running around with cluttered minds these days. We worry about what to do about the direction the country has taken, we worry about how best to deal with personal situations in our lives, we worry about work, way too much. Perhaps the way to unclutter our minds is to stop worrying and start taking more direct action. Talk to the people around you, find out their real concerns and help them find some answers. Take your own problems and solve the ones you can, without worrying about whether you are creating the optimum solution. Get out of your head for a while and take a walk somewhere full of nature.

For me, my uncluttering spot is in my garden. I go outside and wander in the garden for a bit, and find myself feeling better about things. No matter what worries and concerns I have, they are small compared to a day full of sunshine and flowers and growing things. It helps living in San Diego where I can almost always count on a beautiful sunny day.

I think Americans really have a disease about getting things right, though. We want to live in the right house, drive the right car, send our kids to the right schools, live the right moral values. Yeah, sure we do. But how many people do you know who are simply happy with their lives? How many don’t worry about having enough money, even though we are among the richest people on the planet? Do you hear many people saying, “I have enough, I think I’ll just relax this year and not work too much?” No, we just go on with our disease, not realizing that if we stopped caring about having the right things and living the right way, our lives would be so much easier and better.

Perhaps that’s why I’ve come to focus on what is left. What’s left of my life, where I would like to go, what I would like to see, how I would like to live. Not what other people think is right, or even what I may think is right, but the things that are left out of most people’s lives. Beauty, simplicity, artful living instead of filling our houses with cheap crap. Time spent learning and growing instead of watching TV or spending yet another day working at jobs we hate to buy more stuff we don’t need. Why can’t America be about spreading fun and laughter instead of spreading war and trying to control everything? We have enough, people. Let’s learn to enjoy it, instead of wanting more. Unclutter our minds, our houses, our lives, and let’s learn to live again. Let’s share a new American dream – one about making life fulfilling again instead of filling our gas tanks, bellies, and houses full of crap.

After three months with no period, this one is now in its ninth day and still going strong.

Perimenopause sucks.

I got to meet Gene Wilder tonight (briefly) signing his new book, “The Woman Who Wouldn’t”.

I told him “thank you”, and, “it was wonderful”, and he looked surprised, so I said “I read it in line”.

He looked at me surprised and a bit sad, and said, “The whole book?”

So I smiled and said, “Yes!” and “Thanks for everything”, and shook his hand and he squeezed mine. It was awesome.

My favorite passage from the book, the one that made me cry:

“I brushed away a fly that looked like it was about to land on Clara’s eyelid. What an angel face she has. I don’t want her to die. And I don’t want her to fall in love with me on the rebound from that asshole she was married to, or out of vulnerability because of her thoughts of death and cancer. I just want her to be happy, for as many weeks or months or days that she has. The pain is going to come later, Dr. Gross said. Well, watch over her, Jeremy. But I’ll be glad when I’m healthy enough to return to my work and my home, without responsibility for Clara’s happiness.”

That evening I received a note addressed to Mr. Webb, from Mrs. Mulpas. It read:

Dear Jeremy:
Too tired to eat dinner…perhaps because I’m so happy after our lovely picnic. I’ll see you tomorrow. I hope you’re happy, too.

Clara

UPDATE:

This is pretty cool – here’s an interview with Wilder the day after the book signing I was at:

GW: I went to a book signing last night at the Borders book shop in Caramel Mountain. I had never been there before. And there were people who had come at 8 in the morning to get a number. And when I walked in — I’m used to big crowds, but not this big — it was overwhelming. And here’s the answer to your question. When it started, we saw one of the parents carrying a baby. I said , “How old is that baby? It looks so young!” — “Three months.” Then I saw another parent carrying a baby. “How old is that baby?” — “Five weeks.” So there were kids, then there were the parents of the kids, then there were the parents of the parents, and then there were the parents of the parents of the parents. I mean, I had generations! And happened at every book signing! When there were people in their late 70s early 80s, then in the 60s, then in the 40s and then as teenagers or young married couples in their 20s. Age was spread across the board, and that’s a nice thing. But… well, I suppose, I have an ideal. Probably a woman involved, who is reading the book and crying afterwards. My memoir, it used to be called “I Lean Towards Women”, and I thought it was a stupid title because it sounded like a man who had one leg shorter than the other. Then I remembered what Gilda had said 3 weeks before she died “I have a title for you” and it didn’t make any sense to me till 14 years later!

Another Wilder interview here.

So hubby comes home from his physical this morning wanting to tell me all about it for some reason, and says, “Do you get prostate exams?”

Sigh.