Life experiences – Page 17

Aging

AOA — AGING’S ON THE AGENDA

Posted on August 24, 2023August 24, 2023 by Neal Saye

A new blog category examining the frightening, exhilarating processes of our inevitable aging.

So here I am, sitting in my ever-faithful study chair …

… re-reading Andrew Weil’s Healthy Aging.

I first bought and read the book back in 2005 …

… when I was a young 53.

And now that I am a young … 71, I am understanding Weil better than before.

For this first post in the new category, I’ll let Weil speak:

“To age gracefully means to let nature take its course while doing everything in our power to delay the onset of age-related disease, or in other words, to live as long and as well as possible, then have a rapid decline at the end of life.”

I like that Aging Agenda.

HR and I belong to a wonderful church here in Savannah, Asbury Memorial. Recently we lost our church’s matriarch, Miss Virginia, at 99 years of age. On Sunday we celebrated her long incredible life.

Miss Virginia sang in the church choir up until a month before her demise. She lived “as long and as well as possible.”

Healthy Aging to Us All!

Five Friday Happy Bringers

Five Friday Happy Bringers 8/11/23

Posted on August 11, 2023August 17, 2023 by Neal Saye

My weekly gratitude journal, of sorts.

1. Roses from HR.

2. Yummy breakfast at our new favorite Savannah bakery, Sweet Patricia’s (named after the chef’s grandmother).

Puff pastries with egg and bacon. Sweet roll with orange filling.

3. Having enough money to buy puff pastries and a sweet roll.

4. Also having …

Even if it gets turned around sometime.

5. Reading a new book about one of my anxiety issues …

May you breathe easily into a terrific weekend ahead.

My Saturday Evening Post

My Saturday Evening Post: 8/5/23 “$1.5 Billion Pickles“

Posted on August 5, 2023August 6, 2023 by Neal Saye

So today, after buying the winning ticket for Monday Night’s $1.5 billion Mega Millions Lottery …

… a distressing thought occurred to me, interrupting my more-pleasant day dream about the hippest colors for matching Land Rovers for Robert and me. The Distressing Thought:

“What if, because of some Freak Accident by The Universe, I DON’T WIN?!”

After hyperventilating and falling into the depths of despair far too long for a man of my age, I finally came to my senses, realizing that there’s more than one way to get 1.5 billion dollars. Duh.

Then, Creative that I am, it didn’t take me long to come up with a viable Plan B.

A PICKLE BUSINESS!

Right?! Yes?! You with me?

I got to work, feeling so lucky that HR and I had just purchased some beautiful fancy cucumbers.

TIB (Truth in Blogging): Robert prepped the cucumbers, using his Fancy Stainless Steel Kitchen Mandoline Slicer thingy, which he won’t let me ANYWHERE near. He says I would kill myself because of my wandering attention span.

See? You’re believing in me now, I bet.

The name of my new $1.5 Billion Pickle Company?

“NEAL’S DILLS,” of course.

My Saturday Evening Post

My Saturday Evening Post: 7/29/23 “Group Hug”

Posted on July 28, 2023July 30, 2023 by Neal Saye

So for lunch on Thursday, HR (“Husband Robert” for the uninitiated) suggested we drive across the Savannah River to Bluffton SC and eat at Cahill’s.

We’ve eaten there several times before, and their Meat and Three is just scrumptious.

Oh goodness, Cahill’s Fried Chicken is Southern Culinary Joy.

For my Three, I chose sweet potato soufflé, collards and creamed corn. Robert got mashed potatoes with gravy, pickled beets and stewed cabbage. (We kept reaching our forks across the table to each other’s plates.). Washing it down with sweet tea, the “champagne of the south,” as Dolly Parton says.

The grounds of the working farm are simply beautiful.

Robert, who grew up in Inner City Baltimore, kept trying to pet and then milk this fake cow (bull?).

When I told him it was a statue of a cow, he got all huffy and stormed off toward the (real) chicken coops and the giant oaks proudly displaying their recently rained-on Resurrection Fern. (Do you know about Resurrection Fern? It looks brown and dead until rain. Then it is gloriously alive.)

“See”? HR asks, as if he caused the Resurrection Fern to resurrect.

When we got home, with our odds and ends we purchased at Cahill’s Market, Robert placed the few items on the cutting board for a photo op. The peppers and the tomato quickly scooted close to each other in a Group Hug.

If we could all be like vegetables!

Okay, sorry, if we could all be like fruits and vegetables.

Five Friday Happy Bringers

Five Friday Happy Bringers 7/28/23

Posted on July 27, 2023August 17, 2023 by Neal Saye

My weekly gratitude journal, of sorts.

1. Being thankful for American patriots who fight for our country’s liberty and freedom.

Thank you, Governor Whitmer!

2. Summer corn, cut fresh off the cob, and cooked in my grandmother’s cast iron. Oh my GOODness.

3. Eyes.

4. Rejoicing over whoever invented the “It’s-Simply-TOO-Hot-to-Turn-on-the-Oven” Crock Pot. (I may sell our stove.)

Featuring Lemon-Garlic Chicken Stew.

With no oven-heat to deflate me, I pulled out the wintery/snowy deer bowls.

A Cool Yum!

5. The ability to walk.

May you walk into a pleasant weekend ahead!

Humor

“Pine-Apple-ing”

Posted on July 18, 2023July 18, 2023 by Neal Saye

So I walked into our bathroom, an hour or so ago, in order to, well you know.

I started to sit down and saw this …

“Wait, what’s going on?” I thought, as I leisurely, then worriedly gazed at the curtained window. “Is this my bathroom?! Where AM I?”

“Is that an alien just outside my bathroom window? Look at his/her TALL hair!”

Terrified, I was ready to squeal, to yell for HR (Husband Robert- you know that!) to come help me, when I decided that, “No, let’s pull back the curtain. Kind of like with the Wizard of Oz.”

And then I realized.

HR had just put the pineapple in the bathroom window to catch some sun and ripen a bit more.

But seriously, IN THE BATHROOM?!

Encouragement

Be …

Posted on July 9, 2023July 10, 2023 by Neal Saye

Five Friday Happy Bringers

Five Friday Happy Bringers 7/7/23

Posted on July 7, 2023August 17, 2023 by Neal Saye

My weekly gratitude journal, of sorts.

1. Joyful Sunflowers from the Forsyth Farmers Market here in Savannah.

And when they started to bow down their heads oh so dramatically, I figured out another way to extend their life a bit.

2. At Barnes & Noble, HR holding up Kitty Corn from the book we bought granddaughter Isabelle for her fifth bday.

(We bought Kitty Corn too. She wanted to get out of retail.)

3. Short pants in the summer.

4. Spices and Herbs! What a blessing they add to our culinary lives.

5. Breathing in and breathing out.

May you have a spicy weekend ahead!

Five Friday Happy Bringers

Five Friday Happy Bringers 6/30/23

Posted on June 30, 2023June 30, 2023 by Neal Saye

My weekly gratitude journal, of sorts.

1. Radishes.

2. Billboards sprouting up around Savannah featuring grandson Daniel as Raoul in the Savannah Theatre’s upcoming production of Phantom of the Opera.

The production opens July 7.

3. This week walking one of the trails (by myself, quite unusual, R and I are usually together 24/7 ) at the Savannah National Wildlife Refuge near us.