All lives matter of course, but at this moment in my life OLD LIVES MATTER to me personally because I realise that although I am not at all OLD I have a label around my neck stating that I am!
I am very lucky I have all my marbles, well I never had that many anyway, but I check each morning when I get up, and they are still there! I know my name, my post code, my address and even know my INSIDE LEG MEASUREMENT...I remember my bust, waist and hip measurements to...36-24-34...I was a mannequin and that was very important then. Now, I’m just guessing but I suspect my measurements are 36-36-40...where did my little waist go to I wonder?
Life is so busy, so much happens to you through the years and you don’t seem to allow much time to stand and stare, who wrote that poem, I can’t remember ..I will remember during the day hopefully before I finish this little blog. So much is expected of you from that first scream at birth, you are kept busy, eating, drinking, laughing, crying, schooling, love, children and so on and it’s only where I am now that I can see the exhausting journey behind me.
Those 2 words ‘in hindsight.’ Make you think. I can see what I did wrong now, but at the time you 'go with the flow,' perhaps you are too busy trying to keep other people happy, or you didn’t think that the decision you made on the spur of the moment held any importance to your future life. Should you have turned left or right? Should you have looked down at your feet instead of smiling at that 'good looking boy' across the room?
As a young girl I was a bundle of nerves, I blushed all the time, I had a stutter/stammer and life was miserable. I had nothing to say to anyone as it seemed to me that I was invisible, and I realised nobody would want to hear anything I had to say anyway. I had an adoring mother, so overpowering at times, so difficult to not let her down and a larger than life Jewish stepfather. He embarrassed me whenever he could, and I duly hated him!
Perhaps that last sentence was more important than I realised, as I wrote it for my mother, who just kept pushing, kept wanting me to succeed . She had placed, on her pathetic plain daughter, and enormous ask. I was expected to be a debutant, to be presented to the Queen. Where does one start with a challenge like that...well you just get on with it...bit by bit you drag yourself through all the hoops that are put in front of you, you perform like a circus seal. I did it as every time something fell into place with my mothers' wishes seeing her face and her smile and her pride in me was enough to make me go on, and on and on. I need to stop now, my mother died 10 years ago but I am still preforming, still wanting her approval I suppose.
I’m not going to go on about me, you can buy my book if you are interested...no darling it's called BAD ORGANISATION by Wendy Darling (I have no idea why I wrote it under that name, but my name is Wendy and in the story of Peter Pan and Wendy, I am Wendy Darling, so I expect it's that...who cares anyway what my name is. I'm not important, I'm just me.
So here I am now, towards the end of my life I suppose, of course they may find an eternal life pill soon, so I might be around for some time yet, BUT I don't want to be around with a plaque above my head saying OLD. I'm not allowed to say BLACK or FAT why the hell should I be called OLD? Do you mean to say my whole life is just summed up with one word, OLD?
I am still funny, I still have my uses, I am kind, I am no nuisance really, well sometimes I whinge about aches and pains but generally I can be an asset. I'm still a businesswoman, I do still make money, I am not a strain on society like many many people. How dare society toss me away with a 'past your sell by date,' sticker.
Let me just try to explain what it feels like to have worked your guts out, to have bought up a family, to have cared for loved ones, and perhaps like me now I wake up in the morning, I stretch and maybe go back under the duvet, the sun is shining, I feel great. I have a busy working day ahead of me...must get up. But then I stop and look ahead..for me there is NO AHEAD! I generally shake off the feeling of uselessness but sometimes I can't...what's the point of getting up, what am I trying to prove? Who cares? After all I am just another OLD LADY shuffling around being in the way, driving in the middle of the road and indicating left and going right...who needs me...NOBODY!
Please consider me, I am a human being after all, I can't keep going without some hope, I need to be of some use. I know more than most people around me, just because you call me OLD doesn't mean I can't be of some use, it hurts to be discarded like this SO STOP IT. Believe me one day you too will be OLD, see how you like it!!!!
So here I am, past my prime, but I'm like a Duracell battery and until someone unplugs me I will keep going and going...
