Older and wiser

I turned 58 yesterday, and my wonderful family all called or stopped to see me. Our son Forrest invited us to a dinner out on the town, and that sounded lovely. It is just plain TOO HOT to cook. So I waited anxiously for the appointed time, got my husband, Dick, out of bed and began to get him ready to go. He felt dizzy, and begged off....so I went to dinner without him. Although we had a wonderful time it wasn't nearly as good as it would have been if I hadn't allowed one corner of my brain to worry about Dick the whole time we were gone.

Overall though, I had a very nice day. My brother David gave me a wonderful hand-written letter about our growing up years and how much he cares for me, along with a nice chunk of cash to "spend on myself". That was very special.

Our son Forrest and his family not only me us for dinner, but gave me beautifully framed photos of themselves taken by a friend.

Our daughter Tracy called, and promised she would be down in a week or so, she just couldn't make it that day. She is always good for her word, so I get to have ANOTHER birthday when she arrives! (But that doesn't mean I'm another year older..!)

My sister Lois and brother-in-law Beaux each called me independently, which was very nice. There's something special about talking to each one personally.

My brother Ken called, my sister-in-law Tina called, and my good friend Marie called. Actually Marie was the very first to wish me a Happy Birthday.

Today our friend Bobby stopped by to wish me a happy birthday too. The birthday wishes just seem to keep coming.

I want each and every one of them to know that I felt wrapped in their love and humbled by their caring for me.

Since it was my birthday I gave myself an early present. I have been thinking for some time about adding a little color to my life....literally. For years I have kept all the walls in the house painted white...not just white but "ultra pure white", figuring that I would add color with the items I put in the room and hung on the walls. I have a lot of wood in the house and that has always been satisfactory for me. But a while back my daughter and her husband painted their living room wall and one wall in their kitchen very bright colors, one red, one a deep forest green, and I fell in love with the feel the colors added to their home. So, never one to move very quickly when change like this comes along, I have been debating with myself about painting one of my walls a different color. I have exposed brick in the kitchen, so I figured I needed something complimentary, which left me in the red hughes. I finally chose a color, bought a gallon of primer and paint, and put them on the back porch for the last 5 or 6 months....still debating internally. I've been all-white so long that it felt like a huge leap to go with color. Silly, huh?

Anyway, I finally broke down the other day while I had some time off of work and primed the wall with the gray primer the paint lady sold me. Good Lord, gray is an ugly color on a wall! It was supposed to dry for 24 hours, but it was so ghastly that I couldn't wait. I waited several hours, ran my hand over the whole wall to make sure it was dry, then stayed up late to paint the red. I went to bed quite contented that I would wake up and find an exciting change in the room when I first entered in the morning. Boy! Did I get a surprise. I'm not sure if it was due to the gray primer, but when the whole wall was painted the color I had chosen it turned out to look purple. Not just any old purple, either. It looked "plum" purple. I could hardly believe it. My experiment was not going as planned! So today, after drinking my morning coffee, I couldn't stand it another minute. I ran to the store and bought myself a "real red" paint, and came home hoping it would help. I now have a very red (well, actually kind of a burgundy red) wall and I like it much better. Dick was asleep when I painted over the purple, so I guess we'll see if he can live with the red or not. If he hates it I'll try something else, but for now I'm kinda liking it! And it was relatively quick and easy to do.....less than an hour today to cover the purple. If that's all it takes I may change color weekly, or every time I buy new shoes. Who knows where this could lead? I might end up dying my hair a different color, or get new colored contacts to see with. This may have started a whole new phase of my life.......'if you don't like it - paint it!".

It's probably a good thing birthdays only come once a year....I seem to have lost my mind with this one!