THE GIFT TO MYSELF

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Dec. 4th, an auspicious day for me. Today is the day that my #2 son, Randall Wm. Jager, reaches the magnificent age of 60 years.  And tomorrow, Dec. 5th, my #3 son, Alan Wayne Jager, becomes 58 years of age.

It doesn’t seem possible, of course, that I could have given birth to men of this age.  Not to mention the number #1 son, Stephen Jay Jager became 62 years on Nov. 9th. And trailing behind them in years only, is Martin Earl Jager who reached 55 years on March 27th.

Thinking about all of them and how alike and yet how different they all are, has brought back a lot of memories.  They are all good dependable men, have their own place in society, and are sons to be proud of.

Steve is the oldest – he got to go first on everything, to be the boss to his brothers, and the one to set an example. He excelled in school, became an Student Council member, and graduated with honors. He has been a father to both children and stepchildren and a successful workaholic all of his life.  He has a great job on an oil rig in Pennsylvania and other states. He is an avid reader and we all know where he gets that from, me. And when you want something worked out you can depend on Steve to figure it out.

Randy also did very well in school. He then enlisted in the US Air Force where he was chosen to be one of the four airmen that lived in underground missile silos where they guarded our country, a great honor. Randy has always been our loner – takes after his mother that way. For years he has been a gold prospector in California, and for a long time I had trouble keeping up with him.  But besides that he has become a truck driver all up and down the Western States. He and I have a great relationship via text most of the time.

Alan is #3, and when he was very young he was always the goof off in our family.  The one who could make you laugh or drive you crazy. He could fix anything. He evolved into a very hardworking oilman, saved his money, built a house, started a great business that he took over from his father, Preston Jager, and became a staunch business man.  He raised a wonderful family that we are all proud of, and he even became a politician.  Now he has just taken on a new job as Holton Township supervisor in Michigan.

Finally, here comes Marty, the youngest. As did his brothers he did well in school but his life took on another meaning when he joined the US Navy, where he rose thru the ranks and made us all proud of him. Marty also took on the care of both children and stepchildren and has done a wonderful job of it. Now, after retiring from the Navy, he is employed as a mechanic in Florida. He is a very thoughtful and loving person to all who know him.

When I think of all four men I think of how proud their father, Preston Jager, was of them. He too was a hardworking, intelligent, family man, and that has carried over unto all of them. All four of them have been wonderful to their two stepfathers, Gary Bosley, and Bob Rider.  Both fathers made a great contribution to the loving men that my sons have become.

My “boys” are loving, courageous and dependable, and how much more could any mother ask for than to have sons like these? They will always be boys to me.  To know that they love me and care about me is the greatest gift of all.

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COMPASSION

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“Compassion” is another one of the words that have been floating thru my mind as of late.

One of the suggestions in our writing class was “Forgiveness.” And in the midst of thinking about all of the ways that we forgive, or try to forgive ourselves as well as others, the word “compassion” just kept sneaking in.

When we are young it seems so natural to hold a grudge against someone that we perceive to have harmed us, or our loved ones.  Anger seems to hold sway over common sense and we often glory in our anger. But as we get older, need I say, actually “old”, anger can take its toll. Knowing that we are “right” and someone or something else is “wrong” doesn’t seem to work as well as it used to.

And sometimes it even begins to seep into our souls, that we weren’t always right either, that maybe we held grudges.  Maybe we even read thoughts into someone else’s comments that weren’t intended.

The younger people who we disagree with, how do we know what life’s experiences have brought them? Maybe life hasn’t always treated them as well as it could have. Their generation and the ones following it have had to cope with a whole different set of problems than we have. We do not always agree with our own generation, but we have all had different experiences and expectations.

I think it is time for all of us to walk the mile in the other persons shoes! Realize that life isn’t always fair, but it is what we have got, and we have to pull together or be torn asunder, as the old saying goes.

I find that as I age a lot more people are looking at me with compassion. The first few times I got called “dearie” and, “sweetie”, I laughed! Why did all these people think I was “old”? Little did they know what was inside of me, I thought.

But as time has gone on I find that I am being looked at with, you guessed it, “compassion.” I feel I am doing my part to help make the world better, by smiling back and realizing I am helping them to feel compassion for others.  And that is a good thing.

We are all here to help each other enjoy life, so go for it, people. Call me sweetie or dearie, open the door for me, I don’t care, I  love it.  And I will do it for you, wherever I can.

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PRAGMATIC

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For the past several years the word “pragmatic” has been popping up in my conversations with my husband whenever we got into any serious discussions about life and our place in it. Now that we are retired we have a lot more time to have these talks, and it has been amazing to me how we have gotten better acquainted with each other by just sitting and talking.  After almost 24 years you would think that we are used to each other’s ways, but that is not always the case.  When you both have a job somewhere there isn’t always time to really get down to the nitty gritty of how you feel deep inside about certain subjects.  We think that we know most of how the other person will react to everyday subjects because we have been together for so long.

Each of us seems to have a certain boiling point, and we know pretty much what it is, so we try to avoid it. What is the point of having an argument when you know that you aren’t going to change the other one’s mind anyhow? That is what I call “pragmatism”, when you know what is important and what really isn’t. Like when you know that you really should get after that extra load of washing, but it surely will  wait until tomorrow.  Or the grass certainly needs cutting, but you can always do it later.

“Realism” seems to be a synonym that works just as well.  One of the advantages of getting older is you begin to realize that it is a waste of time and energy to force anything upon anyone. Realism tells you that it is all going to work out just as it was meant to anyhow, regardless of what you do, or push or shout.  If at the same time your spouse is learning the same lessons as you are, why, you are a very lucky person, and they will be happy to embrace your pragmatism.  You will live in a more joyful house, and your children and friends will call you blessed.

A pragmatic is one who accepts what is, and is happier for it.  But a pragmatic is also one who looks for the silver lining, because they know it is here somewhere.

 

 

IT IS JUST SO HANDY!

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It is a beautiful November day and I am smiling at all of the sunshine around me this morning.  We have arrived back in Florida for the winter from our home in Michigan and I am so happy to be here.  No matter where I look I see the familiar faces and scenes that are welcoming us back.

It is not that I was overjoyed to leave the north.  This year it has been blessed with a lot more sun and warm weather than is normal for a northern state in November. Living on a farm in the summertime is something for anyone to be grateful for. Altho we are retired there are still many obvious blessings when you live in a farming community.  The abundance of fresh produce, the orchards to walk thru, the lack of traffic on the highways near us, all of these things make summer a delightful place.

But! Yes, everything changes. We begin to feel a nip in the air, it is getting dark an awful lot earlier, and during one rain shower it actually turns to snow for a few minutes. And then we know it is time to start changing addresses, packing up our summer clothes, and heading for our home away from home.

This year we decided to take a different route, some back roads and highways we had never traveled before, and so it became an adventure with less traffic, more rural scenery, and a lot less trucks. We live in a beautiful country, folks, and we have just seen a lot of it. We avoided the big cities and I didn’t miss them a bit.  Next time we will explore even further.

But what I am noticing the most this year is how handy everything is here in Zephyrhills where we live.  Everything is so close, grocery stores that I like, libraries to enjoy only a mile away, doctors of all stripes near us, bread stores, tech stores, landscaping gardens, great restaurants, anything that we could need, all within ten minutes of our house.  When you live in the country as we do up north, we go 25 miles north, or 32 miles south to find the things we need.

So I have decided that in addition to the warm weather, our pleasure at being out of the winter storms, all of the things that I like about Florida, one of the very best things is how handy it is to be here, enjoying life, with the best of two worlds.

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IMAGINE

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Imagine living in a home with no mechanical sounds!

Nothing that has a motor. No TV, no radio, no refrigerator, no furnace, no bells ringing when the food is done, no air conditioning, no man made sounds.

Maybe you are out on the western prairies, maybe you even live in a sod home. It is probably another century and you are among the American adventurers that left all of the conveniences of their eastern homes and headed for a new life in a different land.

You might hear the whistle of a teakettle if you are boiling water on a wood cook stove.   You will hear the sounds of your own breathing.  You may hum to yourself or even break out in song as a way to break the silence. The wind may be howling around the corners. Maybe there is a beloved dog yipping at an imagined enemy. You decide that you will go for a walk where at least you may hear the singing of a bird, or the buzzing of the many insects around you.

But, oh the silence.

So what do you do with the everlasting silence? For one thing, you can keep very busy. Life is not easy for anyone living alone on the prairie. There are always chores to do, the essential things that make the days seem a little smoother – wood boxes to be filled, floors to be swept, meals to be cooked, clothes to be washed.

Even without sound, you can smell the flowers. At night you can gaze at the galaxies all around you. All about you the world is filled with the majesty that is life whether you have man made sound or not.

You may wonder why I have chosen this subject today. Well, that is easy to figure out.  I just turned off all the sounds in my house, and you know what?  The silence is wonderful.  I think that I shall practice this every day for a while and it sure makes it easier to count my blessings.

 

5:56 AM

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Early to bed and early to rise,

Makes a man or woman healthy, wealthy and wise!

Where in the world did that come from?

A childhood of memorizing old sayings, dredged up from a distant past.  Memories of our local school where we repeated all of the familiar passages from our books until we knew them by heart.  No TV, no internet, no phones for us.  We relied on our reading and studying for everything we learned.

Now altho I have a big digital  clock shining its message in the early morning light I have a built in alarm clock in my head. No matter where I am, north or south, in my own bed or traveling somewhere, I wake up.  It’s Sunday morning here, the one day you would think I’d sleep in, but NO!  I’m awake and I’ve had enough sleep.  Seven hours this time because I stayed up, immersed in a great book, that I just had to finish.

Not only that but I am retired, I don’t have to get up. I could lie here as long as I’d like. No children calling out, no pets needing to be let outdoors, just me, knowing it is time for me to get out of bed. Looking out the window I see the orchard rows, and they are white! It’s May 15th, and we have snow on the ground. This is not good.  The orchards are in full blossom, and they definitely do not need the cold weather.

My mind leaps from one scattered idea to another. I must make the coffee, but I also must write down the words swirling in my head. I search for my notepad and pen, and ah, I am safe. Reassured, all is well.

I am up, it is early in the morning.  I feel the urge to write, and I know the snow will melt eventually. The deck is white now, but it will soon be brown again. I am ready for a new day.  It lies before me, I can do whatever I choose to do, and since I got up early I have plenty of time to do it.

Mornings are beautiful, especially in the country, and I don’t want to waste a single one of them. Come and join the early risers in your life, and you’ll be glad you did.

THE MOON IS WELCOMING ME HOME

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IMG_0134The moon is welcoming me home.

It is shining thru the bare branches of a Michigan maple tree.

I sit on our bed and watch.

To the north the Big Dipper sparkles in the clear midnight sky.

The beautiful moon is glowing.

I can see it reflected in the mirrors of the room about me.

Below my window I can see the lawn and the silver apple trees

In the orchard spread their welcoming branches to me.

I can see the farm spread in every direction,

Waiting for the oncoming spring,

Knowing they are about to bloom in splendor.

It is true. I am home!

The world is rejoicing with me by enfolding me in its beautiful light.

It is showing me my path, my way forward, and I am grateful.

It is so good to be home again.

A SAFE HAVEN FOR WRITERS

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Retirement.

As we move forward in our lives retirement is not always as easy as we had hoped this new stage of life would be.  At the very least we can agree that things have a way of changing. What sounded so great when we were in our 50’s sometimes takes on a very different hue than we had planned for. So we make adjustments and somehow it all seems to work out for the better.

One of the things that has become a really great blessing is the way we have of making new friends, and best of all, they are friends that we have a common interest with.  We may have a wide variety of backgrounds, and different ways of looking at the world around us, but this is all to our benefit as we come together and share all of our thoughts and experiences. Subjects that we never even thought of are brought forward in great detail.  Life growing up in a Maine community many years ago becomes fascinating when you are hearing it firsthand from the one who lived it.  European experiences bring a whole different culture to the forefront when it comes to you across the table in your group of writers.

And we are all writers.  We all have the urge to write, to express ourselves, to share a part of us that may have been hidden before.  We may have written all of our lives, but reading it out loud in front of other members is another kettle of fish, as my father used to say.  Hearing the quiver in someone’s voice, knowing the fear that lurks beneath the surface as they reveal an inner part of themselves to us, we all are sympathetic to our creative friends. It takes real courage to bare your soul, to allow others to know the inner you. And we do it, week after week, and somehow it seems to get easier each time, as we realize we are safe among our creative friends. We can relax, knowing that we reside safely in this circle.

Our class means a great deal to me. What others say about my writing is important to my development as a writer.  When I write it is like I am talking to them, my friends. As I am reading, I can hear the rhythm of my voice, and it is very comforting to me to be able to express my thoughts.

It is also a very good feeling to listen to others and know that we all have a very special place in each others lives. We are showing that creativity expands in our life no matter what the age, and we have an important function to fulfill.

The main thing that I have been taught in our class is that we are all survivors.  We have all been thru the mill, done what had to be done, and we have survived. And we all still have a smile on our faces for our friends. I see the victorious human spirit in everyone in our class and it gives me great pride to say that I am a member of our Creative Writers class in Betmar Acres in Zephyrhills, Florida.

THE LISTMAKER

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If you have ever been lucky enough to live with a Virgo, this information is going to be no surprise to you.  Virgos are the people who make lists, for everything that they do or want to do, or plan to do.  Their first inclination is to pick up a pen and start writing whenever something new shows up.  You notice that I say “lucky”, because they love to make these lists.  In fact they have probably saved your life more than once by their lists when you have forgotten what you need to do in your life.

I bring this subject up because I am a Virgo.  Yes, and that is the way it is.  I make lists all of the time.  I write everything down before I go anywhere. Of course I don’t always remember to take the list with me.  When I was much younger just writing it down would make it lodge firmly in my mind, and I wouldn’t even need the paper with me.  Now things have changed somewhat and I find I need to take the list with me.  I even forget from one aisle to another what I need to get, if I don’t have the list.  Time happens to us all, and it sure has happened to me.

Today is the big day.  I pulled out my old Florida/Michigan notebook that I have been using for five years.  There is a page for “Taking to Florida”, another for “Taking to Michigan”, one for “Things to do before I go to Florida”, and yet another for “Things to do before I go to Michigan”. Every year I add to the pages until I finally have to start another one.  I must have 10 total pages by now.  Things are crossed out when I have decided I no longer need to take or do them, or added when I decide I must have it with me.  It is amazing how much we can actually put in our Toyota, and still have room to sit down in the front seat. I have no excuses, I just seem to need to have certain things around me in order to be comfortable.

So I have begun this spring’s project.  As I start packing I keep checking my pages, filling the boxes, crossing out the old ones that don’t work anymore. I make all of the phone calls and change all of the addresses.  We will be leaving sometime next week, and in the front seat I will have my notebook.  When we arrive in Michigan I will start unpacking the boxes and doing the fun job of putting everything in its place.  Hopefully I will have remembered to bring everything with me that will make me happy in my northern home for a few months.  I’ll put away my lists in a safe place until I am ready to travel south again.

Okay, so that project is done.  Up north I can start a new list before I go grocery shopping because my shelves are really bare up there.  I really need my list to make sure that I get everything I need because I live 25 miles from the store I trade at.

Thank goodness for having a Virgo in our house, that loves to make lists.  I am sure that is what my husband must think!

A GOOD DAY FOR PARENTS

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There might be a better gift that a parent can receive that will fill their heart with joy, but I find it is hard to think of one. This morning I received an alert that one of my sons had a birthday on Facebook, and would I like to write to him and wish him well?  Of course, I thought, I had already sent an e-card, but I would do it.  But I found that some other people had gotten ahead of me already. The outpourings on the page showed me that I wasn’t the only one who had warm feelings for this man.

We have 5 sons, and 2 daughters.  Three of the sons don’t show up on FB much, altho their families do, but the other two sons post often. And the daughters? When any of them have a birthday online, it makes us as  parents proud that so many others appreciate them, and the lists of well wishers are so long and so loving, that it brings great joy to us. We must have done something right. The diapers, and the crying in the middle of the night, the endless washing of clothes, the PTA meetings, all are long forgotten, and here we are.  Our children are all fully grown, they are loved and respected by their families and friends, and we can smile and say Thank You, for all of our many blessings today.

Happy Easter, everyone.