The Color Lilac

I have been driving to work on the same road for eleven years. Eleven winters, eleven springs, eleven summers and eleven autumns. I thought I knew every inch of the parkway. I could tell you what exit I was at just from looking at the side of the road. Yesterday morning as I was driving, I spotted something new. Right before the exit I get off, I saw something totally unexpected. I saw lilac trees. One patch of them,  about 50 feet wide and 30 feet high. I had never noticed them before. They had to have been there for years. Were they planted or did they just grow from seeds being blown in the wind? They were so pretty and colorful. A splash of purple surrounded by a sea of green.

High Strung

I have a family friend that is high strung. Everything is done in a frenzy. Nothing is done calmly. No good has ever come from that. Every year he vacations in Las Vegas and I drive him to the airport. The only stipulation is that the time coincides with my morning commute to work. His flight was this morning. It was scheduled for 9am, or so he thought. When he printed out his boarding pass last night, he noticed that the flight was 6:30am. He would need to be at the airport at 5am. He swears that the airline switched his flight. They didn't. He must have been in such a rush when he booked it, that he never double checked his flight choices before he hit the pay button. His son gave him the ride instead of me. Most people would learn from this lesson. He won't.

The Last Drop

It has been six weeks since my cataract surgery. This morning, I took the last eye drop. I feel like I had an item on layaway and now is finally mine. Although the eye drop routine seems confusing at first, like anything else you get used to it. The first three days, I used a total of 12 drops. The next week I used 56 drops. The next week I used 35 drops. The past two weeks were a piece of cake as I only used 1 drop each morning. It became a bit complicated when the eye drop routine overlapped when I had the second eye done. Week one for the left eye was week three for the right eye and week two for the right was week four for the left. I now feel like I own these eyes, free and clear. In total, 234 drops were instilled over 42 days. Quite a math calculation.

The Hand Dance

Sometimes modern is not better. Since sinks were invented, you opened a faucet and water flowed. Then hardware went from two handles to one handle. Then a goose neck was added for decorative looks. The only type of faucet that I find completely annoying is the movement sensor one. They can be found in commercial buildings and restaurants. Most people do not realize that they are battery operated  so when the battery is dead no water flows. People have no idea when the battery is dead, so we just keep trying to get the water to run. We move our hands left to right. Right to Left. Front to back. Back to front. When this does not work, we circle to the left then circle to the right. We do the hand washing square dance. After we have spent a minute or two doing the hand dance, we move to the right and try another sink.

The Tides Of Motherhood

Today is Mother's Day. Even though I celebrated it yesterday, I will see my parents again today. As I looked around the room last night, I realized that motherhood has many levels. We need to move with life's ebb and flow when it comes to parenting. When our children are small, we nurture very closely. We are hands on and make all of the decisions. When our children reach adolescence, we need to back off a bit. If we don't, they will never learn to stand on their own. When they reach young adulthood, we can move a bit closer again as they become more our equals. They solicit our advice and will take it into consideration. When they meet their spouses, we must pull back again, as there cannot be three people in a relationship. Your child must align themselves with someone else, and rightly so. We hang back for a bit until there are grandchildren. Then we offer advice sparingly but love immeasurably. 

One Day Early

We are celebrating Mother's Day a day early. It is a better day for all of the family to be there. The actual day does not matter. What does matter is the fact that there will be four generations of family. Not all families are blessed to have that. My parents always return from Florida for this weekend. It is important for my mother to be with her children. As each year passes, I pray that everyone will be there for the next celebration.

Sad Goodbye

This morning I will be babysitting my grandson. My son has changed his work hours today in order to attend the funeral for NYPD Officer Brian Moore. He will stand with about 30000 other law enforcement officers from the US and Canada and honor the memory of a young man who died for no reason. Last week at this time he was going to work and had a full life ahead of him. He had no idea that he would only have one more day on earth. That makes me think. Nothing is guaranteed to us. Not even our lives. Our fate is not in our hands. We have some say in it, but ultimately it is not our decision.