Lonely vs. Alone

The other day at a study group, when I said since my husband died 14 years ago and I was alone, this man looked me straight in the eye and said, "It's your fault that you are alone." I wanted to ask if I should start selling sex so as not to be alone. The poor guy has not a smidgen of an idea of what it means to be alone. He has a living, healthy wife, and they belong to a lot of organizations and they are never lonely. At least, he thinks so. You can be lonely in a crowd, in a marriage, at church, which is my loneliest place, lots of places. It's probably a fact that unless they die together in an auto accident, one of them is going to be left to learn exactly what alone means. Here it is:

You attend a group sponsored event, and enjoy it. But when it's over, everybody goes home to their huts, and we who are alone go to an empty hut.
Alone is: Keeping the lights on in the house so that you can pretend somebody's there.
Alone is: Forget about the "honey do" list, because there's no honey to do lit.
Alone is: There's nobody to tell you how you look or if there's a forgotten tag somewhere.
Alone is: There's also nobody in these big woods to look you over for deer ticks or to fasten that necklace or zip up a long back zipper, so you just quit wearing those things, even though they're among you favorites.
Alone is: Even if you are fortunate enough that friends invite you for dinner--you're still a fifth wheel. It seems as if everything, including dinner tables, is meant for two-by-two. Maybe your host will realize that and invite somebody else who is alone, if only to equalize the table settings.

That's part of it, folks. I rarely get lonely, but I am alone forever.

Muthah

A blanket apology

Well, I've done it--alienated one of my kids because of my tirade against cell phones. What I want him to know is that every phone call is precious--even from a cell phone in a car.

Well I remember my mother saying, "I don't know why god lets me live so long." When you get old, you are sort of excess baggage to the kids. They have to make "duty calls" to an aging parent, and I remember well those infrequent "duty calls" to my mother and to my mother-in-law, but now that I'm in that boat, I wish the calls and visits had been more frequent.

We raised a pretty good batch of kids. They are all successfully employed and have full and productive lives. One is a teacher; one has his own business; one has her own business; and one is a successful free-lance entertainer. We raised them to be independent, and they all are, and they are all successful at what they do. I wish they knew how very interested I am in hearing from them--even from dropped cell phone calls and from being put on "caller ignore" for somebody calling who is more important than I am. I haven't heard from one of them in over 6 weeks, although he talks to his siblings regularly.

I have always told them how much hate cell phones, don't have one myself and probably won't get one. I would carry one in the car in case I need to call for help--but I certainly wouldn't talk on one there. The only place in the world is sacrosanct, and it isn't the bathrooms, where I have extension phones. It's my car. Not only is it illegal in most states to talk on a cell phone in a vehicle, but I just saw on CNN that five just graduated teenagers were killed in an auto accident because they were text messaging. I would prefer that my children keep their attention to the road rather than give me their divided attention.

So this is blanket apology to anyone who might have been offended by what I said.

Muthah

cell phone bitchin'

Over my 70+ years, I have had to adapt to new things--cordless phones, no operator on the other end because you can't dial "O" again, the computer and all its wonders. Most of this I have become acclimated to and some I even enjoy.

BUT I HATE CELL PHONES. I think they're the rudest thing we have come up with yet. It's rude, sitting in a restaurant and having to listen to some guy's conversation over "there." "There" doesn't have many boundaries, because people think they have to talk louder over a cell phone. It's rude, having lunch with a friend and a lively conversation going on, when her cell phone demands her attention, and there goes our conversation, up in smoke.

Three of my kids have cell phones only. No land lines. If I lost any of their phone numbers, I couldn't call information, because of course no cell phone is listed. I think that within 20 years phone directories will be obsolete. While I appreciate being called whenever by one of my kids, it's very annoying to me that they usually call me from the car on the way to or from somewhere, and suddenly I'm talking to no one because the call has been dropped. And the conversation must end at their destination. There's also the problem of speaker phones. I never know to whom I am actually speaking, because they all have speaker phones--so I'm very careful what I say about whom. At least they could identify who's listening in!

A thousand years from now when the Chinese dig us up, they will find skeletons with one hand close against the face where an ear should be. They'll probably think we all died of some mysterious facial virus!

Muthah

Boycott of One

Yesterday I handed back to my Schwan's guy a box of frozen "Alaskan salmon" which had a label, "Product of China," telling him to tell his superiors that he has at least one customer who won't buy, or eat, anything that is a product of China. I know my little boycott isn't going to make a shred of difference to Schwan's, but things are getting scary. Toothpaste, cat food, fish--what's next? China is going to be the next world power--after they poison us all!



Muthah

Addendum

Jerry Springer was one of the radio commentators on the concert. Shortly after that he went to Chicago and went crazy. He had been mayor of Cincy before it was learned that he paid prostitute with a credit card.

Also, Eric Kunzel, the conductor is now conducting the Boston Pops. A great loss for Cincinnati.
Muthah

Sad 4th

Muthah is very sad tonight. I just watched my 1992 VHS of the Cincinnati Pops and chorus in their 4th of July concert at River Bend. I realized that in these 15 years I have almost completely lost my patriotism. I got tears in my eyes when they played all the patriotic music, but I have lost so much in the last 15 years, that it all just made me very sad. I realized that my husband was alive to watch that concert with me--he died a year later in August. I have lost my best friend of 40 years, Jane, in that time period. Back surgery has lost me much of my mobility, and there is no way I could go to Marquette for the celebration--people are rude, and despite my walker, they bump into me. I don't really have any idea what the average Joe thinks we're celebrating--it's just another day off to drink a lot of beer and watch fireworks. Sometimes I really wish we were still a British colony, because all those freedoms in the Declaration and Constitution and by-laws are rapidly disappering, thanks to King George W. At least as a part of the British empire we just might have universal health care and we could get rid of crooked leaders with just a vote of no confidence. It's also sad not to have family nearby for a cook-out.

I did pick up one interesting thing from the concert. When Irvin Berlin wrote GOD BLESS AMERICA, he had no show to put it in, so he put it on a drawer. Kate Smith asked him to write something patriotic for her to use as a theme song, so he gave it to her. The interesting thing is that he made no money on it. When he gave it to her, he signed away all royalties to the song to the Boy Scouts. Wonder how many scouts know that???

muthah

"IT"

Muthah wonders today what ever happened to "It"--the scooter-type thing that had us guessing for months. It was supposed to revolutionize the way we get around-one had only to think where one wanted to go, and it went there. But I've never seen one, not even one. Maybe "It" thought its way out of existence. Anybody??

wrong numbers

Muthah is very angry this morning. At 1:15 a.m., RING, RING. I answered, and a bright female voice said, "Is this Bridget?" This same person has dialed me now twice in the middle of the night asking for Bridget. I didn't read her out about dialing wrong numbers in the middle of the night--but more Idiocracy.

Muthah