My Grandma G just turned 90 this weekend. My Mom and aunts threw her multiple celebrations, and good times were had by all.
Grandma G is feisty, intelligent, engaged, busy, and observant enough to stir up the pot in her family on a regular basis. Honestly, I hope 90 looks that good on me, I really do.
On a side note, and for full disclosure purposes, when hubby and I tied the knot I made it perfectly clear that 'til death do us part means for a really long time in our family. Really long. He still said 'I do', but I'm pretty sure if he had thought seriously about it, he might have hesitated for at least a beat or two...I'm a lot to take on a good day/week/month/year/decade, so more can be, um, maybe more than he'd bargained for.
For example, Grandma Alice was 89+ when she died. Grandpa was 85. Other Grandpa was 89+ (and had lived that long in spite of rheumatic fever, two major heart surgeries and general disdain for any food that wasn't brown and covered in a salty gravy). His mom, Great Grandma Nellie, was 106, and rumor has it she finally just died because she was bored.
In our family, then, unless you do something to extremes that kills you early or get hit by a bus or an act of God takes you from this reality to the next, you tend to live to a ripe old age. Which is a good thing.
But at some point, and I happen to be at a personal juncture where I'm asking myself a lot of these introspective questions, how many things are we good at?
I'm spending time looking at my career, and after longing for time/space/means to write full time for a living for most of my life, I look at what I do, how I do it, the passion I bring to my work and wonder if it's too late to switch. If I've inadvertently carved a path from which I'm unable to extract myself.
Not to be dramatic, but is it possible to redefine or repurpose after a certain career point and expect success or simply be viewed as eccentric and have your work fall into the avocation category? That would upset me, I think, as writers tend to be sensitive to that kind of feedback that feels condescending, you know? I do know this about myself.
Anyway, as I was observing my long-retired Grandma, and her elderly friends, and my other bits of family and friends, this thought crossed my mind.
Given an opportunity to become that writer, to grow creatively and explore and expand and realize my life-long dream, would I seize it and make myself proud or simply fizzle and end up waiting tables for a living for the first time since college?
And, just how long will life give me to pursue this haunting desire? How many more crazy cycles of growing small companies can I/will I engage in before my compulsion to write to my heart's content outweighs all attempts at logical excuses not to?
My biggest fear is finally getting there, but just too late.
Grandma G is feisty, intelligent, engaged, busy, and observant enough to stir up the pot in her family on a regular basis. Honestly, I hope 90 looks that good on me, I really do.
On a side note, and for full disclosure purposes, when hubby and I tied the knot I made it perfectly clear that 'til death do us part means for a really long time in our family. Really long. He still said 'I do', but I'm pretty sure if he had thought seriously about it, he might have hesitated for at least a beat or two...I'm a lot to take on a good day/week/month/year/decade, so more can be, um, maybe more than he'd bargained for.
For example, Grandma Alice was 89+ when she died. Grandpa was 85. Other Grandpa was 89+ (and had lived that long in spite of rheumatic fever, two major heart surgeries and general disdain for any food that wasn't brown and covered in a salty gravy). His mom, Great Grandma Nellie, was 106, and rumor has it she finally just died because she was bored.
In our family, then, unless you do something to extremes that kills you early or get hit by a bus or an act of God takes you from this reality to the next, you tend to live to a ripe old age. Which is a good thing.
But at some point, and I happen to be at a personal juncture where I'm asking myself a lot of these introspective questions, how many things are we good at?
I'm spending time looking at my career, and after longing for time/space/means to write full time for a living for most of my life, I look at what I do, how I do it, the passion I bring to my work and wonder if it's too late to switch. If I've inadvertently carved a path from which I'm unable to extract myself.
Not to be dramatic, but is it possible to redefine or repurpose after a certain career point and expect success or simply be viewed as eccentric and have your work fall into the avocation category? That would upset me, I think, as writers tend to be sensitive to that kind of feedback that feels condescending, you know? I do know this about myself.
Anyway, as I was observing my long-retired Grandma, and her elderly friends, and my other bits of family and friends, this thought crossed my mind.
Given an opportunity to become that writer, to grow creatively and explore and expand and realize my life-long dream, would I seize it and make myself proud or simply fizzle and end up waiting tables for a living for the first time since college?
And, just how long will life give me to pursue this haunting desire? How many more crazy cycles of growing small companies can I/will I engage in before my compulsion to write to my heart's content outweighs all attempts at logical excuses not to?
My biggest fear is finally getting there, but just too late.
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