WHAT DO YOU FRET ABOUT-- YOUR AGE OR YOUR WEIGHT?

 JOHN SAID HE TELLS PEOPLE "I don't know my wife's age.  

C'MON, I KNOW HIS AGE, AND HIS HEIGHT, WEIGHT,  SHOE SIZE, PAN'T SIZE, HAT  SIZE, --ALSO WHAT SIZE UNDERWEAR TO PURCHASE. ALSO, WHAT SIZE SPORTS JACKET FITS HIM.

Wrist size?  Of course I know what wrist-watch he'd like, though he wears a digital timex. He loves rings. especially our  tall (below the knuckle) 18 karat solid gold wedding rings that we rarely wear because they are ucomfortable. He likes cufflinks, including the 3/4 inch fancy pair that has a floral pattern.  

I used to shop for his sweaters at the 17th street Barney' before it  closed--greens, browns, never purple--purple clashes with his skin tone. Now there's two Brooks Brothers within walking distance but the dresser where we keep his sweaters is jammed and has to be left open for at least 4 days till the moth ball smell fades into tolerable.

Currently he buys exercise outfits for me in Greewich Village, last Xmas--an extra warm, extra large,  flannel Salmon-colored exercise outfit that makes me feel like a big something or other who escaped from a tank.  I gave it to his oldest, wisest sister, Lee Gunter who brags--"the moment my brother saw this outfit, he bought it for ME!  Lee Gunter wore it with the 6 turquoise necklaces brother John gave her for her 50th birthday last year. 

 HE BUYS THINGS FOR ME LIKE THAT, SO  LEE GUINTER  CAN WEAR THEM.  I WONDER IF I CAN  BORROW THE NECKLACES? THEY'D LOOK GREAT ON ME IN ONE OF MY JOGGING SUITS.  I WEAR  DIFFERENT STYLE SUIT EVERY DAY.  COULD THAT BE WHY MY HUSBAND  DOESN'T KNOW MY AGE?  YES! Every time I look different, we have to figure out who I really am again. It's quite titilating for someone who's been married for 8, going on 9 years. 

TITILATING?  HEY, ITS FUN!!!!!!!!!!!!

GRABBING THE DAY

 GO FOR IT.  BE SURPRISED, BEWILDERED, SHOCKED,  OR AMUSED  BY WHAT'S AHEAD, LOOKING BEYOND WHOMEVER IS WAITING IN LINE, STANDING ON TIPPY TIP-TOES AS  YOU STRETCH LONG, REACH HIGH OR PALM THE FLOOR, SMILING YOUR MOST CONFIDENT SMILE,  WHILE EATING A CHOCOLATE BAR OR TWO. 

CONCENTRATE     

 

                       SNAG 

DON'T  JUST  HANG AROUND   

Be your REALLY TRULY REAL  GRABBER SELF

BOLDNESS

 

 BRAVERY 

FEARLESSNESS

SAYING GOODNIGHT TO PEOPLE I LOVE

Who? 

WELL OF COURSE JOHN CULLUM. 

If I count how many years we've been together it tells a private tale of when and how we got together --revealing enough about how old we are, so that I need to behave like a sensible, contented older woman, but ....but I shared the whole day with you--you brew the coffee and make sure there's extra packets of sweetner cause you know I want it extra sweet but won't use sugar ever since my dancing days when I watched my weight scrupulously. Did most things scrupulously. Yes, everything that's sweet is made sweeter with artifical sweetner and you always make sure it's on the table ----the sugar packets--cause I Iike  it sweet, and I shared this day with you--the steak you cooked for my supper that YOU didnt really want to eat, but ate smothered with kethup. Anyway, you know me so well I don't bother to pretend to be sensible, and can don my silliness or kiss your hands when you figure it's time for me to have an "activia" strawberry yogurt.  Yes, you watchover me; I decided to pull togther the book I am writing on line with the help of WHO--well  of course it's Shareen. Brilliant, creative sister daughter dearest truly best friend who married and divorced our son JD who lives way way out west and puts photos of sunsets on his facebook posts--she loves him, I love him and who and what he really is now a days, well I can only sort of imagine. Not ask 'tho I think he is inside and outside a idea man, a deeply philosophical man-man. So therefore, also  ignoring typos I want to say goodnight to Jd  and Shareen  and John my husband and say grab tomorrow -- with all the confusing woeful things that are heating up--covid, Trump, open or don't open schools  etcetera -- you don't need a list---just grab tomorrow and live. I am with you and love you hugely. 

ME AND JOHN

I think about this special guy (John Cullum every day--if there was/ is/ a watchful, listening LORD above us, I bet he would approve. Since I am thinking and writing about THE REAL ME, you are getting the story about me --"The Real Me,'" ---and also getting the story of Frankee Ryder, a passionately committed girl/woman who very early in her life, always ALWAYSwrote on the bathroom mirror. 

Frankee didn't budge till the letters on the mirror melted and ran together-- I WILL DANCE TILL I DIE--  I W D T I D  ...

(Wish there were a way I could ramble on in upper and lower case with what I'm typing and NOT use caps: Our son JD (John David Cullum) says when you write in caps, you are shouting. Although I am not shouting, right now I am sharing a few moments when I feel this is really me.)  

If right now I am REALLY ME, declaring it like JD said, what can you grab onto from this "shout?" 

You are possibly rabbing it, understanding what I'm saying loudly right now

        (Please, read this with dramatic energy)

  I wanted to be a great dancer more than anything in the world and I did it!