school | Life on a Colorado Farm

Yesterday was my birthday…I’m now 64 years old.

It always surprises me that I made it to anywhere after 50. I don’t know why it does, but it does.

I can remember sitting in my desk in the first grade of school, the teacher, Miss Mable Howard, was talking about the 20th century ending and the 21st century beginning…I remember thinking that none of that makes any sense at all.

Then she talked about the year 2000, you have to do the math, but this was waaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaay back in 1955, the year 2000 was sooooo farrrrrr away that I couldn’t even get it to come into focus. Since it was so far away I decided that I would make it to the age of 50, which was really, really, ancient and just let everything else take care of itself.

As the years progressed I would think about that little girl so long ago deciding to be fifty and then let every thing else just happen as it would. Fifty seems like a real nice number, way back when. It still does.

When I was fifty I lost my best friend/sister, my beloved Grandmother, and both my parents. Strangely my life did end at the age of fifty. Every year after fifty has been a surprise and a gift. A year to treasure and be thankful for. I am not sick, nor do I have beloved family or friends ill, what I have is a new year that my little 6 year old mind could not comprehend in 1955.

A gift of life.

Many of you have emailed me birthday wishes, which adds richly to my birthday. My children and my grandchildren and my step-grandchildren have widened my life to a whole of completeness. I have become the matriarch of our family, which still seems like an odd thing, but also a blessing.

Really, life is truly a circle and one we all get to rejoice in.