Thought for the day

It’s challenging, but you have to at least try to eat right and exercise.

The sixties were coming to a close and everything that was important was happening on a college campus—or at least I thought it was. Civil rights, women’s rights, protests against the Vietnam war, fighting for the rights of migrant workers, the Beatles, hippies, the draft, getting the vote for 18-year-olds. But I wasn’t going to college.

Okay, so I can’t go to college. I won’t let this stop me. I will be part of the social revolution!

Thankfully, my mother had insisted I take a typing class in high school. “Just in case,” she said. Just in case what? “You’ll always be able to get as a secretary.”

In case I don’t get married was what she meant. In case I don’t go to college was what I thought.

But just like college, marriage did not look like it was going to happen. Living at home wasn’t’ in my plan either. Neither was Timothy Leary’s philosophy of “Tuning in and dropping out.” I needed a job. So, secretary it was. women-in-office

How could I explain my fall from activist grace to my friends. I couldn’t admit that I had succumbed to the evil establishment. Women’s libbers were encouraged to resist the society’s traditional roles, pull away from the stereotype—be all we could be, whatever that was. And it wasn’t a housewife or secretary.

I felt like a social activist camouflaged as a secretary. I had to redeem myself in the eyes of my fellow resistance fighters.

Did I mention I lived in the Deep South? No? Well, secretaries in the South in the 60’s and 70’s wore the clothes from hell—dresses, nylons, pumps. No pants, no bare legs. Kathryn Hepburn was not a highly regarded role model for young women. But this was it! This was my cause! Pants in the office, trousers as Kathryn would say. women-wearing-pants

Images of Gloria Steinem’s revelations of the degradation of women as Playboy Bunnies flashed before me. I would expose the misogynistic dress code and fight for women to be allowed pants in the office.

I was ready to defend the rights of women!

I stood outside my boss’s office door building up my courage. I smoothed my A-line skirt and tucked in my shirt.

“Mr. Sanders. I want to talk to you about the requirement that women in our office wear skirts or dresses. Women should be able to wear pants in the office.”

“You are absolutely right,” he said. equal-pay-pic

Who knew he was such a liberal! I began rehearsing a more hard won version of this victory to my friends depicting myself as the quiet revolutionary.

September 18, 2016

Thought for the day

Fortunately it’s not as hard to brush my teeth every day as it is to write a “thought for the day.”

September 11, 2016

Thought for the day

I am so proud and grateful for my family:

My son’s father, 20-year Green Beret, deceased Viet Nam veteran

My husband, 30-year Marine, retired

My daughter-in-law, 20-year Navy, active duty.

September 8, 2016

Thought for the day

Sugar is a necessity of life. Wish it wasn’t so.

September 6, 2016

Thought for the day

Decades ago when I first began simplifying my life, I made the decision that plants belong outside. It was the right choice then. Today my life is simpler and less cluttered—the perfect setting for my new friendship cactus. I can’t wait to re-pot it tomorrow!

September 5, 2016

Thought for the day

Today’s a holiday. The gym is more packed than normal. It’s great to see that people in my community don’t take a holiday from working out!

I can’t do squat!

Daily Prompt – Sidewalk

I can’t do squat! And I mean that literally. The older I get, the less cooperative my knees are and the lower I can squat. This is probably the biggest reason my backside is flat as a pancake. Well, maybe not literally but pretty close. And every year, especially now that I’m closer to 70 than 60, what little rear end I have droops lower and lower. It’s been years since anyone told me that I squat “ass to the grass.”

jb plank — Seriously, who needs a butt when they can do an extended plank like this!

When I ask a potential female client what her goals are, nine times out of ten, it involves her booty. For many women, working out is all about the butt. Harder, firmer, higher, rounder, smaller, less jiggly, ad infinitum. And the squat, of which there are hundreds of variations, is the all-time glute day favorite.

There are some girls (and by that I mean women under 40) who do glute work every day. I call them the “Queens of Squat,” and they love it when I bestow the title upon them. When I see one of the queens working out, I can’t help it, my mind starts reciting my pet gym mantra, “we must, we must, we must improve our butt.”

While my caboose may not be high and tight, it’s not too flabby either. And I owe my somewhat fit, tiny hiney to an exercise I lovingly call the “side walk” or “penguin walk.” My clients call it the walk from hell. There are several variations. If you are suffering with knee pain, choose a style that doesn’t require you to bend your knees. Remember, if there’s pain, you must abstain.

I like using a resistance band, but the “side walk” can be just as effective with your body weight, sans equipment. If you tightly squeeze your gluteus muscles during this exercise, you will feel the burn. When a client tells me she thought of me every time she went to the potty, I know I’m doing my best work.

Here are the basics.

Position your feel shoulder width apart. The band should be taunt but not stretched. You can place the band above your knees or closer to your ankles. If you have a resistance tube, step on the tube and hold the handles to create resistance.
Bend your knees slightly and move into a half-squat position to activate the gluteus muscles.
Keeping your feet in line with your shoulders, step sideways to the right keeping the band tensed. Without releasing the band’s tension, continuing side stepping for 10 reps.
Repeat to the left for ten reps.

Trust me, you’ll be thinking about me tomorrow.

I “like” your post

Remember those little squares of paper we folded up to flip out with questions like, “do you like me?” You move your fingers to flip the squares to get the answer. Ideally a “yes.” I need one of those little things for blogging. fortune teller paper.jpg

When I like what you have to say, hey, that’s easy. Just click “like.” If I’m lucky, a link will show up and ask for my comment. Most of the time, that doesn’t happen and then I’m searching all over the site to find where I can make a comment on what you said. I really like you and want to say something to you. Geeze, it’s like standing on your front porch and banging on your door. Where are you? I know you’re there somewhere. Open the darn door.

Don’t you want to talk to me? Or the worst question, don’t you like me? It took me a while to find the little “star” on, I think it’s the WP Admin, I’m not sure, but whatever. But I found it, and now I can find your comments to me without scrolling through every post on my blog to see if anybody liked me or wanted to say something to me. It was just a little tedious. I’m rolling my eyes now.

Here’s the point of this post, sorry it took me so long to get here. I’m going to select one blog that I follow or want to follow and read it all, or least a month or two if you’ve been blogging all your life, of your blog. Isn’t that a super idea. Okay. It’s not my idea. I stole it from Sele Moir.

I’m only giving him a little of the credit though. Some credit belongs to Kids and Life After 40

She told me (commented) that we must be related because we had so much in common. I was a little embarrassed because I wasn’t “following” her and she must have been following me, or at least finding me wandering out there somewhere. Well, what if we were related. I always thought I was adopted, so somewhere out there is my real family. Naturally, I had to check it out, so I read her whole blog. Fortunately, for me she’s only been blogging for three months.

I couldn’t believe it! We might be sisters! Well, sister, I’m following you now. It will be easy because we have a best friend in common, sugar. The three of us should probably set up a date for shopping, especially if there are coupons or “two-for-ones” and we can squeeze in a stop at the food court. Both our minds tend to be a little busy and jump around a lot, but hopefully, we’ll be a good influence on each other because we want to write and blog better.

You’ll like my friends. Hopefully, I’ve pinged or linked or hooked or whatever so you can meet them.

https://kidsandlifeafter40.wordpress.com/

https://selemoir.wordpress.com/