I made a bank deposit at the drive through the other day and drove away with both my deposit slip and the big pneumatic cylinder that they return the slip in. I didn't realize it until that evening when I looked over and wondered what the odd thing sitting on my passenger seat was. Oh.....
When I told Alex about it the next morning, she just rolled her eyes and shook her head. If Bess had been in the room, I'm pretty sure they would have exchanged one of their knowing glances--that irritating, conspiracy of youth look that says, "I think Mom is losing it."
I'm turning 60 in a couple of weeks and the girls seem to see this as some sort of milestone, although not necessarily a good one. I'm pretty sure they've started looking for signs of deterioration. And I don't doubt that they're finding them.
Saturday, for instance, I couldn't come up with my cat's name. Which is a little bit pathetic since her name is "Kitty." But, really, it was no big deal. I just used the anonymous call of, "Here kitty, kitty, kitty," and the cat came running. No harm, no foul so to speak.
My girls tend to see it differently though. They seem to think that forgetfulness is a bad thing. That it's tied up with aging. Or brain cells dying. Or Mom losing it. And so they look for signs.
I probably should just ignore them. But it's kind of got me worried that Alex may decide pretty soon that she can't let my grandson Flynn ride in a car with me. Come to think of it... I've never actually driven him anywhere yet. And last weekend when I offered to drive home from St. Louis, she and Andy were quick to say that they weren't the least bit tired even though neither one of them has had a full nights sleep since Flynn arrived eight weeks ago.
I think it might be time to sit down with the girls and explain to them that I'm okay, and that 60 is the new 40. That I can still finish a crossword puzzle before either of them, name all of the finalists on Dancing With the Stars, read several books a week (even if I can't remember the titles), and react in record time at seeing anything vaguely resembling a mouse scampering across the floor. And that car accident this past winter? It was absolutely not my fault. Okay, I might bear a little responsibility for the broken back window in the Harms' Explorer, but that other accident...I was faultless.
"Being able to text," I'll explain to them, "or having a phone with a keyboard, is not an appropriate test for competency."
"And a little forgetfulness at a bank drive through is not a sign of impending senility. After all, I did remember to get my deposit slip. It's right over....well, it's somewhere around here."
All those signs they think they're seeing--they're really just nothing.
When I was expecting Alex, I spent the entire nine months embroidering a special hand made blanket for her. And then, on our very first outing, I set it on top of the car while buckling Alex in, forgot about it, and lost it forever somewhere along highway 40 in St. Louis. My guess is that it probably ended up right beside my three gas caps that had the same fate. And these things happened while I was a young 30-something.
Surely the girls must remember me driving them to grade school and arriving with my coffee cup still on top of the car. And I was how old then? A baby...no more than 37.
And what about that time that I wore two different shoes to the mall and shopped for 30 minutes before looking down and seeing one brown, one black, one flat, one with a heel. I don't think I was even out of my 40's.
That lost book that I finally found in the freezer....I was no more than 42 when I put it there. Using hand lotion instead of conditioner on my hair....I've done that fairly regularly for decades. Forgetting to put the eggs in the recipe...not all that unusual over my lifetime of cooking. And what about your Aunt Ellen? She was only in her 30's when she drove the carpool and remembered to pick up everyone except her own daughter, who she left stranded at the grade school.
"So girls," I'll explain, "the next time I drive off with the bank's cylinder, or forget your name, or open up the freezer when I'm looking for my book, don't assume that I'm losing it. Because, believe me, I lost it a long time ago."
And by the way, if you don't see me when you're reading this and think I might have wandered off, don't worry. Flynn and I just went out for a little car ride.
