Thursday Friday

Hot black coffee is good for cleaning eyeglasses and Haaretz comes several times a day whether I want it to or not, even after I press unsubscribe; arrives, lets me read a sentence and a half of a news article then says if I want to read more, pay. 

Today we are taking family 19 miles west on 30A beyond SeaSide to Santa Rosa Beach for lunch at Stinky's Fish Camp. More than one car will be involved. Bubba does not appreciate that cars anymore hold four people and whoever sits in the back seat is squnched up so tight as to barely move legs and feet. The old ways were best, when cars were designed for comfort, with spacious legroom, a footrest if you stretch your legs out that far, easy entry and exit, and a kid in the back seat can stand up behind his mom and talk to her as she drives. But I'm done buying cars unless there's a reason. Besides, I'll all too soon need to quit driving altogether, trying to keep an eye on myself to recognize when the time has come. 

When you are twenty it never occurs to you that your grandparents' limitations could ever get personal, you just shake your head. At some point between forty and fifty you start noticing, realize that Time is not imaginary after all, and take off to do all the living you better squeeze in while you're still "young." About sixty-five you notice that you have knees. Beyond seventy you wonder why the hell the young people don't notice that the bulletin print is too small, and steps aren't well marked, and thick rugs are to trip over and thin rugs to slip and fall. By the time I realized what the bishop's committee on aging was for, I was too old for it. It's inane to think a committee on aging should have people who feel sorry for old people; it should have old people.          

Keeps returning to mind: after heart surgery eight years ago this month, AVR/CABG, the people whose job was to ease me back into life and the world with good advice warned me to watch for two things: depression and grouchiness. As I've reported here several times over the years, depression never set in; but the aftermath of a category 5 hurricane is quite depressing to live into and through; and grouchiness has naught with surgery, it's old age entitlement just like "Here, sir, take my seat, I'll stand up and hold my gran'baby," and "Why, thank you, young lady, thank you kindly."

The trip to Stinky's was yesterday, Thursday. I had a dozen half-shell and a draft amber beer, and shared Stinky's "Oyster Log" with everyone else.


Served on a long, flat log, 36 oysters, thirty baked various ways and six fried. 

T