Loving La Vida Lago

The water laps at the shore, a breeze causes the tendrils of the willow tree to gently sweep the rocky beach, a noisy group of geese fly overhead, lazily making their way into a great V. This is lake country, the Okanagan of BC and I am here for a week in the last gasp of summer. It's mid -September so the kids are back in school and the lake is largely quiet. Only the occasional boat goes by and I have yet to see one pulling a tube or a wake boarder. Summer fun is over in lake country. The sun is still warm mid-day but the nights and mornings are cool.
Sitting here on this dock with the sun in my face, the smell of the lake in the air, the stickiness of sunscreen on my skin, I could be any age, 7, 17 or 47.  For all that things have changed in the last fifty years some things are still so much the same. The lake is the lake is the lake. Especially now at this time of year when the Jet Skis and Sea Doos are silent.

Lots of tubing with our kids.

Coming here as a kid we played on canvas air mattresses that had to be dried in time to sleep on that night, and truck inner tubes inflated at the local gas station.  We slurped up overripe peaches and buried the pits in the sand, cooked wieners over campfires and went to bed sunburnt. It was heaven.  The sun was hot, the lake was cold, the skies brilliant blue. Some of my very best memories revolve around time spent at the lakes of the Okanagan.  We brought our kids to these lakes as well, dragging along boats and SeaDoos and staying in homes not campsites but the lake is the lake is the lake. We ate peaches, roasted wieners and tried not let the kids get so sunburnt. I hope their memories of those times are as savoured by them as mine are are by me.

Everyone enjoys the lake their way!

Without children at home to plan summer vacations around we don't get to the lake so often. For a few years now we've spent some time on the Sunshine Coast enjoying the ocean and hiking in the forest. Occasionally we take the plunge into the chilly ocean waters when the air gets hot enough. It's not the same as the lake though and I had missed it, so this year we chose Okanagan Lake for a week.
Trying to find a waterfront place at the last minute in the Okanagan is almost impossible so we booked for September when things open up. The weather is a bit more of a gamble but we got lucky and had sunshine for six out of seven days. The sun wasn't as hot, the water felt colder and there were lamb chops on the BBQ not wieners but, you know.....it's still the lake. We sat on the dock with friends, soaked up the sun and listened to the lap of the water.  My husband, Ted showed off his prowess on the diving board while others opted for a paddle in the canoe. Two of our group even indulged in a late night dare of a naked jump off the dock. I wasn't one of them and I'm not telling who it was! The point is, we had fun, even though we are older and not tipping each other out of inner tubes into the lake, it was fun. There is something about the water, the dock,  the swaying willows that brings out the kid in us. So as I sat there alone on the dock that first day, the sun on my face, the year's fell away. I didn't worry about how I  look in a bathing suit or if I was getting too much sun, I just breathed in the lake smell, listened to the sound of the water and wished someone would bring me a tomato and mayo sandwich to make the day complete. Sometimes life can be that simple.

On The Precipice

I turned fifty-nine years old a couple of months ago and that fact seems to be on my mind quite frequently these days. It has been said that sixty is the new forty. What does that mean exactly? That question keeps popping into my brain as my sixtieth birthday comes ever closer. I neither feel nor look forty, that much I know, but what should I look or feel like at sixty?  The spirit of me that was nine is still the same at fifty-nine, that doesn't change but the body I carry that spirit around in has.  

Yes, this is who I am inside.

Fifty years ago perhaps, forty was the age of the dreaded "mid-life" crisis where men had affairs with their secretaries and traded in the family station wagon for a little red sports car and women had sex with the gardener now that the kids were in college. People married younger, had a family younger so by forty they were envisioning the life that many of us nearing sixty have in front of us now. Children are finally out of the house, relationship issues settled for better or worse, more financial stability. 
Back then parents in their forties probably seemed as old to their twenty-something offspring as we appear to ours now. Is that what is meant by "sixty is the new forty"? My parents generation grew up faster but did they really grow old faster or is that just a construct of my egotistical, rule-the-world, 'aren't we the best' generation of Baby Boomers? We have to believe that we can't possibly be as old at whatever age we are as our ancient parents seemed to be. 

June and Gabe ready to party
in 1972!  They are 51 and 43

I have a picture of my mother at her sixtieth birthday and when I look at that and think of who she really was and what she was doing at that age it is no different than my generation. No, she wasn't trying to wear clothes that her daughters were wearing or taking Boot Camp classes but she did go back to work after I left home and she and my dad were traveling and partying with friends in their spare time.  Living their life and enjoying it. No different than my husband and myself now. 
Its a conceit to believe because we may think we are fitter, better dressed, hipper and more worldly than the generation before us that somehow we are "younger". Sixty is sixty. If you were to open me up and examine what was there and compare it to what my mother's insides looked like at sixty you would probably not find much difference, in fact she might come out on top. I have had a different sort of life filled with more fast food and alcohol, more pressures and stresses over parenting and lifestyle, added to by social media and Martha Stewart. I've been bombarded by microwaves and the constant societal pressure to be young and perfect and yet, most of my peers require reading glasses, many have hearing aids, a surprising amount have hip replacements and are on blood pressure or cholesterol medication. We are not forty, and modern medicine is not going to save us in the way we think it will. 

So at fifty-nine and counting I feel as though I am standing on a precipice. I have been playing around in the forest, and now I have wandering over to the edge and am looking down. Unlike when forty was forty and there was still many years ahead, at sixty there are more years behind than ahead now. As I contemplate all this, the words of my late father, Gabe, come into my head. When he turned eighty he told me that he had never been bothered by any birthday except for his eightieth. He knew that he was probably in his last decade and that pissed him off a bit. He died at 87. I'm not feeling morbid or old or afraid of dying. I will choose to back away from the edge, live my life not looking down, unafraid of any birthday, like Gabe. And at eighty I'll let you know how it feels. 

No Going Back

You cannot escape the fact that it is 'back to school' time right now. Every form of media blasts us with sales related to school supplies, childrens clothing, lunch box items and dorm bedding.  It's a big business and one that my parents contributed to for the twelve years of my own schooling and then I added to for the fifteen years it took to get my two sons through from kindergarten to grade twelve. For the first few years of elementary school with my sons the supplies list was strictly adhered to, often pre-purchased through the school as a once a year thing, no thought required, until the pile of unused pencil crayons, water colour palettes and glue sticks started to spill out of the cupboards at home. Time to reconsider.  So I shifted to only filling in the gaps in the lists at the start of each year, relabeling items as necessary.  Don't get me started on the labeling. Seriously, do not get me started!  

Private School ready!

Then came high school in a private school where besides requiring the full kit of a uniform and gym strip, that all needed labeling as it was identical for every kid, (don't get me started!) there came separate supply lists from each teacher.  Very specific binder sizes and colours, unusual paper requirements, a special four colour pen, etc etc. Most of this was duly purchased by me and rarely used by the boys. I could never figure that out. Why such a specific requirement when the teacher never actually required the students to use it?  Or did my children just ignore the request? Quite possible.

 My boys both had short lived post-secondary educations that required little more than a binder, some paper and an expensive computer. If they needed anything else I had shelves full of supplies to choose from. But who uses a pencil anymore? Or graph paper or duo-tangs or highlighters or glue sticks?? Nobody I know. Maybe in grade one or two those items are still in high demand but I doubt it.

So fast forward a few years, both sons are no longer in any academics, and my husband and I are preparing for a move. Well, I am doing the preparing, husband is doing the envisioning. While filling boxes I throw open a cupboard to find...school supplies. Dozens of binders, all sizes and colours, some never used. Ditto for those damn duo-tangs and I think you have to be over a certain age to even know what those are. Felt pens, pencil crayons, endless pencils and sharpeners, scissors, tape, binder dividers, White-Out and unbelievably, reinforcements. Those little white stick-on circles that repair and reinforce the holes in binder paper.  What teacher required those and ever got a student to use them? And then there are the reams of paper. Ack!

I was not about to pack and move this stuff to my new place but it pains me to throw out perfectly good items that I have paid for so I had to come up with another solution.  First  I decided to  completely outfit my home office and that of my huband with the best of the stuff. Okay, that took care of maybe a tenth of the supplies. Then I recycled anything that could be recycled, filling my blue curbside collection bag.  All usable items were donated to the thrift store. While watching TV at night I worked my way through a shoe box full of pens and felt pens checking each one to see if it still worked. Yes, I am dogged and thrifty, I admit it. I did throw out broken and crummy stuff, even I have my limits, I am not a hoarder! 

My youngest son graduated high school seven years ago and it has taken me that long  to divest myself of the overabundance of school supplies. I'm feeling good about it now but every so often I will open a drawer and see a pair of small, blunt ended paper scissors with one of my sons' name carefully written on it and I am brought right back to the memory of that mountain of unnecessary things I purchased in the name of education. Then I say a little prayer for the moms and dads out dragging around Staples this week, supply list in hand, trying to do the right thing. I pray that they can throw down the sale flyers, wait to see what their child actually requires and never have to go through dealing with the trail of school supply debris that I had to. I am never doing "back to school" again and it feels wonderful!

Put It On The Bucket List!

I am so excited. I put something new on my bucket list today and it's fulfillment is decades away.  It will be something left for me to look forward to after I turn 90.  My goal?... to become a medal winning athlete in my age group before I die.  I was inspired by the article on the front page of the Vancouver Sun about a 100 year old woman, Man Kaur, who is cleaning up at the Masters Americas Games that were held here in Vancouver.  She finished the 100 metre race in one minute and twenty-one seconds. Not exactly in the same class as Usain Bolt but good enough for a gold medal for her. Yup. She also won gold in javelin and shot put. No other  female competitors in her age group category so she wins gold in pretty much everything she enters. Now that's the kind of sporting competition I can get into. 

                                                      The much decorated Man Kaur.

The much un-decorated Faye

I'm no athlete. Growing up I managed to learn to swim, skate and ride a bike, that was about it. I suck at racquet sports despite taking many lessons, due to poor depth perception and lousy hand/eye coordination. I took skiing lessons but quit the sport after a few tries down the hills. Much money was spent on golf lessons and equipment, with too many hours wasted whacking balls at the driving range. All to no avail. I haven't golfed in years although I did give it a good try for about a decade.  Team sports in high school? No. I was an honour roll student who barely squeaked out a C+ or B in gym and that was mainly due to good attendance and always having my gym strip.  And track and field? Never happened.

That is not to say that I don't keep fit because I do. I aerobicized my way through my twenties, ran around after my two young boys in my thirties, swam, hiked, walked, slogged through workouts at the gym for a decade and a half, and have now settled on walking and yoga. So I am keeping myself in shape getting ready for my final decade of athletic excellence.  It's going to be wonderful. Travel, camaraderie, fame! Maybe even a front page in the digital news or however we will be getting it in thirty plus years.  My new idol, Ms. Kaur, who was featured in the paper didn't start training until 93!  

The only snag I can see in my plan to die with a dozen or more gold medals around my neck is the fact that I am aging right in the middle of the Baby Boom. Shit. There will be so many others trying to do what I'm doing. Competition might be tougher than it is for Ms. Kaur. And then there is the teensy, weensy, little issue of living till past 90.  There will be way too much competition in the under 80 category with all the damn Boomers so I have to stay healthy and hang in until at least 90, maybe 95 even. And I guess that will be the ultimate bucket list entry after all. But still, think of it, me, a track and field star! If only my grade seven gym teacher would be around to see it, she would never believe her eyes.