Good Genes

 

My new Passport photo. 

 

 

I'm 65 years old in a couple of months which is just plain ridiculous.  Can't be.  I'm not that old.  Time and years are just weird. 

10 minutes on a drive to the ER with a 3-year old with burns on his legs can be a whole lifetime.  A decade, 10 years of my life, can go by in the blink of an eye.

In July I will have been married 45 years.  In one way, it is an eternity.  But looking back, it has gone by in a flash.  Time is relative.  I've heard and read that.  It must be true.  I'm studying on it.

Thank goodness for the good genes of my ancestors.  I'm going to be 65 years old and I'm a rarity in that I am not taking any prescription drugs.  No blood pressure or cholesterol meds. No water pills or anxiety medicine.  Still, because the government says I have to, I will spend about $16 a month on prescription drug insurance.  I take 4,000 units of Vitamin D daily to help my memory.  I use coconut oil to fry my eggs to help my memory.  I learn new cards and games with my grandchildren to help my memory.  I get out and go walk and go to work and learn new skills.  Yup.  To help my memory. 

The Humana Prescription Part D plan that costs me $15.70 a month isn't going to pay any of my daily preventative medicine costs or reimburse me because I have the common sense (and good genes) to get out and exercise my body and my mind.  So in my way of thinking . . . so much for Government.

I walked up the hill at the cabin yesterday.  Vi's guy, Bob, is gone to Colorado so I walked up to walk Vi's dog for her.  (Being useful and staying involved is also good for the memory.)   Vi has a bad knee and maybe a bad hip.  She walks with a cane.  So, I walk up and get Zoey on a leash and decide to walk around Vi's yard to pick up sticks as there had been wind the past week and I mow her yard (to keep active, fit and involved).  Leash in hand, I step on a railroad tie and it rolls down an incline.  I go head over heels, never letting go of the leash.  I roll and bounce and wallow myself up off the ground and the only damage I find is a sore ankle where it knocked against the railroad tie.  At that moment, I thank God! and am so grateful for my good general fitness and good genes.

At the same time, I am scoffing at the doctors and all the hoopla of the last three decades that told me to take calcium pills because

     1)  there is osteoporosis in my family
     2)  I was a smoker
     3)  I am white
     4)  I am within the recommended weight limits of a woman my height

Over the years the doctor suggested and all the medical health articles touted the use of  calcium to build strong bones.  About 15-20 years ago, I had a bone scan which showed I was 'at the low level' and should take a high-priced, high-faluting drug that could have caused about 12 serious side effects.  I refused the prescription and any further bone scans so when I turned that cartwheel yesterday and got up thanking The Lord there were no broken bones, I was also thumbing my nose at the medical specialists and pharmaceutical companies who had wanted me to hand over the $$$s for the calcium, tests and prescriptions. 

Oh, this post makes me happy!  I may write another.