Simple things in life keep you young at heart
What can be more enlightening when you step outdoors with your first morning coffee and come face to face with a brilliant sunrise peeping over the treetops high above a misty and low, ground-hugging fog?
It plum puts a little zing in your heart, especially when you hear a whir of wings overhead and glimpse your first hummingbird of the season heading to his feeder hanging by the kitchen window. Wow, looks like it’s ‘gonna be a great day, in fact, a very good day to cut some grass.
Have you ever realized you have more fun doing things you’ve been told not to do rather than things that are acceptable for you to do?
Well, I’m faced with that decision a good bit of the time and this particular day was one of those times, because when you’re told all the time by your sons, “Now, Mama, don’t be bothering with the grass, I’ll cut it one day this week,” I decided I’d have more fun not listening to my young’uns, simply because I enjoy cutting grass — not sitting high on our John Deere riding lawn mower, but walking behind my 20-inch blade cut push mower.
An early-morning grass cutting with the grass still wet with the dew gives you a pattern to follow as you keep circling around from the outer edge of the section to be cut till you reach the center, kinda like a maize. I prefer the smaller push mower because you have to walk twice as much to get the job done, giving myself twice as much exercise. Plus, like Dennis the Menace says, “Remember, Dad, if you enjoy what you’re doin’ … it won’t feel like work at all.”
Another thing that goes right along with cutting grass is whistling while you’re working, another fun thing I’ve been told not to do. Many, many years ago as a young bride I made the mistake of whistling a gospel song while doing chores in my home, to which my mother-in-law, when hearing me, informed me that girls weren’t suppose to whistle, especially in the house and definitely not a church song.
Well, that was a new one on me, because I had always whistled and still do now, much to her dismay, I’m sure, with her up in heaven. Turns out, there’s an English proverbial phrase saying, “A whistling woman and a crowing hen are neither fit for God nor men.” In other words it’s an improper activity for females. Oh well, I never strived to be fit and proper anyway. Takes away half the fun in life.
Mrs. Alice J. Shaw, was a first and celebrated American artistic whistler, a musical performer who was billed as “The Whistling Prima Donna,” touring Europe and India starting in 1886. She even whistled for the Prince of Wales, but because a whistling woman was sometimes considered vulgar or unwise, she was careful to craft her shows with the utmost decorum.
A few years back, The Island Packet asked readers to make suggestions for their favorite comic strip to be added to the paper. My suggestion was the “Pickles” comic strip by Brian Crane and it was picked and added to the comic section of the paper, so that’s another simple, fun thing I enjoy reading in the morning.
My husband, Harry, had been told by our brother-in-law, from Jacksonville, Florida, who read “Pickles” in his newspaper, that the comic strip reminded him of us, Harry with his white bushy mustache and both of us “debating” all the time.
Brian Crane created “Pickles” featuring a retired couple, Earl and Opal Pickle, along with their family and pets. It just celebrated its 30th anniversary April 2. The April 20 edition had Earl telling Opal: “I came across an inspiring quote this morning by David A. Bednar that said, ‘If today you are a little better than yesterday then that’s enough,’ so this morning I picked up a Cheerio off the floor without being asked, when yesterday I would’ve just left it there.”
Hmm, a simple gesture. Like Dolly Parton said, “A positive attitude and a sense of humor go together like biscuits and gravy.” Can’t beat that!
I have some simple items given to me by friends that make me happy, like an old beat up frying pan that friend Margaret Sanders always used to fry up her “lip-smacking-good” fried chicken in, and when I commented on liking the fry pan she gave it to me. I use that pan all the time and it makes up some good brown gravy as well as crispy fried chicken.
Recently, when visiting friends Czeslaw and Kyrslyna Pasionek at their new home, I admired the four large handcrafted “ants” made from black wrought iron lined up in marching sequence on the edge of their patio. Czeslaw, (Czes for short), walked over, picked one up and said, “By George, this one has the name ‘Jean’ on its bottom,” so now, “Jean,” a large, fun black ant they picked up from a roadside flea market in Gila Bend, Arizona, now resides on my back porch step, making my heart happy.
Henry Ward Beecher said: “Every artist dips his brush in his own soul and paints his own nature into his pictures.”
So, that’s what it boils down to; what color are we painting our own selves so a sunny attitude and personality will shine through, showing others we’re “young at heart”?
Jean Tanner may be reached at jstmeema@hargray.com.