Senior Moments 2000

Walmart was our location – doesn’t everybody have to go there?  Our nearest Walmart is twelve miles away.  We always have a list of assorted items to buy on our trips to this “store that has everything”, and we were in the drug area on this particular afternoon.

One feels so stupid when things such as this happen, but nevertheless, I was looking for the toothpaste we use and for the life of me I couldn’t remember the name of it.  John and I were intent on finding the right kind — looking for the right coloring instead of name.  I looked up and saw this old man staring at us from the main isle and wondered why he was looking at us.  I first thought our conversation and inability to find what we needed were entertaining to him.  However, after a few seconds I discovered that he continued to stand there and stare.  Without my hearing devices, I didn’t know what was being said, but knew John had engaged in conversation with the elderly gentleman.  I couldn’t imagine who that was – he had on a baseball cap (it seems country men aren’t dressed without one) and shorts!  When I looked up the third time and heard him laughing, I recognized him as one of our neighbors; and on top of that we had graduated from high school together (so did his wife)!  I couldn’t believe I hadn’t known who he was!  Of course, we had to all laugh about that and he reminded me of my age (the youngest one in that graduating class, but now well into the senior years).

Moving on around the store, we ran into him again and this time he was with his sister-in-law (instead of his wife).  I asked about their spouses (who are brother and sister).  These two couples live next door to each other, and today were shopping together.  I was told, they had just come from Kmart where Brother had left some items on the bench where he had been sitting and had gone back to try to find them (so I’m not the only one who has senior moments).  We talked about several things – one being the price of gasoline and that fact that we had to conserve in whatever way we could.

This elderly gentleman gave us that hearty laugh and remarked, “If we had known you needed to come here we could have picked you up to ride with us.”  It just may come to that — after all, we are trying to live on a fixed income.  I’ve said many times that retirement is twice as much husband and half as much money.  Another saying I used early on after John’s retirement was that I married him for better or worse, but not for lunch!  Oh well, that’s been so long now that I’ve forgotten what it was like not to have him home for lunch.

It seems I’m always writing about how it used to be, but I read one time that older people talk about the past because they have no future, and young people talk about the future because they have no past.  Maybe that’s the way it is with me writing Country Living.

We might as well laugh as cry about the senior moments; we all have them and we feel fortunate to have been able to hang around long enough for them to “set in.,”  And another thing, I’m told by someone older than me that it’s not going to get any better — this senior style of country living.

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