The Middle Ages

My mom once told me that she could tell how old a man was by what he talked about.  Her story went like this:

When men are young, they talk about women.  Amongst themselves, they discuss the cute gal at the gas station, the sexy one who works at the post office, the waitress with the nice curves, how some chick flirted with them at the restaurant - you get the picture.

Middle age arrives and the conversation shifts to food - where you can order a fantastic steak, the best diner, the greasy spoon with heavenly lemon meringue pie, the fabulous Thanksgiving meals Gran used to make…

Old men talk about their ailments - diseases, operations, aches and pains, medicines they are taking, side effects of medicines they are taking, doctors they see, doctors they want to see, upcoming office visits, warts, moles and cloudscapes*. 

(*Autocorrect felt colonoscopies couldn't possibly be what I meant, so she graciously changed it to cloudscapes.)

The Zimmermans in our native habitat - a restaurant booth. 

I was thinking about this conversation the other day and what I hear these days validates my mother's theory.  I even see it in myself. Although I'm not gonna admit that my husband and I are solidly middle aged, I will say that now we go to the grocery store and impulse buy for fun.

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Sweet, Sweet, Music

My mom died in 1999, so why am I thinking about her funeral today? 

Yesterday my friend Ed e-mailed me a joke about a bagpiper. Of course I laughed, because bagpipes are funny. Why?  I don't know; they just are.  That got me thinking about my own bagpipe story, which got me thinking about Mom.

Picture provided by my littlest sister

Before she died, Mom expressed a wish for a bagpiper to play at her funeral. Who EVEN KNOWS a bagpiper? Seriously.  Not me, that's for sure.  I thought she was joking but apparently after I left home the family started attending Highland games and my mother developed a love of the instrument.  So that was that.

Nobody wants to deny their dearly departed mother her dying wish and, miraculously, my sister found someone from a nearby town and hired him. But he got lost on the way.  That really sounds like a set up for a joke but that's what happened.  The funeral went on … no bagpiper.  What are you gonna do, right?

Just as the minister was wrapping up, out of the clear blue sky came the loudest, most horrible squawk I'd ever heard in my life!  It startled me so much that I jumped sky high.  Then I burst out laughing. Because of the noise nobody - except Jerry - heard me.  My shoulders were shaking but Jerry was patting my back, so it looked like I was crying uncontrollably.  The "uncontrollable" part is accurate.  It just wasn't tears. 

At the burial site, the bagpiper stood on a nearby hill and played "Amazing Grace" as they lowered the casket into the earth.  It was haunting.  There wasn't a dry eye among us. 

I still miss my mom and don't think that I would have needed this experience to think of her.  Every time I see a bagpipe though, I re-live her funeral. And, to this very day,  - fifteen years later - I vividly remember that first note. It still sounds like someone choking a very big, very angry bird.

That is why I decided to learn to play the ukulele.

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The Tower

It took Brody a long time to complete his masterpiece.  He labored hard to put the rings on the tower of the classic Fisher Price toy.  When he was finished, his mom told him that it wasn't quite right.

Here's a difference between being a mom and being a grandma -- it looked perfect to me.

Creativity!

Say..cheese?

While Jessica was taking our little yellow man to see the pediatrician, his big brother and I attended his toddler gym class.

The difference between being the Mom and being the Grandma is this:  When you're the Grandma and take your 20-month-old to Gymboree, all you can think about is how germy the toys probably are.