Blog #489                                July 23, 2026

 

Have you noticed that on every corner, they’re building a new Senior Citizens Residence Center?  Do you know who they’re building them for?  They’re building them for all those people who rode bikes without a helmet when they were kids.  All those people who drank water from a hose, played outside without sunscreen, put butter on their popcorn and rode with nine other kids in the back of the station wagon with no seatbelts.  All those people who played with dirt and acorns and bugs, ate hotdogs every day and swam in the quarry.  And all those people who stared for hours at Howdy Doody and Lash Larue while double-dipping their spoon in the Peter Pan jar.  I wonder how we all made it this far.

 

But I’m glad we did.  Hi there and welcome back.  I hope you are feeling spiffy!  My wife is out celebrating her birthday for the 23^rd time, so I have some time to chat.  My coevals and I have made it this far, they tell us, by eating healthily.  By “they”, I mean the ever-increasing accumulation of supercilious busybodies who think they know how to run my life.  Well, I have a bulletin for them – there is only one person who knows how to run my life - Carol.   And she does not need your help!

 

How about coeval as our Weekly Word?  A coeval is a person of roughly the same age as oneself; a contemporary.  Where else can you learn a useless word every week?

 

You probably can tell that I love telling stories.  Most of my stories have been told to my grandchildren.  Tyler used to sit on my lap and say, “Poppy, say a once-upon-a-time.”  I tried telling stories to Carol, but it didn’t work out.  She’d always be working a crossword puzzle, reading a book and making dates for one of her birthday celebrations all at the same time.  Yet she was still able to criticize every Mother Goose or Brothers Grimm story that I told.

 

Forget that Rapunzel woman.  Nobody wears their hair that long anymore.

What mother would name a kid Rumpelstiltskin?  That’s ridiculous.

Glass slippers are out!

The tortoise beats the hare?  That’s stupid.  The tortoise is too slow.

Jill would never have gone up that hill with Jack.  She would have gone shopping.

Gotta go now.  Thanks for the story.  Next time talk faster.

 

Maybe I’ll do better telling you a once-upon-a-time.  Once upon a time, 59 years ago, a skinny little boy (21) married a beautiful girl (21).  They saved her wedding gown for over 30 years thinking their first daughter, Jennifer, would wear it, but Jennifer was taller than her mother.  Besides, a bride wants her own dress.  I’m surmising this, of course, never having been a bride or being in possession of even the smallest sliver of fashion acumen.  Anyway, Jennifer got her own wedding gown and we saved that and then there was Abby’s wedding dress and we saved that too.  And that made three. Stephanie was married at a ranch in the wine country of California, and the wedding attire was more blue-jean than white.  

 

I’m rambling here, but it’s making me think of the time years ago when one of my employees told me her granddaughter was getting married and they were doing everything without spending money.  Grandma was doing the cooking and a friend had offered their house for the reception.  In the spirit, I told her we had three wedding dresses in the cedar closet and I’d be happy to let her granddaughter choose one.  I don’t think it would fit, the Grandma said; she’s 8 ½ months pregnant.  Wow, I said, I hope she doesn’t have the baby while she’s walking down the aisle.

 

The wedding was slightly belated

The bride was already dilated

We sang “Here Comes the Bride

Eight centimeters wide

To get herself wed, then sedated.”

 

Carol has begun to listen to classical music when she reads.  First of all, I cannot do two things at once.  I cannot read while listening to anything.  I cannot talk and drive at the same time.  Anyway, the classical music she plays is very pleasant, but it’s not for me, and the reason is that it takes too long.  If you have something good, get it done in three minutes.  That’s about my limit, and that’s why I love Rock ‘n Roll.

 

But there was one exception.  I have often shared with you some of my eccentricities, peculiarities and peccadillos, and if you’ve read enough of these blogs, you will have realized that this kind of crap cannot be coming from a stable mind, and you’d be right.  One of my most unstable periods occurred about 20 years ago, when I actually began to visit a shrink.  My symptom was that I was listening to the same song every night, Alice’s Restaurant by Arlo Guthrie.  Every night, every single night, I would sit in the kitchen with my iPod, or whatever it was we were using then, and listen to Alice’s Restaurant, which doesn’t seem so bad until you realize that Alice’s Restaurant lasts for 22 minutes and 26 seconds.  I don’t think the shrink helped me any, and my devotion to the song faded away over the years, but the experience did lead to my understanding of Snow White.

 

Snow White was actually the first psychiatrist, and she began practicing when she was visited by the Seven Dwarfs.  She asked each one of them if he was Happy, and when only one said yes, she knew they needed help.  She hung up a Psychiatrist shingle, and one day, a neighbor saw the dwarfs leaving her office and said, “What is she doing to those little fellows, shrinking them?  And that’s how the term “shrink” became associated with psychiatrists.

 

Message from Shakespeare:  Come, now a roundel and a fairy song (A Midsummer Night’s Dream).  I think it should have been Snow White and the Seven Cats, and they’d elect me as their leader and call me Chairman Meow.  Purr.

 

Ok, that’s enough crazy for one week.  Please come back next week.  I’ll tell you another story if you do.  And in the meantime, stay well and count your blessings.  And remember, you can get anything you want at Alice’s Restaurant.

 

Michael                                    Send comments to mfox1746@mail.com