Take One For The Team

I’ve been swimming alongside the URI women’s swim team for months now. One day the URI coach said “I have something for you.” As I waited, I contemplated what it might be – a workout plan perhaps. I really had no idea. He gave me an official RAMS swim cap so I could feel like one of the team. Did I mention he is so nice? Always opening up a lane for me, flagging me over to the pool that is dominated by the URI swim team. “We are only supposed to have 4 lanes,” he explained, “but if no one is here, we use them all.” So, he didn’t really think he was being nice, but I did. As a result, I decided I should get him something too, but not something I had to buy. I didn’t want the guy to feel bad. A couple days later, I gave him a copy of my CD Country Road asking him if he liked country music and explaining this was me - Galen McGovern.

A couple days later, in my swimming haze of plugged ears and lack of vision (due to the fact that I stopped swimming with my contacts in), I hear what I think is Neil Young coming from the stereo system by the pool. Hmm, is that Helpless, Helpless, Helpless? Whatever it is, it’s pretty good. I should find out who it is. Wonder why they are playing folk music? Then I realize, it’s my CD blasting away on the side of the pool. The swim coach in nowhere to be seen but I am smiling underwater.

A couple days later, I see the coach and tell him that was pretty funny playing my CD. He said we’d have to find another celebrity to swim with me in the pool. He also asked if I wrote any of the songs. YES, all of them.

And, I thought I was pretty special with my swim cap and the fact that he played my CD, but I have noticed he has given caps to other swimmers. I am not the only one…………………..but I think I might be his favorite as I doubt any of the others gave his country music.

The 378 Best Colleges

“Michael, where is that college book?” I asked.
“I thought you took it,” he said.
“I gave it back.”
So I looked in his room and found it on the floor amidst the wreckage.
“See I told you that you had it,” I said proudly.
“What are you doing in my room?” he asked.
(I can't win)

Unrelated thoughts

• My eyes are getting so bad, I bought non-alcoholic wine. It was positively putrid. Now my memory may be getting bad too – did I write about this wine before?
• Daniel said, “That is one ugly moon.” Now I have never thought of the moon as ugly so I asked why. “Because it’s not full.” Oh.
• Seen on the Domino sugar box: “We’ll always be your sugar.”
• When driving Daniel along a built up stretch of Route 2 he said, “I hate this. Where do they play?” That’s my boy.
• Daniel was doing his touchdown dance in the house and I asked what that was for. “NFL, obviously.” Oh.
• Dangerous question for a woman to ask a man: “Do you notice anything different?” Only answer I could think of that was safe is this: “You look more beautiful than usual.”
• Daniel’s latest: “I need to drain the lizard.”

Unamusing From Main Street

My mother is obsessing over her possessions and every time I see her/talk to her there is some new request for me to help her with something. Her helper says it’s a little dementia. I think as my friend Etta used to say, old people become more the way they are. And it’s not a pretty scene. She is positively obsessing about the dollar cost of things and possessions she can’t keep track of and insulting people and driving everyone crazy in the process. Does she have any redeeming qualities? My friend Nan said something about how she has probably always been this way. At least she used to ask me if I wanted a grilled cheese once in a while. Now it’s a negative energy vortex, sucking me in and sucking me down. And it sucks. It's all about her. As Nan says when we talk about old age “Bus” - meaning get hit by one before you become a burden. Bus. There are nice old people out there, aren't there?

Tips for those of us approaching old age

Be nice.

Don't be a burden. Move into assisted living if you can afford it.

Don't live alone in a house.

Have friends and a community. Stay active with something other than TV.

Realize you are f..cking old, and deal with reality like the fact that you won't drive forever. Plan accordingly.

If you have children, you do not want them to hate you - be nice.