Today I Celebrate

Today is my 87th birthday and a doctor at one of those fast med places told me yesterday I was in great health and had 10,000 more miles to go. He’d never seen me before and made his assumption based on questions such as “Did you grow up on a farm?” and “Why did you move to this part of the country?” and “Do you have family near by?” Naturally, we got around to books. An older man (who owns the clinic), he told about having five acres of land, going out to the fields to work, wearing earphones and listening to Books Aloud. If he talks this way with every patient he sees, no wonder I had to wait so long to be called in.

But the truth is, he based my projected longevity on my mental attitude. That goes a long way, of course, and is no guarantee, but is perhaps better than a medication. Now, if I could only place in some of those writing contests announced at the IWL conference going on today and tomorrow in Coeur d’Alene, it might add another year to my life, to write more manuscripts for competition for next year. I’ll let you know if I do place. If I don’t place at all, well, that’s another story.

♥