Celebrating 84 Years of Living and Learning

It’s Taken Me 84 Years to Learn All This — And I Still Have a Ways to Go

Eighty-four years ago on a Sunday morning in mid-September, my mother gave birth to me at the Pensacola Maternity Hospital in Florida. A lot has happened along the way. I’ve learned many things, some of which I’d like to share with you.

Consider this my running list — updated annually, added to constantly, never quite finished.

About People

The most important things in life are people — both family and friends. You never know how long you’ll have them so spend as much time with them as possible. Overlook the things that annoy you and appreciate the things you love.

Don’t look down on anyone. You never know what is going on in their life.

Go out of your way to be kind to everyone — even the people who aren’t kind to you.

You learn too much too late about a person when you read their obituary. Tell them now.

There are lots of wonderful people in this world and I will never be able to meet them all. That fact delights me rather than discourages me.

About Learning

There are many ways of learning and a college degree doesn’t guarantee wisdom. I attended a very conservative Southern Baptist all-girls college in Alabama and then the very liberal University of California at Berkeley. I learned a great deal at both — and even more in the decades since from books, from life, and from people I never expected to learn from.

No matter how old you get you’re never too old to learn something new. Just about anybody can teach you something about life if you’re paying attention.

Never go to sleep without having learned something new that day.

About Beliefs

Your beliefs will change over time — and that’s not weakness, it’s growth.

I grew up in a conservative Southern Baptist family in the segregated South. I remember my pastor preaching that the Bible supported segregation. That one sermon made me begin to question everything I had been taught, because I knew in my bones he was wrong.

At college in Marion, Alabama — thirty miles from Selma — the maid who cleaned my room would stop to rest and talk with me. I learned about her dreams, her children who had moved north seeking opportunities, and that she was no different from me in any way that mattered. Moving to Washington DC and then California continued to reshape my understanding of the world and the people in it.

Today my belief system is very different from what it was at eighteen. I believe all people are equal and deserve the same opportunities. I am a better person for having changed.

I’ve also learned to walk away from situations where I cannot change someone’s mind. This is especially important in today’s divided world.

About Life

Don’t make mountains out of molehills. Let the small annoyances go. You’ll be a much happier person.

What is inside a person matters far more than outward appearances. This is fortunate because the outward appearance tends to go downhill with time.

I never want to look back and say “What if?” You’re never too old to follow your dreams — I wrote my first novel at eighty-three and am working on more.

I’ve learned to live every day as if it were my last. To appreciate what I have. To harbor no regrets.

Life is a great deal more fun when you are doing what you love.

Spend time outside whenever you can. Fresh air is better than two aspirin.

I don’t need a lot of stuff. The longer you live the more you accumulate and the more you realize most of it doesn’t matter.

Life is too short to put up with things that don’t make you happy.

About Myself

I am quiet and introverted. The upside is that I am a good listener, and people tend to actually hear me when I do speak.

I don’t like the dark. Light affects my mood more than almost anything else.

I hate exercise but know it matters. I fight my inner resistance and do it anyway. I also like sugar rather more than I should.

I’m not perfect. I’ve learned to laugh at myself. I try to be the best person I can be without taking my mistakes too seriously.

I’m not always right. This took longer to learn than it should have.

About Loss and Starting Over

Two years ago I lost my husband of sixty-three years. I thought I knew what loss was before that. I didn’t.

What I’ve learned since is that grief and forward motion can exist at the same time. That you can carry an absence every day and still find genuine joy. That the life you rebuild after loss is different from the one you had — not lesser, just different. And that the people who show up for you in unexpected ways — five men at a lunch table, a friend with flowers from her garden, a daughter who calls just to check — become the architecture of your survival.

I’ve also learned that you can never go home again. Santa Cruz, the town I always dreamed of returning to, has changed beyond recognition. So has Pensacola where I grew up. But then so have I — and that seems only fair. We are none of us the same people we were. The places we loved exist now mostly in memory, which is perhaps the safest place for them.

The Short Version

A Terrier-Poodle mix, with only three paws, can work his way into your heart faster than you’d think possible. So can a shy little mini-dachshund named Dixie.

Fifteen minutes of quiet time for yourself every morning can change your day.

No one succeeds entirely alone. I would not be where I am without the people around me.

When you get away for a few days, really get away.

And finally — after eighty-four years I am still learning, still growing, and still genuinely loving the process. I don’t feel old. I’m not afraid of what lies ahead. Age means only what you allow it to mean.

The wrinkles arrived. The grey hair arrived. They mean very little.

What means something is this: I have lived fully, loved deeply, built things I’m proud of, and still have more to do.

No regrets. Not a single one.