To Absent Friends: Celebration and Reflection

Hello Friends!

Today is a day of mixed emotions and time for reflection as I reach a life milestone. Not only is it my birthday, but it is THE BIG birthday upon which I start drawing what in my Grandmother's day we used to call the Old Age Pension. I am officially from today an OAP.  These days, it's more politically correct to refer to someone of a certain age as a Senior Citizen  or Older Person.  The other day, I was discussing all of this with a friend. We concluded that we had both felt the same almost all our lives, that drawing your state pension was something that happened to other people or to your grandparents as they got to the right age. Never imagining that we would be drawing our state pension ourselves one day, yet here we are. She has been drawing hers for a few months now.  Age is a number.  If my health was better I would not feel old, and probably still be working and as active as I ever was hiking the highways and byways, and still able to garden.  It was not to be.

I would be making the most of my All Wales Concessionary Travel Pass which I have had  for 6 years now.  It entitles me to free travel on all bus services in Wales.  I used to use it a lot, but have not used it at all during the Pandemic.  Of course, there are now other benefits too, to being of Pensionable Age, such as quiet shopping hours in stores, and special discounts in shops, cafes and at the hairdressers.  I look forward to those little treats at cheaper prices!

As I prepare to celebrate me and what will be a small, regular sum of money coming in, today is also a day for reflection for other reasons.

Firstly, I remember and honour my mother, for five years ago today I was sitting by my dear mother's bedside as she slowly slipped from this world. It is very hard to do that on any day, but it is even harder to do so on your birthday for there is a certain irony that the beautiful woman who gave me the gift of life was slowly slipping away on the anniversary of that day when she brought me into the world.  I send her my deepest love in Heaven in heartfelt gratitude for all she did for me.  She would not want me to be sad, I know, so I will be happy for her sake.

My Beautiful Mother

Secondly, It is the day I remember all my friends who have gone on before, some of whom saw their 60th birthday or their 65th. or drew their State Pension and benefits, their lives taken in their 50's.  I might not be in the best of health and I might be protesting at the labels I now must wear but they did not make it, their lives cut cruelly short long before they should have been.  

Plans for a trip to the beach with friends, to drink hot chocolate and eat cake sitting on the picnic tables overlooking the bay, are scuppered by the weather.  We will go again when it is not so wild, wet and windy. So while I shall sit quietly and celebrate by myself with a shop bought celebration cake and ice cream, and open the gifts that have arrived, I will also be remembering my school friends, particularly Carol, Susan, Raydene, and  sweet Elizabeth {who so tragically died age 11} gone before, and with especial love my dear mother.  Gone but not forgotten.

To Absent Friends!

Until next time

Stay safe, Stay well

Debbie xx