WHY DIDN'T ANBODY TELL ME!!!!

Ever since the day my husband decided he didn't like me anymore (april 15, 2009) and left me to go live in one of those greener pastures that middle-aged men seem to be so fond of...i have become an employee of my parents. while for the past seven years i have been a SAHM (stay at home mom) (with my husbands blessings i might add)i have also made myself available to help my mother and father with day to day things they are no longer able to do. like cook, clean, shop, drive them wherever they need to go, etc. The Bible tells us that we are to take care of our parents in their older age and that to not do so is worse than a heathen. i listen to God when he talks to me. i had a good job. i made good money. i was a display manager/decorator for Haverty's Furniture and i loved my job. until, after three years of extremely physical work, this old body just gave out and i could no longer lift sofas and china cabinets and assemble furniture and walk a 33,000 sq. ft. showroom 100 times a day. so i did what any good Christian girl does. i prayed. i asked God what HE wanted me to do. (my husband never forgave me for asking God before i asked him) and He told me. He told me to quit. so i did. and living on faith that God would provide our needs, i was able to be home when micajah got out of school and attend school functions and have his friends over at my house (so i could know what they were doing) and God told me it was time to take some burdens off my parents shoulders. i would go over a couple days a week back then and cook dinner for them and clean their house. their big house. their really, really, big house. and they paid me. but, i wasn't doing it for money. i was doing it because that's what God instructed me to do.


Anyway, ever since the middle-aged man moved out, i have had to become self-sufficient, and still be able to care for my parents and micajah (and now, 15 dogs and a cat) so i have been hired. which means i now go over almost every day and i cook dinner and clean house and the middle-aged man has forced me to list this as "MY JOB." i don't like that. but, it is what it is.

My father is a huge fan of cooking shows. and Paula Deen. especially, Paula Deen. i love her recipes, but i'm not overly fond of her cackle. she lives here in savannah, you know, and everybody that comes through here thinks she is just the greatest thing. i've eaten at her restaurant and i've seen her several times. i even sat at the table next to hers one night at Masada's. she was being incognito since she was there with her family. no makeup. jeans and a mans dress shirt. i wouldn't have recognized her except for the cackle. it's very distinct. and i can do a perfect imitation of it. daddy always wants me to do it when there are a gazillion people around and make them think that "Paula Deen is in the house!" but, daddy loves to watch her show and every now and then he will see a recipe that he "just has to have" so me or mama or my sister will make it for him. this past friday it was cheesy garlic grits casserole. he wanted it for lunch so i ran over to krogers and got all the stuff and mama made it. it had chicken broth in it. not sounding especially yummy to me. daddy loved it. i said that i did too. and i ate them.

i see some members of my family every day. i go to church on sunday and wednesday mornings i go with mama and daddy to bible study. we go out to eat lunch with everybody after that. in other words, i see alot of people, all the time. and they see me. which led me to question the members of my family, while we were eating lunch at cracker barrell yesterday...WHY DIDN'T ANBODY TELL ME THAT i HAD A 3 INCH LONG HAIR COMING OUT OF MY CHIN!!!!!!!  i mean seriously. how could they not notice it. everytime i would tilt my head down it would tickle my chest. i kept thinking it was a flea and i would try to swat it away. but it kept coming back. i didn't notice it because i can't see anything that close up. it had started tickling me the day before. that night i pulled out my magnification mirror and saw it! and i got rid of it with my personal little finishing touch electric razor wand. i saw people looking at me funny that day when i was in kroger, but i didn't know why. now i think that they were probably thinking i was dressed up for halloween. you know, the witch with the hair that grows out of a mole! it was scary. all these people had looked me in the eye when i was talking. some just a couple of inches away from me. and i noticed their eyes would dart down occasionally, but i didn't really think anything of it. but SOMEONE had to have seen it. fluttering in the breeze. and no one said a word. i don't know how long it had been growing. sometimes i go to bed at night and wake up the next morning with a fully grown mole or skin tag. i think that secretly people don't tell us when they notice things like this, or that we have a piece of parsley stuck in our front teeth, or that the third button down on our shirt popped off and our shirt is now gaping open for all the world to see our pudge. i think that deep down inside they want us to suffer a little bit of humiliation. because they know that next time it might be them with their shirt on inside out or a piece of toilet paper stuck to their shoe or chocolate chip cookie smeared on the backside of their good white pants. and no one will tell them either.

while we were at cracker barrell we got into a discussion about the beliefs of different churches. and i got to thinking. again. in the Bible God tells us that before we take communion we should examine ourselves. and if we have anything against a brother we should go to him and ask for forgiveness. i was sitting across the table from daddy and a sudden bout of guilt came upon me. I HAD LIED LAST FRIDAY!! and i knew i had to confess my sin. so i looked daddy square in the eye and told him that i hated those grits we had last friday. every single bite i took i was holding my breath. every single swallow i was secretly gagging. in my book, chicken broth, garlic and grits DO NOT GO TOGETHER!!! so i confessed and i was forgiven. and i felt good should we have communion on sunday. and then i missed church.

when i was younger my friends and i would talk about the latest pair of bongo jeans we bought or the new 4 inch heels we would wear to the dance. we swore to high heaven we would never, ever, EVER be caught dead wearing pumps or flat shoes or elastic waisted pants or granny panties. our world was all about skin tight straight legged jeans and stilletoes and crop tops. our nightly routine was a quicky face wash and a 30 second brush of the teeth. NEVER in our wildest dreams did we know what turning 50 meant for us. we didn't care either. because we would never turn 50. and believe me, had i known...i would never have grown up!

we lie to ourselves and say that sweat pants and pajama bottoms are just soooo much more comfortable, which i don't deny, they are. but the real truth is that we can no longer wear pants with zippers. no, those zippers were only made to hold in the first stomach, not the second and third. and we lie to ourselves and say that flat shoes and crocs are just so much easier on the back and i don't deny, they are. but the truth is that we can no longer wear the cute 4 inch heels because we can no longer bend over to put the little strap into the buckle!!!

i am not ashamed to say that i am fifty years old. but i am ashamed that i went back on my own word and gave in to the pumps and flat shoes and the sweat pants and pjs with the elastic waists. and i am sorry to say that the quicky face washes before bed time are looooong gone. now it takes 30 minutes just to remove all the makeup that i put on to try and disguise the moles and the dark circles under my eyes and the wrinkles crawling across my once smooth skin. another 30 minutes to shave and pluck all those hairs that sprout up overnight. and then another 10 minutes to take off my clothes and squeeze into those elastic waisted pj's and crawl over to the bed. fifty is not easy for me. WHY DIDN'T ANYBODY TELL ME IT WAS GOING TO BE THIS WAY?