Catching up

[Murfreesboro]

Without living there, it's hard to know what was really going on between those two women. Since your Aunt Betsy did pass away, perhaps she just wasn't feeling well much of the time.

I'm sure you'll choose wisely for Millie's companion. As for her diet, I think much of our longevity is beyond our control. We want to think we have more power over these things than we do. Obviously, dissipation is likely to wreck our health. But beyond that, I think all this fastidiousness about what we eat and how hard we exercise, etc, is probably not going to add much to our time here. At most,, it may make us feel better while we are here.

My experience of child bearing taught me that most of these things are beyond our control. Because of the cord issues I had with my boys, I learned that things can go terribly wrong in a great big hurry and it's nobody's fault. Since then, I've heard younger women pontificate about how they'll have babies at home, etc, and I always beg them not to do that. Nobody at the hospital is going to force feed you drugs if you don't want them. The medical folks are just there to make sure the baby is ok if something very unexpected happens. But nobody ever listens to me when I say these things. The young women think they'll be OK because they are smart and strong willed. And usually they are right. But what they don't recognize is that I was smart and strong willed, too. One way or another, life teaches humility to all of us.

Re the elderly, the best arrangement I ever saw was my aunt's out in CA, who lived to be 90. A few years before she died, maybe 7 or 8, her adult kids sold her house for a pretty penny. Then they used some of that money to build a tiny house in my cousin's backyard. During the day, a hired companion stayed with her. At night, a family member would sleep with her. With four kids and multiple grandkids in the area, they rotated the nighttime duty. She was well looked after and was able to spend some time at her son's house when it suited everyone. But she had her own place, and so did he and his family. Now that she's gone, they can use that tiny house as a guest cottage.