What Will I Look Like When I'm Old?

What Will I Look Like When I'm Old?

I don't really care!!! Honestly. I really don't mind aging. I just want to grow old. I want to be alive for as long as possible to enjoy all the beautiful people in my life (but they all have to live longer so I won't have to say goodbye). I don't care that I'm getting older, or my skin sags, I don't even care if I get shorter! Could that be possible?

I know that it wont be easy, as we get older so many things change, simple things like having a good night's sleep are a big deal. What you can and can't eat.

I've always been an extremely hyper person, not hyper in a bad way, at least I don't think so. But I move fast, I talk faster. I used to be able to get out of a 2-door car by hoping over from the back seat to the front seat. One, because I could, and two, I couldn't wait long enough to move the lever and the seat and waste all that time getting to where I was going.

I worked in Manhattan for many years and when you are walking in Manhattan on your way to work, or more important, on your way home, trying to catch your bus or train, you have to act like a mad driver, weaving in and out of traffic from lane to lane. I mastered that art, as I was already a super fast walker, and being small, I've even cut under an umbrella or two while weaving in and out of my lanes of people. They didn't see me coming! Now I can't get out of a car like that and I've even noticed a grunt coming out of me when I get up from a long sit at my office desk or here at home.

I still walk fast, talk faster, move in general at a quick pace. I still continue to make my co-workers dizzy when they watch me zoom around the office. I remember an attorney telling me when he saw those commercials for Mazda with the Zoom Zoom theme, he thought of me. He even starting calling me "Zoom Zoom". When I worked on a trading floor downtown (as a secretary), there was a carpet in the hallway heading to the messenger center but just before you turned the corner for the center, there was a tiled floor. When I turned that corner, I always heard, "hi Tricia". They knew the sound of my walk.

I grew up in Brooklyn, but moved to Staten Island when I was 15. We moved to a development where all the houses were white with black roofs, eventually people added a little changes, but there were rules, and the changes were minor. The houses weren't all the same size but still it could be confusing. I even remember a kid running in our house and after a second or two realizing he wasn't in his own home.

Once my friend Irene, and her friend Debbie (now my friend too) came by to pick me up for a night out. Irene had been there before, but it was still confusing, especially for Irene. Irene is super smart and has great skills in her field of work, but Irene and I have a joke between us for years now. I would ask her how she could be so smart at work, I mean really, she knew the insides of computers and computer security, so much knowledge about computers that I have absolutely no understanding of, and here was something simple, like for instance coming to my house, yeah they all looked the same, but there were numbers on the house, I did have an address! So after lots of little confusing times between Irene and me, I would offer her a quarter, as being paid for thinking somehow must have made a difference in the girl. I wonder what she's going to be like old? Confused? I guess I'll have to start offering a dollar. Well that's if I remember the joke when I'm in my late 90s! Because I have always had my own "confused" moments!!!

So anywho, Irene and Debbie are coming to pick me up and when they ring the bell, Irene of course is confused, do I have the right house? And now she's got Debbie thinking, have we rang a stranger's bell? But Irene said something like, no, I hear her walking to the door, we have the right house.

I wonder if I will still have that pace in my old age, or will I be like Tim Conway on the Carol Burnett show.


That might be, but that fast walker will still be inside my head, trying to get wherever as fast as ever!

Two years ago, my nephew Robert, 8 at the time, asked how old I was and I told him, you just crashed my 50th birthday party, don't you remember. I said I'll remember when I go to your 50th birthday party. He looked at me like I was crazy and said "you'll be dead". I said no, I'll be old and you'll actually be happy that your old aunt is coming to your 50th birthday party and I'll be happy telling everyone, yup, I'm 95 years old, still feel like a girl.

This little project I created for my friend Maria, my sister (not really). I have a group of friends, who I guess, because they were single the longest in my life have just been in my life a lot more than other friends. I think Maria started it, but we just all call each other "my sister" when greet each other or say goodbye. Maria was feeling a little blue, overwhelmed by so much going on at the time and I just wanted to make her smile.

I found this great picture and photoshop'd me and Maria in. I made it into a card and the caption read "you have what in there!" It did bring a smile to her face and it's wild to imagine what we might look like. Maria showed her husband and parents and they didn't realize it was us. I hope this is us, again I hope to grow old, have wrinkles, even some of the changes that old age causes, I don't care. I hope I'm one of these old ladies looking through my big pocketbook for ?








These mini vodka shot bottles I created for "my sister" patti for her 50th birthday party.


I searched on line again for my pictures and found this cute little cartoon and tried to make Patti's face into a cartoon playing with color intensity, maybe not perfect, still learning a little about a lot everyday. Everyone at the party loved them and I always feel so good when that happens but a few days after the party everyone called and said that they didn't realize it was Patti as the old lady pictured. But again this was so much fun for me, and a nice memento for Patti's family and friends to keep on the shelf.

So what will I look like when I'm old. I'll look the same. When I look in the mirror I don't see anyone different. When I look at an old picture of myself, yes, I see the difference. But when I look in the mirror I just see me and I guess that's what I'll look like when I'm old.

Showers

Showers all day again in the Big Apple and today I'll share some of my favorite designs which I created for a bridal shower and also a fun idea I had planning a shower.






I have said before, my best work happens when I am creating something for someone I love. Now I love the young lady pictured here as a little girl, but more, I love her mother very much. Her mother is Linda and if you've met Linda, you can't help but feel like you just met the nicest person in the world. I met Linda in high school and we were very much like the girls in the movie, "The Trouble With Angels" and the crazy silly jokes and antics Linda and I shared are the best memories. Linda and I kept in touch after high school for a few years but she met and married her husband, of 25+ years now I must say, and I was the wild and crazy single girl, we kind of fell out of touch, not because we didn't care, but our lives were so different. But a day before our 20 year high school reunion Linda and I reconnected via phone.




I didn't get my invitation to the party until the day before the party, for whatever reason and when I did get it I responded yes and asked if Linda would be there. She was! I asked for her phone number and called her up. A young teen answered the phone and after I said hello and asked for Linda I heard him call to her and say Mom, Tricia G is on the phone. I almost cried, I had heard over the years from people that Linda had kids, I didn't know much more than that but to hear her son calling his mom and saying my name like it was something he heard all the time made my heart soar! We may have led separate lives for all those years but we both remembered each other, shared our love and stories about each other to our family and friends.

Linda's children are all grown now. She has three, Terence, Cristin and Sean and honestly she and her husband Tom should be very proud of them, they are awesome!

Cristin had a beautiful bridal shower planned. An old fashioned tea party which was held at Lady Mendl's Salon in New York City. Lady Mendl's is a old brownstone with a Victorian style inside. You can look Lady Mendl's up on line, it's a hotel and obviously they serve tea and fingers sandwiches, scones and jams, they host all kinds of parties and meetings, events and for Cristin, it's was a tea party.

I made chocolate bar wrappers and tea bag covers for this party and seriously when I sat down at the computer to start my work I had no idea it would come out so well. It was purple to start with but then I just started changing the lettering, things didn't match, I just keep going until it seems right! The pictures are not totally Cristin. Only the face. I found both the tea party and bride picture on line by just looking up "tea party" and then "brides".


The pictures I found were perfect and the colors made me change the wrappers from purple to the old fashioned paper look I used. That paper, I also found on line by searching for parchment and then just copied the picture onto my desktop as a jpeg. Both the bride and tea party pictures were in color but I selected certain parts to keep in color and then changed the rest of it using a sepia or old fashioned look. I had no idea what Lady Mendl's Salon looked like prior to the shower and I can't believe how perfect these were for the party. They matched. Even both the bride and little girl at the tea party pictures were little girls with hats on and everyone at Cristin's party was instructed to wear a hat. It was so nice, classy and old fashioned. Cristin and her girlfriends hats and dresses reminded me of Holly GoLightly's style in "Breakfast at Tiffany's". It was a day to remember and I'm so glad that something I made for Cristin not only added a nice little touch to her shower, but it made her mom, my friend Linda so happy.


Now since I'm on the subject of showers...I don't have any pictures this time, this was long before I started doing any of my little projects. One of my bestest friends, Karen, was getting married and I was her maid of honor and another bestest friend, Pat, was her matron of honor. Important to this shower story is that Pat at the time was the mother of a 2 year old boy and very pregnant, due to have her second son a couple of weeks after the shower. So because of our honorary duties as her maid and matron of honor, we planned her shower.

Her shower wasn't anything like Cristin's. It wasn't any theme or at a restaurant, we had it at my house. But that's the end of the story...let me begin.

I had just started video taping everything. (Everything, driving everyone nuts!) I used one of those huge video cameras that was heavy and I'm a tiny person, I would be aching after filming. It wasn't even mine, I can't remember who I borrowed it from but borrow I did, constantly. One day, another thing I have to get around to doing, is having all those videos transferred to dvd now. How many more times just in my lifetime, will we have to change the format of our old films? Mine were the old 8mm and I took them to a photo store and paid to have them transferred to play on a tape for a VCR, now I'm transferring those to dvds, not as expensive, especially if you know someone with a dual dvd/vcr with recording options, and really not that expensive if you look on line and send them your tapes. Worth it, but seriously, will it change again?! And when will I get around to the vcr to dvd transfer?

Well as I said, I was taping everything and decided to record Karen's shower from writing out the invitations, to the party itself. I haven't seen this video since before Karen got married, which is 20 years this October, I can't believe it. She just sent her oldest off to college, I can't believe that either. Time.

Pat is very funny. Silly. She would even laugh at the silly, not funny, things she said and would make you laugh too, at nothing. So writing the invitations out was just probably us giggling most of the time, then we pretended to be getting phone calls from the guests RSVPing. That was too funny. Trying to be serious, making up something that the person was saying about Karen, I have to see that video (dvd?) soon! We also filmed me and lots more of my bestest friends cooking the dishes for the shower. Bestest friends, also means my sister Linda, pregnant with her first child (so Hannah was kind of there) and her dog, Moose. We were laughing for hours cooking and prepping. And the best thing about all of this was that Karen would be sharing a day that was all about her, for her, and she couldn't be a part of because it was her surprise shower.

The day of the shower I had clothes for Karen to change into and make up for her to put on, as I knew her regular routine was going to the gym. I called Karen, and this too was being filmed, it was so hard not to laugh or sound excited. We had the shower months before the wedding so we were pretty sure she wasn't suspicious, as she surely would have been closer to her wedding date. I called and told her that Pat went into labor and her husband wasn't around to watch her 2 year old, I needed her to give me a ride to pick up the baby. She said she was just on her way out the door to go to the gym and would be there really quick. When she beeped outside my door, I was on the phone, the cordless ones with the long long wires so you could walk around with your phone, the ones that got all tangled up and we'd hang them from the second floor above the stairs so we could untangle them, those phones. So I'm on the phone, and waving her in. As she's coming to the door I think I told her that Pat's parents took the baby and we didn't need to watch him, but come in, I'm on the phone with Pat, talk to her.

SURPRISE!

Karen was! But she looked at me like I'm going to kill you, look how I'm dressed! I gave her a look that bestest friends always know, "I've got your back" and this one meant, I've got your make up!!!

Karen loved her shower, but more, she loved watching her friends plan her shower. She got to send the video to her grandmother in Florida who wasn't able to attend the shower and her grandmother so loved being a part of it in that way. It was a special memory I created for my friend, one that her kids can watch years from now and even her grandchildren, in whatever format that will be!!??

Until next time, showers of happiness.

That Girl

I have worked for many different firms and industries over the years. My first "real" job was as a secretary, a few waitress jobs in between that, and I presently work as a word processor in a law firm. Not my plan. In case you've never heard it, there is a Yiddish proverb, "Man plans, God laughs".

I wanted to be an actress. I can't remember ever wanting to be anything else from my first play in grammar school. I went to secretarial school only because I wanted to be an actress and would work secretarial temp jobs in between acting jobs. I got that idea from watching "That Girl".

"That Girl" was on television in the late 60s and early 70s, starring Marlo Thomas. She played Ann Marie, an aspiring actress who moved from Brewster, upstate New York, to Manhattan. She got all kinds of temp jobs while she was trying to get an acting job. I so wanted to be That Girl! The aspiring actress, my very own beautiful apartment in the city, her wardrobe, and I didn't know what being on Broadway meant then, but I wanted Ann Marie's life.

During secretarial school there was an open audition on Broadway for Grease. Thousands of people there but it was so much fun meeting people who wanted the same thing I did. And it was at the Minskoff Theatre. The theatre opened their first show with Irene, starring Debbie Reynolds, who is my favorite movie star. There I was on the same stage she sang and danced on. I was nervous but some people at the audition were really bad, just like you see on American Idol and I knew I wasn't that bad, and I knew my personality would add a little boost to my singing voice. I got a natural high performing, I was always a little nervous but loving it at the same time. When it was my turn to sing, I got to sing a little longer than some and they asked me to turn around, take off my glasses so they could see my face better and then said thank you and that was it. I never heard from them. But I was floating on air that day and to this day, I'm so proud of myself for trying. I love that I experienced it. I was being "That Girl".

When I completed secretarial school, I asked the job placement person at school to only send me out on interviews with companies that had something to do with movies or television. She told me it didn't make any difference what industry I worked in, I would be a secretary and that would be the same no matter where I worked. I wouldn't listen, I could have got a job at a big financial firm on Wall Street, or a law firm, but I wanted to be part of the arts, even if it was just as a secretary.

My first and only interview from the school was at RKO General, located on 40th Street and Broadway. I didn't know anything about RKO when I went on the interview. I just knew it had something to do with movies and I was going to take whatever job they offered me. The job, unfortunately, was working in the legal department for the lawyer handling legal matters for the bottling division.

During my interview I learned a few things about RKO that made me really want the job. They didn't make movies anymore but owned TV and Radio stations all over the United States. The TV station in NY was Channel 9. Romper Room and The Joe Franklin Show was pretty much all I knew about Channel 9. Joe Franklin, by the way, as I have recently learned via Wikipedia, was known to "boast of his discoveries", meaning his discovery famous people. I remember running into him many times and he would always ask me if I knew who he was, did I know who he knew, what he had done. Sweet man. I never told him, but no, I did not know who he was. And again per Wikipedia, "... he was even parodied by Billy Crystal during the 1984-1985 season of "Saturday Night Live". I will have to find that on YouTube.

I also learned during my interview that after six months of employment, I would be eligible to apply for jobs that were posted for employees first before looking outside the company. My plan was too get out of the legal department and somehow work in radio or television.

The radio stations in the NY office were WOR-AM and the FM station at the time was called 99X, I have no idea what it is called these days. In 1978, Jay Thomas was a top DJ on the FM station and I remember meeting him within my first few days of working there. He left not long after that and now you see him on television and movies. You might remember him from the TV show "Cheers"? He played Carla's second husband, the hockey player. Eddie LaBec?

From my first day I was beyond excited, not only was I living one little part of Ann Marie's life, I was seeing movies stars all the time. I didn't ask for autographs or talk to any of them, well I guess by chance I did get to speak with a few, I just was in awe seeing them in person, I was part of the world I dreamed of.

I ended up loving my job at RKO and stopped thinking about being an actress. I didn't forget about it, I just was having fun. I was making money, buying beautiful clothes, shoes, lots of shoes. I went on vacations. I spent weekends "down the Jersey Shore" with my friends. I went to the Grammy Awards at Radio City Music Hall! It was February 27, 1980, there I was, way up in the balcony, watching and listening to Barbra Streisand and Neil Diamond sing "You Don't Bring Me Flowers".

Sitting at my desk one day, Sir Elton John walked by, eating an ice cream cone and he kind of nodded at me, acknowledged me, human to human, too cool.

I rode the elevator with Liberace once, and we chatted for a few minutes, a nice man, again just human to human, chatting with a stranger while sharing an elevator ride. He wore a full length white fur coat, lots of jewelry and lots of make up, but he was nice and not at all full of himself.

I literally ran into both Tab Hunter and Tony Randall (on separate occasions). I happen to be a "fast walker" which must be a Jerry Seinfeldism. When it happened with Tab, I remember that I was on a mission, running down the hall after a guy named Rob who was a good friend and John A. Gambling's producer at WOR-AM Radio. I wanted Rob to get in touch with Bruce Springsteen's people to have him as a guest on "Rambling With Gambling". I had been asking in jest somewhat, but also on the slight chance...but Rob was walking away and telling me for the gazillionth time that it wasn't going to happen. I was yapping away asking why, aw come on, and doing my fast walker move and crashed right into Tab. He heard the Bruce conversation and got a big kick out me. Tony Randall actually did a little "Felix Unger" move on me when I crashed into him and brushed his lapels like I left dirt or mussed him up!

I eventually got out of the legal department and worked at the brand new RKO Radio Networks division. Again, a bit of information I learned, according to Wikipedia, "RKO Radio Networks was the first commercial radio networks to distribute programming entirely by satellite".
I did not know that! I probably typed it, as I worked in the advertising department and typed all the press releases (no computers in those days). I wasn't reading, I was also just concentrating on not making typing errors.

This brochure was my chance to get my face out there in the world. The actress still inside the secretary. I hung around after work when the crew was setting up, just watching, waiting, hoping that they would ask me to be in the picture. Finally, one of the photographers asks, can you sit at the desk and pretend like you're answering the phones? Could I do that!? What would Ann Marie say! Of course I could, yes I could do that!

I think that was my most favorite job ever. There were so many creative, smart people that were part of that company.

After RKO Radio Networks I started working for the local radio station, WOR-AM, and still was having too much fun to pursue my dream of acting. I was happy being on the sidelines. One day my boss asked me to call Kaye Ballard. If you don't remember her, or, have never heard of her, she was on a show called "The Mothers-In-Law" with Eve Arden, and lots of other television shows and movies, but I knew her from that show. I couldn't believe part of my job included calling up a famous person.



I didn't get Bruce Springsteen on Rambling With Gambling but I myself was a guest on "The Joan Hamburg Show". Joan had Gladys Knight scheduled as her guest and everyone in the office was so excited that Glayds would be at the studios, then so disappointed as Gladys got sick and couldn't do the show. Joan decided to do a show about fans and I think pretty much everyone who knows me, knows I love Bruce. Joan and I talked about Bruce for a while and then she started asking me about what life was like for a New York City girl, what did I do for fun, long before Carrie Bradshaw I might add.

Joan Hamburg also worked at CBS-TV, she did a consumer report show for them weekly. One year, for Halloween, she was doing a story on a great costume shop in the city, really cool hand-made costumes. She asked me and a few other girls if we would come and model for her. I chose a cockroach costume. I know it sounds gross, but I chose it because it was one of the only costumes without a giant head which would cover my face. I wanted to be seen! And the cockroach only had some sort of hat with tentacles coming out of it, shoes and gloves with tentacles and I added a pair of sunglasses and smiled for the camera.
We had a VCR at the time and I had my mom set it up to record. Me on TV! We should have taped all afternoon, because every time they promoted the news that night, they showed my picture, me, as a giant cockroach, smiling and waving! Classic!!! Unfortunately...and I forgive you Linda...my sister taped "March of the Wooden Soldiers" on top of my television debut.

I loved working at RKO but was lured by the big bucks downtown and decided to move on. I began learning about computers which I really loved and finally starting working temp jobs, going to acting school and even had a couple of auditions.

My "plan" changed again, and I don't think God was laughing. I think there's a reason we are where we are, when we are. For some reason I wasn't meant to be "That Girl", live that life. Mostly, I try to think of myself as George Bailey in "It's A Wonderful Life". George's plans never worked out but he had a wonderful life.

Just One Picture

Just one picture.

It's not perfect, a little blurry...I still have so much to learn about photography. I'll just keep practicing.

It goes with out saying I absolutely adore the person in the picture, my niece Bella. I love the colors, the steps look better in the photo than they do when you're looking at them in , her expression, her pink cleats with her pink dress and her braids.

Her braids. I taught her dad, my brother Joey, how to braid her hair, he might have done it the day of this picture or maybe not, but I'll always remember him awkwardly learning to braid her hair, wanting to do it for her, practicing with 3 strings I left for him so he wouldn't be driving Bella crazy while learning and finally mastering the braiding of his daughter's hair. Bella will not remember all this as she grows up. I probably wont either when I grow up!!! But I think Bella will get a good feeling when she looks at it.
Her heart will be remembering.

Although she was very aware I was taking her picture, it still captures the true Bella, her silly face, her sense of humor, just being a little girl.
She was at one her brother's many baseball games at a field that sells tattoos in a machine for fifty cents. She spends most of the game asking my brother for money to buy more tattoos. By the end of the game, she has tattoos all over her legs and arms. I'm surprised that she's not tattoo girl in this picture. It must be very the first inning.

It also reminds me of me, at her age, going with my parents to one of my 3 older brothers' baseball games, taking the bus to get there, getting an Italian ice at the corner pizza place after the games, but mostly climbing the monkey bars in the park by the field, getting to the top and then having my sister go get my father so he could get me down.

Just one picture.

My family ala Sgt Peppers Lonely Heart's Club Band

This I never got to finish, started it about 4 years ago on my old lap top which crashed, probably from making this picture.
It took me a long time especially because I didn't plan it out before I started adding pictures and layering them and because of cropping sometimes individuals by themselves and even when it was 2 or 3 people in a photo, it takes time.

"Let's start at the very beginning..."
My intention obviously was something like the Beatles Sgt. Pepper's Lonely Heart's Club Band album cover. I wanted to include movie stars in there too, but decided to just add family members, the kids at various ages, old pictures, black and white photos, even using the same picture and flipping it to face the opposite way, pictures of family members who have passed on, as well as my four-legged family members who have crossed the Rainbow Bridge, including my Molly Brown and my sister's family dog, Fred.

I'm sorry I didn't finish this, not only because I wanted to add more pictures, but it needed some tweaking. I only have one small post card sized copy of it, which I printed just as a test run at a time I was low on ink, and then...crash...which was my own fault, I was putting too much on my computer and wasn't backing up. I've learned my lesson and back everything up on a cd or dvd, I just have to have a better system of finding what I need.

If (little word, big meaning)...If I retry this project first I would gather all the pictures I wanted to use, deciding which ones would work best as the front layer, full body shots. I would lay out a design on paper and the back row is where to start and layer over that.

For the picture above, I started with the picture right around the "Full Hearts" sign and kept adding around that. Live and learn.

I collected the beautiful yellow leaves from down the block, the ones outside my house were pretty, but darker, I loved the yellow, the light! I placed them in the street and made the word family.
I tried to take the picture from on top of my brother's van, but I'm too short, had to have Joey take the picture for me!

Even though it's not done, I love this picture. And as you've noticed it's my "full heart" club band, as I sometimes am alone, but never lonely, all of these people are a phone call, email, text message, or prayer away...I wish you all a full heart like mine.

Self Portrait

This is Bella, as she saw herself at 5 years old. I've had it hanging on my refrigerator for the past year and every time I see it not only do I love the little artist in her but I look at the word "Me". Me. Funny word just sitting there all alone. Me. Small word but big, changing from day to day. Me.

Bella is my brother Joe's daughter, little sister to big brothers Robert and Jojo. I was in the delivery room watching her come into the world, and I know the first words Bella heard over and over and over again were "oh my God". Her parents joked with me that that was all they heard the whole time too. I could not believe what I was seeing, experiencing! I have seen films on birthing but to actually be there and watch a child come into the world, a child who is part of your family. As an aunt I was so overwhelmed, as parent, I can only imagine a small tiny bit of what you must feel.

I live upstairs from Bella and her brothers, and it is a very different relationship with them, than it is with all my other nieces and nephews. NOT AT ALL BECAUSE I LOVE THEM MORE, I LOVE EVERY SINGLE NIECE AND NEPHEW I HAVE (and I have a lot!!!!) But I say it is a different relationship because I myself grew up with my aunt living with me and my family until I was about 5 years old, and even when she moved out and got married, I still saw her pretty much everyday. She is my mom's sister, my beautiful Aunt Libby. She is much younger than my mom and when my grandmother died she came to live with us. Eventually Aunt Libby and her family ended up living across the avenue from us and we really saw each other every day. She was a part of my life in a different way than my other aunts and uncles and to this day I think we have a different relationship than she has with her other nieces and nephews, and again I have to say, she doesn't love me more, it's just that we had a different relationship.

There's all kinds of studies done on personality traits that people have if they were first born, the baby of the family, the middle child of course, even twins, I've met quite a few and they always tell you who was born first.

Me. Well I am the 4th child born to my parents, but also the first girl and since there were 3 more kids born after me I am also the middle child. I was born into a large family already and again Aunt Libby was there and though I can barely remember living together, it's there in side me. Me.
Me. I started life being adored and coddled by my older brothers, my mom often joked with me that she had to have another child just so I wouldn't be the only girl and the baby of the family. Even our neighbors at the time I was born, 2 boys my brothers' ages and their little sister Laura who was 2 years older than me. They still tease me to this day how when the ice cream man would come around and we'd all ask for ice cream and be told no, not now, I would sit on the stoop crying and the ice cream man couldn't resist me and gave me free ice cream. That's what they tell me, I have no memory of that, but all those experiences that we don't remember, I think, make us "me". I lived in Long Island until I was 4 and I really just have very small glimpses of memories of living there. We visited there after we moved back to Brooklyn so I think most of those memories are really from when I was a little older. But my father's brother lived in Babylon and we lived in Deer Park and I know we spent so much time at my Uncle Bill and Aunt Joan's house. I can remember it more than my own home in Long Island.

Me. Ever changing. Sometimes because the world around me changes, sometimes because I want to make a change in myself, be a better person, be healthier, be kinder, be smarter!

My brother Joey told me not too long ago that our dad would say to him "If, little word, big meaning". I don't remember my dad saying that but since Joey said it, I say it to myself every once in awhile. It is a hopeful word sometimes, a warning, a chance.

So, me, another small word but so big in meaning.
Me. Today I'm happy single girl. Girl, I'm 52 but I still feel like a girl, I don't think of myself as a woman and to say it or write it, it doesn't feel like me, not yet anyway.
Me. I don't work 9 to 5 and I haven't used an alarm clock for about the last three years. I just wake up. Usually very early but I don't wake up to a buzzing alarm, or loud music, I just wake up and it's a wonderful way to start my day.
Me. Today I wrote this blog and remembered Bella being born. Bella drawing this picture for me. I thought about me at 5 years old, living with my Aunt Libby. I remembered being locked out of the room we shared, a lock high up on the door that I couldn't reach even standing on a chair. And I remembered one of the reasons the door was locked. I remember she had Dippity-Do on her dressing table, not that I could read "Dippty-Do" at the time.

I remember being so intrigued by whatever this jar held. It was a clear color and looked like lots of bubbles in a substance that also was like nothing I had ever seen. I tried many times to open it and it being too hard for me to untwist the cap. Until one day that I tried and it opened and I put it all over my face. I don't remember much more, but I'm sure I got in trouble, I'm sure I felt bad that I made my Aunt feel bad, a little more added to "me".
Me. Today is Friday, it's Labor Day Weekend, which is a 3-day weekend and I also get out an hour early today because of the holiday weekend.
Me. Today I already thought of just a few of the wonderful family and friends that I love and they love me.

Me, little word, big meaning.

Mug Shots?

No, just an idea I had for my niece's bachelorette party. We spent the weekend in Atlantic City and as I was planning on making a video of all the pictures I took, I decided to spice them up a bit.

This was an easy project and took no time at all and made a great start to a night of fun with the wonderful women in my family and my niece's new family. Even coming up with the names for all of us was fun too, we were laughing so much. I especially love Lucky Libby and Mama Outlaw's mug shots, they look like they could have been part of Bonnie and Clyde's gang...molls! Enjoy.