Aging My Way
I am a strong woman — most of the time. Let me see someone hurt an animal or a child and I am standing tall and vocal and ready to do battle. And I was 110 percent into fighting the tough battle for equal pay for equal work when I was a working journalist.
However, that strength didn’t extend into all areas of my life, including many instances of ignoring career and personal injustices. And I haven’t gotten much better with age. One example is that I would rather take a loss than return an unwise purchase.
Most recently, I have let the promised trim of the two Oleander trees in the patio area of my new apartment go undone ever since I moved into the new place on August 20. Yeah, I made two half-hearted requests of the apartment manager, and even cornered one of the landscape guys – without success.
Then I started trying to trim the trees myself because I didn’t want to ask anymore. I’m not sure what this reluctance is all about, but I do know I have one granddaughter, Heidi, who takes after me. We tell her to get her sister, Lindsey, to act as her voice when something is serious. Lindsey takes no prisoners.
And neither does my granddaughter Shanna, who also lives in my apartment complex. She recently took off from work for a few hours to corner the landscapers and demand they trim her grandmother’s trees.
The result was that I soon watched the workers through my sliding glass doors go about doing the job. They not only trimmed the trees but gave my patio area a good raking to take care of all the fallen leaves. And when they finished, they gave me a thumbs up.
I’m not exactly sure what Shanna said to them, but it certainly worked. When I thanked her, all she said was: “I got you Nana.” It’s nice to “be got.”
Pat Bean is a retired award-winning journalist who lives in Tucson with her canine companion, Scamp. She is an avid reader, the author of Travels with Maggie available on Amazon (Free on Kindle Unlimited), is always searching for life’s silver lining, and these days aging her way – and that’s usually not gracefully.
Pat Bean's blog 
Nice, indeed! 😎
Thanks for commenting. Love your web site.
🙂❤️
Shanna is amazing 😍
Yup!
Love your post and your strength! However, my personal belief is that each of us is less than perfect, which is why we all need Jesus. I also, however, consider myself a very strong person (because of Jesus), and in me, this strength manifests in a different way – I discovered that since I was unable to “make” others do what I thought they should, I simply learned to do it myself, and in that way, I am about as self-sufficient as a person could be. Part of it is because I live on a farm, where you have to do it yourself……strength can be manifested in many ways. Be strong!
It is nice to be got indeed, I was actually thinking about that couple of days ago, and I realized that I no longer want to fight life’s fights alone. I need to be “got”. A concept that I have fought and denied myself its right for a very long time. It is weird how our mindsets shift as time passes. Thanks for sharing and reminding us that its okay to lean on others for help.