Me in my favorite place, a busy newspaper newsroom back in the late 1980s. — Photo by my work colleague and dear friend Charlie Trentelman.
Aging my Way
I came across the above picture of me sitting in a newsroom in Ogden, Utah, and my first thought was that I looked quite young. But reflecting back on that time in my life, I realized I wasn’t, well at least by some standards. The photo was taken some time in the late 1980s when I was pushing 50.
While the past 35 years have been kind to me in many ways, my body has gone the normal way for my years – it’s succumbed to the pull of gravity and become flabby and wrinkly.
As I look at that photo of me, I recalled that it was taken about the same time I hiked up a mountain with a woman who was in her 80s, and I remembered that she got to the top of the mountain before me.
I recall hoping that I would be as spry as her when I reached my 80s. It was wishful thinking that didn’t happen. Somewhere in my late 70s, hiking up a mountain ceased to exist as a possibility for me. And a couple or so years later I got a rollator, which lets me take nice walks on flat ground – and I bless the person who invented such a device because my balance is the shits.
Meanwhile, despite my sagging body, I am blessed in many ways, including having love and laughter in my life. While the love, which I didn’t feel I had when I was younger, is comforting, I don’t discount the laughter. As George Bernard Shaw said: “You don’t stop laughing when you grow old. You grow old when you stop laughing.”
I think that’s especially true when you can laugh at yourself.
Pat Bean is a retired award-winning journalist who lives in Tucson with her canine companion Scamp. She is an avid reader whose mind is always asking questions (many of which are unanswerable), an enthusiastic birder, staff writer for Story Circle Network’s Journal, author of Travels with Maggie available on Amazon (Free on Kindle Unlimited), and is always searching for life’s silver lining. She also believes one is never too old to chase a dream.
After 85 years, I still believe that behind every storm there is a silver lining. — Art by Pat Bean
From vowing on Mondays that I will have a more productive week than the one before to life after a divorce, starting over has been the theme of my life for the past 85 years. The first time I remember this happening was when my family moved when I was 12 years old.
I saw the move as a golden opportunity for a new beginning. It meant I would be leaving five years of being bullied and the nickname of Cootie Brain behind. I was that kid whom nobody chose to sit with at lunch and the last one called when team captains picked players. I wasn’t even popular with teachers due to my inability to stay in my seat and a loud voice that they were continually shushing.
I suspect the brain part of my nickname came from the fact I was a straight A student whose hand was always the first to go up when a question was asked, and the cootie part came from the fact I always came to school with stringy, tangled hair. I blamed my mother for that for many years, until I realized I used to scream when she tried to comb my hair, besides which she was burdened with two toddlers just 11 months apart, was the sole caretaker of her bed-ridden mother, and had a husband who spent most of his paycheck before coming home late Friday nights.
It was a stressful household, and I cried a lot, both in school and out of it. At least by the time we were forced to move from my grandmother’s house after her death, I had learned to wash, comb and even curl my own hair.
The move came at the end of fifth grade and I had the whole summer ahead of me to mull over the persona I wanted to present to my new schoolmates. It just so happened that this was the summer I read Eleanor Porter’s books about Pollyanna, a fictional character who is always cheerful and who always looks for the good side of things.
I credit these books for helping me get through the rest of my school years with at least a few friends, even though I still hadn’t conquered my tendency to get too loud when I was excited. Years later, I realized that the friends who accepted me as I was were really the only friends I needed.
Meanwhile, Pollyanna’s philosophy continues to influence me today in that I look for a silver lining when bad things happen. The glitter usually isn’t too hard to find – until this past year when I had a massive heart attack that required three surgeries and the placement of three stents.
My whole life became a start over, and I didn’t take it graciously. While I appreciated that I had family and friends who were there to help me, I resented that they were too eager to help me. I had always been, out of necessity for most of my life, self-sufficient. It hurt me that suddenly I couldn’t fully take care of my own needs. Having to accept that I couldn’t do it all on my own was even worse than being called Cootie Brain. This was a start-over that was out of my control and I resented it.
Thankfully, I’ve mostly come to grips with my new life by now. On the plus side, I have more energy this year than I did at the start of 2024 and have healed enough so I can mostly take care of my own needs once again – but I’m not so dumb as not to know how blessed I am that I have loved ones waiting in the wings.
In the meantime, life has become even more precious – plus just as important, I still believe in silver linings.
Pat Bean is a retired award-winning journalist who lives in Tucson with her canine companion Scamp. She is an avid reader whose mind is always asking questions (many of which are unanswerable), an enthusiastic birder, staff writer for Story Circle Network’s Journal, author of Travels with Maggie available on Amazon (Free on Kindle Unlimited), and is always searching for life’s silver lining. She also believes one is never too old to chase a dream.
I was reading an essay Michael W. Clune wrote about his panic attacks, which began when he was high school. He was told by an emergency room doctor that the best thing to do when he had one was to breath into a paper bag.
There was a technical explanation for doing this, something about hyperventilating, too much oxygen and the lack of enough carbon dioxide. I didn’t quite understand the specifics – but then that’s not what I’m writing about.
It’s what Clune did afterwards when he wanted learn more about panic attacks. He went to his local library, where he checked out the card catalog to locate a book or two about the topic. Not finding much, he then flips pages through the thick “P” Book of an encyclopedia set – which back then was a common item in many households. My family bought one from a traveling salesman and paid for it weekly.
Michael’s description of his search for information took this 85-year-old broad back in time. For years I had duplicated Clune’s actions to satisfy my insatiable curiosity – or to educate myself for a newspaper article I was writing. I also learned to use the Periodical Index. A huge book that was updated monthly listing where to find magazine articles on just about anything.
Those searches back then often took hours, maybe even days. If I think about how I can instantly find information online, it stuns my brain.
But then a lot of things blow my brain these days, like the watch I’m wearing on my wrist. It was a Christmas present from a granddaughter and her wife, who have been worried I would fall or something and couldn’t get to a phone. That I don’t always have my phone on me is a hang up of my age, I’ve concluded.
The new watch lets me both answer and make calls. It reminds me of Dick Tracy, a tough-talking crime fighter portrayed in a comic strip created by Chester Gould way back in 1931. Beginning in 1946, he had a watch in which he could call or be called.
Those facts, by the way, were found almost instantly by a Google (actually I use Bing) search. While I remembered Dick Tracy and his watch, the details hadn’t been stored in my brain.
Pat Bean is a retired award-winning journalist who lives in Tucson with her canine companion Scamp. She is an avid reader whose mind is always asking questions (many of which are unanswerable), an enthusiastic birder, staff writer for Story Circle Network’s Journal, author of Travels with Maggie available on Amazon (Free on Kindle Unlimited), and is always searching for life’s silver lining. She also believes one is never too old to chase a dream.
While this is the year and model 1949 Studebaker convertible in which I learned to drive, the one I did that in was a lot more scuffed up and less shiny as I recall.
Aging My Way
One thing leads to another is the way my brain works, especially as an old-broad, and retired journalist who has time to let her mind wonder.
It started with a mention of the Stutz Bearcat, which I thought was a funny name for a car, and which sent me scrambling to learn more. My search had me acknowledging that information at one’s fingertips is the No 1 redeeming feature of the internet.
What I learned is that the Bearcat was designed and built by a man named Harry Stutz because he wanted to enter the Indianapolis 500-mile race. The year was 1911, and Stutz’ car placed 11th in the race’s inaugural event.
While uncovering these bits of history, my mind wandered back to the car in which I learned to drive back in 1955. It was a maroon, 1949 Studebaker convertible owned by a boyfriend.
Wanting to refresh my memory of that 70-year-old part of my personal history, I once again strolled through the internet until I came across a photo of the exact same model and make of that 1949 car.
Almost needless to say because of the year, the convertible had a manual gear shift. It made learning to drive a bit more difficult than today’s automatic transmissions, which I use as an excuse for my first driving lesson. While attempting to work the clutch and gas pedal at the same time, I and that convertible ending up taking out a hedge growing too close to the driveway.
There have been a lot of cars in my life since then, including a 1976 Ford Mustang, which was the first new car I owned and which cost less than $4,000; a 1990’s Subaru Legacy that wasn’t happy unless it was going at least 80, and which earned me three speeding tickets in one year (my first and still only speeding tickets) but which I still consider the best car I ever owned: and a 21-foot, 2004 Volkswagen/Winnebago RV that took me around the country for nine years after I had retired.
I wonder what it would have been like to have driven that 1911 Stutz Bearcat. But then that is something the internet can’t answer.
Pat Bean is a retired award-winning journalist who lives in Tucson with her canine companion Scamp. She is an avid reader whose mind is always asking questions (many of which are unanswerable), an enthusiastic birder, staff writer for Story Circle Network’s Journal, author of Travels with Maggie available on Amazon (Free on Kindle Unlimited), and is always searching for life’s silver lining. She also believes one is never too old to chase a dream.
Mr. Eastern Bluebird on my RV Mirror — Photo by Pat Bean
Aging My Way
When I was traveling around the country in a small RV with my canine companion Maggie, I awoke one morning to find a bluebird, the eastern species to be exact, perched on my RV mirror. It stuck around long enough for me to take its photo, actually seeming to pose for me.
This avian visitor started my morning with a smile of happiness before Maggie and I continued on our way driving down the Natchez Trace Parkway, a historical route that began as a path used by animals and Native Americans, then was adopted by the multitude who followed. The designated scenic parkway is now a 444-mile drive through history, traversing through Tennessee, Arkansas and Mississippi.
The bluebird’s own history as a symbol of happiness is said to have begun with a Chinese myth that goes back thousands of years. It has been included in depictions of a fairy queen who was the protector of women who didn’t comply with role of females in a traditional Chinese family.
Nice myth, I thought, when I came across it while researching the origins of the bluebird’s symbolism. Native American folklore identifies the bluebird as a spirit in animal form associated with the rising sun, while Russian fairy tales see the bluebird as a symbol of hope.
The myths have inspired more modern days song writers to come up with such tunes as: Somewhere, over the rainbow, bluebirds fly, which Dorothy sang in The Wizard of Oz. Or There’ll be bluebirds over the White Cliffs of Dover, which the British sang during World War II – despite the fact bluebirds have never flown over those cliffs. Even the Beatles sang about the bluebird of happiness.
Not to forget poets, I came across 44 poems during my research that used the bluebird to represent happiness, such as this simple ditty by A.S. Waldrop: This bluebird is special/so cheery and merry too/ He’s here for just one reason/to bring happiness to you!
Ah! It’s nice myth. But, as I’m mostly a happy person, I believe that happiness comes from moving on from bad things and finding your own silver linings, be it a hug from a friend or a change of circumstance. At 85, I have plenty of experiences doing just that. I choose to be happy. As Barbara Kingsolver says about having the strength to go on during bad times: “You stand up at sunrise and meet what they send you, and keep your hair combed.”
Or, as I have been doing lately, keep your hair short enough that it doesn’t need to be combed.
Pat Bean is a retired award-winning journalist who lives in Tucson with her canine companion, Scamp. She is an avid reader who always has many unanswered questions, an enthusiastic birder, Story Circle Network Journal staff writer, author of Travels with Maggie available on Amazon (Free on Kindle Unlimited), and is always searching for life’s silver lining. And she believes one is never too old to chase a dream.
Alligator stand-off in the Okefenokee Swamp. — Photo by Pat Bean
Aging My Way
While thinking about the chaos going on in America today, especially after the senseless New Orleans rampage, an image of Pogo came into my mind. In case you’re too young to remember, Pogo was a fictional opossum who lived in the Okefenokee swamp in a comic strip by Walt Kelly that ran from 1948 to 1975.
“We have met the enemy, and he is us,” Pogo once said — and that line has stayed with me ever since.
I was a faithful reader of Pogo from its beginning. The strip was written in such a way as to appeal to both children and adults, and I saw it both as a child and then as an adult who appreciated its political overtones.
The strip ran during a time when daily newspapers were tossed in your yard by a paper boy, including three of my own who had paper routes. The carriers were independent business owners who bought the papers at a discount price and then went around at the end of the month to collect from subscribers – and hopefully have a profit. It was a real-world reality for the youngsters.
I remember one cold winter, however, when I told them anytime the temperature hit freezing, I would drive them for their morning route. And since we were living in Northern Utah at the time, I found myself ferrying them around every early morning for a full month.
As for the cartoon’s setting in the Okefenokee Swamp, I thought the place was fictional until I came across the wetlands while RV-ing through Georgia. At 600 square miles, this valuable wetland should not have been so easily dismissed. I spent a day getting acquainted with the geographical wonder at Swamp Park, a Walt Disney like educational and tourist attraction located on Cowhouse Island near where the Suwannee River begins life.
Anyway, Kelly coined the phrase about the enemy being us for an anti-pollution Earth Day poster in a 1970 comic strip created for Earth Day, or so says Wikimedia. You didn’t think my memory was good enough to remember years, did you?
But I do vividly remember Pogo. And I’ve often used his phrase about the enemy being us. It is quite applicable in many of life’s situations – and that’s kind of sad.
Pat Bean is a retired award-winning journalist who lives in Tucson with her canine companion, Scamp. She is a wondering-wanderer, avid reader, enthusiastic birder, Lonely Planet Community Pathfinder, Story Circle Network board member, author of Travels with Maggie available on Amazon (Free on Kindle Unlimited), and is always searching for life’s silver lining.
When I was traveling the country with my canine companion Maggie, which I wrote my own book about, my RV was always full of books. Perhaps that is why I had a couple of flats while on the road.
Aging My Way
What I yearn for in books is good writing, surprise and depth. I also want to read books that teach me something new – and I want the good guys to win. Justice has become a dear thing to me.
That’s not asking too much, is it?
In my earlier years I gave an author 50 pages before I decided I wasn’t going to turn another page. Today, I only give them 25 pages. There are simply too many books out there to let myself be bored and uninterested.
Normally, there are five books on my reading stack, with bookmarks at different points among their pages. While I sometimes find a page-turner among them and finish the book in a day, other books are best enjoyed at a slower pace, especially ones that give me something to think about and savor.
I usually read about two books a week, with this including the audibles I listen to in bed at night – sometimes for hours when sleep won’t come.
I read all genres except horror and true crime, but mostly I favor fantasy, mystery, memoir and travels genres, as well as books about birds and nature. I prefer the feel of a book in my hand, but also read e-books. When I come across the title of a book that sounds interesting, I first check out my library, but Amazon and bookstores, new and used, also get a lot of my business.
It’s my belief that as long as I can afford a book, I’m not poor.
Meanwhile, in case you’re interested (you can always stop reading if I’m boring you), here’s a list of what I considered to be the best books I’ve read the past year:
The House on the Cerulean Sea by TJ Klune. And I’m currently reading the sequel, Somewhere Far Beyond the Sea.
Remarkable Bright Creatures by Shelby Van Pelt.
The Best American Essays 2024.
The (Big) Year That Flew By by Arjan Dwarshuis, who in 365 days set a world record for seeing 6,853 species of birds, some of which are on the verge of extinction. If this book interests you, you should also read The Big Year by Mark Obmaksic, which I read way back in 2005.
The Kingslake and D.C. Smith series by Peter Grainger. These books were free on Audible, and an unexpected and wonderful find.
A Short Walk Through a Wide World by Douglas Westerbeke.
The Armor of Light,by Ken Follett, continuing the Kingbridge series. Follet’s always a great read.
The Rise of Wolf 8 by Rick McIntyre. A great book about the Yellowstone wolves.
The Inspecter Gamache series by Louise Penny. I’m currently reading A Better Man, which is 15th in the series. Penny is a great writer, but justice doesn’t always win in her books, and so they keep me grounded to the real world.
Happy Reading.
Pat Bean is a retired award-winning journalist who lives in Tucson with her canine companion, Scamp. She is a wondering-wanderer, avid reader, enthusiastic birder, Lonely Planet Community Pathfinder, Story Circle Network board member, author of Travels with Maggie available on Amazon (Free on Kindle Unlimited), and is always searching for life’s silver lining.
Just as an eagle must fly, I must write. — Art by Pat Bean
Aging My Way
“Being a writer is like having homework every night for the rest of your life.” – Lawrence Kasdan
I’ve been retired from being a newspaper journalist for 20 years now. It was a job I loved. I thrived under the stress of the interviewing, the research and writing against a daily deadline. Every day was a new learning experience – from writing about Father’s Day from the view of shelter dads to interviewing a former president at a busy airport.
I miss the excitement, and even the grind of that kind of life, which all began two years after I decided – without a doubt in my head – that I had to become a writer. That was a huge dream for someone who was a high school dropout.
As one of my efforts, I applied for a reporter’s position. I saw the job as an opportunity to hone my writing skills. Instead, I was hired as a darkroom flunky at the small Texas Gulf Coast newspaper to which I had applied — for the grand salary of $1,25 an hour.
Toward the goal of becoming a reporter, I started taking journalism classes at the local community college. Fortunately, due to luck and the resignation of two college-educated guys, I got my wish – and a 25-cent an hour raise.
The year was 1967, and I was ecstatic. What I experienced for the next four years, beginning as a green reporter with no experience of the real world, was at least the equivalent of a master’s degree, not just in journalism but in life. Those experiences, along with hard work and my clippings, took me through the rest of a successful journalism career that lasted for 37 years.
And beyond – when I retired from my journalism job, I didn’t retire from writing. A day in which I do not put pen to paper or fingers on a keyboard leaves me feeling short-changed and restless.
But the writing I did in earlier years was all about other people and things – as all true journalists should do. What I write today is all about me and how I feel about things. No longer a journalist, I’ve become an essayist writing about my view of the world – and myself.
The change wasn’t easy, nor safe, because as a personal essayist I expose myself to the world. The transformation began after I wrote the first draft of Travels with Maggie, a book about me and my dog RVing together across America. I was told by a group of writers, who critiqued my efforts before the book was published, that my writing lacked voice.
And they were right. I suddenly saw that I was still writing as a journalist. So, I rewrote the book, adding the voice of an old broad who was still learning and still had a zest for life.
And that’s how I continue to write today – almost every day. I can’t help myself. I think that the day I stop writing will be the day I stop breathing.
Pat Bean is a retired award-winning journalist who lives in Tucson with her canine companion, Scamp. She is a wondering-wanderer, avid reader, enthusiastic birder, Lonely Planet Community Pathfinder, Story Circle Network board member, author of Travels with Maggie available on Amazon (Free on Kindle Unlimited), and is always searching for life’s silver lining.
A week from now, what colors would you recall the colors of these flowers? More likely than not, it won’t be purple and yellow. — Art by Pat Bean
Aging My Way
Memory is fickle, sometimes true and sometimes false. I didn’t need Sally Tisdale’s essay “Mere Belief” in The Best American Essays 2024 to know that. All I have to do is listen to my adult children. When they recall one specific family event, no two remembrances of it are ever alike, including mine. We all could have been somewhere else on a different day.
But I found the article well-worth the read as the author attacked the subject from an ethical writer’s point of view. She believes that we writers have a contract with our readers that says we are telling the truth.
I’ve always tried to adhere to this ideal – and wish all writers had signed the same contract. But enough of that.
Sallie also noted that writers sometimes don’t write the truth but think they are. This is especially true of memoir writing where an author recalls lengthy conversations that happened when they were only two or three years old. But then she went on to say that: “Our false and shifting memories of the past don’t matter to anyone but ourselves. The future only cares about what we learn from them.”
And that line of thought brought me to how I had looked at my childhood from a child’s point of view, and then how one day when I was approaching 40, I viewed it through an adult’s experience. I realized I had failed to be the mother I wanted to be, not from not trying, but from circumstances.
It was only then that I realized my own mother had actually loved me, that it was circumstances, including three much younger brothers and other heavy burdens she carried on her shoulder, that meant I didn’t get the same attention I had when I had been her only child.
A memoir I would have written at 20 would have been much different than what I would have written at 40. At 85, I can see how it would be even more different today. Experience, especially observing the world around me, has made me thankful for the great childhood I had.
Time has a way of changing things – and one’s fickle memories.
Pat Bean is a retired award-winning journalist who lives in Tucson with her canine companion, Scamp. She is a wondering-wanderer, avid reader, enthusiastic birder, Lonely Planet Community Pathfinder, Story Circle Network board member, author of Travels with Maggie available on Amazon (Free on Kindle Unlimited), and is always searching for life’s silver lining.
Heading this year’s Thanksgiving list is that I’m simply glad to be alive – and doing well. Thanks to modern medicine I survived a heart attack and with the three stents I received, my heart and I still have at least a few more adventures to experience.
While thinking about this annual list, I came across this quote by Jane Goodall, that I’m planning to take to heart for the coming year. “Above all, we must realize that each of us makes a difference with our life. Each of us impacts the world around us every single day. We have a choice to use the gift of our life to make the world a better place – or not to bother.”
I hope you will join me in “bothering.” Meanwhile, here are the next 99 things I’m thankful for this Thanksgiving:
2. All the abundant help I received while recuperating from friends and loved ones, especially a granddaughter and her wife who live next door and a granddaughter who flew in from Florida. They stuck with me even though I was a horrible patient.
3. My canine companion Scamp, who fretted over my absence during my hospital stay and stayed faithfully by my side after I returned home.
4. A new artificial knee, which preceded my heart attack by eight days and which is now working perfectly.
5. My small apartment, with its small tree-shaded yard that is a gathering place for birds and provides me a view of the Santa Catalina mountains.
6. The daily Wordle.
7. Sunrises and sunsets.
8. A hot bath.
9. Flowers, but especially wildflowers.
10. Books and the authors who write them.
11. Nature, and all its wondrous aspects that have kept me sane, or relatively so, down through 12. A comfortable bed.
13. Audible, especially when that comfortable bed is not enough to get me through a restless night.
14. Air conditioning and heating.
15. My doctors.
16. My large family, which includes five children, 12 grandchildren and eight great-grandchildren, and their partners and spouses.
17. The internet that feeds my curious mind and keeps me informed in an ever-changing world.
18. Libraries and bookstores because virtual is not enough.
19. A refrigerator and pantry that is always full enough.
20. Fun surprises.
21. Trees and plants that make the world a better and healthier place.
22. Soft pajamas and blankets.
23. My Social Security.
24. Colorful 1,000-piece jigsaw puzzles.
25. My rollator – and a comfortable chair. Priorities change with age.
26. Comfortable shoes.
27. My Roomba.
28. Reality TV series like Survivor, The Challenge and Amazing Race. They’re my soap operas.
29. Being a writer, which makes me more observant of the world around me, and lets me experience life twice.
30. Kind people.
31. An honest media and journalists who only want people to know the true facts without taking sides. As a retired journalist, I have to believe this is still possible.
32. The return of wolves to Yellowstone.
33. Caring people.
34. All the national and state parks, animal sanctuaries and refuges that I have visited, and all the others, too.
35. Sunshine on a cool day, shade and a cool breeze on a hot one.
36. Home delivery.
37. A clean apartment, and that I can still mostly make it so.
38. That I still have a zest for life.
39. Sky Island Scenic Byway that winds its way to the top of Mount Lemmon – and all the other backroads and other scenic roads I’ve traveled in my life. I’m especially thankful that there are a lot of them.
40. Tie-Dyed T-shirts that have become part of my identity.
41. Peace, wherever one can find it.
42. Story Circle Network, my writing network and support group.
43. 50 years of personal journals.
44. That I finally became an avid birdwatcher at the age of 60.
45. Chocolate.
46. Reading glasses.
47. Braless days, which is most of them these days.
48. Computer games.
49. My book, Travels with Maggie.
50. My health insurance.
51. The rainbows that follow thunderstorms.
52. The Cooper’s hawk that sometimes sits in my cottonwood tree, even though it dumps on my patio.
53. The coyotes, whose howls I hear almost every night and morning.
54. Good-natured games of Frustration with a granddaughter and her wife who are as competitive as I am.
55. Van Gogh’s Starry Night – and the real thing.
56. A good pen and a blank page in a journal.
57. My kind neighbor, who loves my dog and gives him a walk every evening, and all my other kind neighbors as well.
58. Washing machines and dryers.
59. Enlightening and interesting conversations.
60. Learning something new – every day.
61. That I no longer believe I have to be perfect.
62, The wisdom that comes with having lived for 85 years, which of course includes no longer feeling like I have to be perfect.
63. Good cream-laced coffee to start my day, and the daughter-in-law who sends me coffee in care packages on a regular basis.
64. For never feeling lonely.
65. Smiles and laughter.
66. Snail mail from a friend.
67. Hugs.
68. A good haircut.
69. Helen Reddy singing I Am Woman, Hear Me Roar. This one almost always makes my annual list because I go back to that era when women were fighting for equal rights – which they still seem to need to do.
70. Art.
71. Butterflies.
72. Morning walks with my dog Scamp, especially since there were some days this past year when I couldn’t walk him.
73. Discovery of a new favorite author, especially one who has written a lot of books.
74. Silver linings – and that I still believe in them.
75. The smell of the Sonoran Desert landscape after a rain, and for its saguaros that drink up the rain for the dry days ahead and bloom once a year.
76. For my new smart phone, which I’m finally learning to carry around with me when I go to the store or walk my dog.
77. For the cuddles and sweet doggie kisses my dog Scamp gives me.
78. For my heating pad when my back hurts.
79. For drop-in guests. I actually love them although most people don’t.
80. The New York Times Online – it’s my newspaper of choice these days.
81. Female role models, beginning with my own grandmother and mother.
82. A hot cup of lemon-ginger tea.
83. Zoom meetings with my long-time friend Kim when we can’t get together in person.
84. Weekend pancake breakfasts with my friend Jean.
85. My brother Robert, who is the sole remaining member of my childhood family.
86. Freshly washed sheets.
87. That I can still drive, and have a car to do so.
88. Phone calls from loved ones, near and far away.
89. Scented candles.
90. Moisturizer.
91. Doggie treats, because Scamp is so happy to get one.
92. My 35-year-old rubber tree plant, which has had lots of babies that I have shared.
93. Aspen leaves in the fall.
94. My 85 years of good memories, and even a few of the bad ones that I have survived and which have turned me into the person I am today.
95. That I’ve heard the song of the hump-backed whale.
96. Readers of my writing.
97. The nine years I spent traveling across America in a small RV, in which I lived full time. I found beauty everywhere – and everywhere is my favorite place, well next to sitting on top of Angel’s Landing in Zion National Park.
98. Ice cream.
99. Quiet mornings in which to ponder and think.
100. And finally, that I’ve finally come to appreciate and like myself.
Pat Bean is a retired award-winning journalist who lives in Tucson with her canine companion, Scamp. She is a wondering-wanderer, avid reader, enthusiastic birder, Lonely Planet Community Pathfinder, Story Circle Network board member, author of Travels with Maggie available on Amazon (Free on Kindle Unlimited), and is always searching for life’s silver lining.
Looking for a supportive network? I found mine at Story Circle Network. Check us out at: https://www.storycircle.org/
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“It is good to have an end to journey toward; but it is the journey that matters.” — Ursula K. Le Guin
Pat Bean is a writer, avid birder, hiker and passionate nature observer with wanderlust in her soul. She spent nine years living and traveling in a small RV. She now lives in Tucson with Scamp, a rescue who was supposed to be a Schnauzer mix but turned out to be a Siberian Husky-Shih Tzu mix who is as stubborn as his owner, her granddaughter says. She was also a journalist for 37 years, and can be reached at patbean@msn.com
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