Meh. This is how I feel about birthdays (my own) generally: meh. I turned 49 at just after 1am, although that was in 1957 and I don’t know if Daylight Savings Time was observed in Western Colorado then, so the actual time may vary.

This year has already been one in which age and health and wellness have loomed larger than usual; losing Mom in June was hard enough, but many of the maladies that got her in the end have at least a partial genetic component. I’ve never been a smoker due to my allergies, but that doesn’t leave me off the hook for either diabetes or heart disease or high blood pressure.

I saw my doctor yesterday, who seems to want to see me every month. And every month, my blood pressure and blood work are, for the most part, right where they should be. I mentioned that I wanted to start an exercise program in order to get “fit by fifty,” and he hooked me up to his little EKG machine, and wrote up another referral to a nearby cardiologist. I did this once before, where I went through the whole stress-test thing, only to be told by the cardiologist that there was nothing abnormal or wrong with
my heart and its function. I got the impression then that he thought my doctor was… over cautious in his interpretation of his little in-office EKG, and I bet when I go this time I’ll get the same puzzled but polite reaction again, as in “Now… why did your doctor refer you to us exactly? Because your tests are all normal.”

The last checkup indicated a somewhat elevated cholesterol level, and since then I’ve been eating veggies more regularly and cutting back on the high-fat but easy choices for lunch at work in favor of salads and fruits. I’ve been trying to back away from the high-sodium stuff and not drink as much “soda pop,” with limited success.

I got orthotics, because my feet, knees, and back have been bugging me a lot lately, and the swelling I’d been seeing in my feet and ankles is a lot better. Next on the agenda is to get a couple pairs of much more comfortable and better-fitting athletic shoes, which will accomodate the orthotics without rumpling at the toes which my current too-small shoes do now.

Next: a walking program, possibly a personal trainer program. I feel better when I exercise and I haven’t been serious about it in too long. Also, I’ve got a tai-chi video which I will be trying to learn, because any form of gentle exercise that also includes stress-busting is very much on my “to-do” list.

More on this later. As for the rest of today’s activities, I had a great call from David’s parents, who are currently somewhere in the Aegean Sea, and then later we went over to see Steve’s new house, which is unfinished, partly full of rainwater, and mostly full of interesting bits of ducting that could be turned into some really awesome Halloween costumes. Then we went to dinner at Bonefish Grill, where I ended up not having a salad, owing to some confusion between us, the waitress, and the kitchen. However,
I did have some pretty yummy “pan-Asian” salmon, although it had nothing on any salmon we’ve ever had in Maui.

Here’s a photo David took of me modeling some of Steve’s ductwork. All the cyberwomen will be wearing them this year.

Still, it was a nice time. Except for the part where we commiserated with Steve about the large amount of rainwater in his unfinished basement, and had to watch him attempt to squeegee several inches of water into the lower level of what will become his media room. We stopped off before dinner to get a “tap” so he could run both sump pumps off the same power line, which comes from the neighbor’s property and which had gotten unplugged before the most recent rainstorm. When we left, both pumps were running, and
with luck the basement will dry out within a few days.

So today was my birthday – what is it to me? One more year, and I’ll be half a century old. I’ll still have a 30-year high-school reunion to decide about attending, because they put ours off for a year (what? Yeah). Next year’s birthday will be in… MAUI, and it will be FUN, and I will be FIT, and I will be FIFTY.

That is all.