Giving Up And Buying A Pair Of Glasses, Does That Mean I'm Getting Old

Well my little Peachy Pinks the time has come.

Yes the time actually came 12 months .....actually probably 3 years ago if I am honest, that I began to squint !

I would squint when reading a menu at a restaurant. I would squint when reading a sign a long way away and I would double squint when trying to read a book in bed at night.
                                   DENIAL
                  of course I don't need glasses !

So I continued to squint to the best of my ability. Friends were throwing their hands up in frustration and one friend even gave me a pair of glasses from the chemist which magnified everything I saw.
In secret I embraced the glasses, in public I looked eternally young and wrinkle free........

Because I was young enough NOT to wear glasses !

But very quickly it all began to go pear shape.
The pile of unread books on my night stand, the 'super squinting' that went on in my classroom when trying to read the fine print and asking my husband to read the menu for me every time we dined out and I had to read the menu.

BUT the real (pardon the pun) 'eye opener' came when I was in class last year and for the life of me I could not read a word of what was on our flower list. In all fairness to my eyes, the writing was super small so I never had a chance really.
A sweet friend in her youthful, energetic years offered to sit there and mark our lists out for me.

I sat there silently and twiddled my thumbs.

Oh my goodness................it appeared that the time had finally come to book the almighty appointment with the Optometrist.

But of course we can't rush these things.  Christmas came and went and goodness knows what I wrote on all of those Christmas cards that I sent off. Goodness knows if my words were legible.  Time was looming to go back to my second year of Floristry class so I knew that I just had to.

So I made the trek to the shopping centre.  I walked past the store a couple of times checking out the queue.  I noticed that a lot of elderly people were standing in line..............:-(

Was that a sign of my ailing years to come. First my eyes, sagging skin on my neck and age spots up my arms.  Would this mark the beginning of the end.
Would I sit in my window and watch the world go by whilst reading women's magazines and cooking the perfect batch of scones......
Oh the mind boggles !!!!

My son wanted desperately to buy a new game for his computer so I happily took my time purchasing it for him.......just 5 minutes longer pleeeeeeeeeaaaaaaaase !

and then the moment arrived.

I took a deep breath and walked head on, head in the air and my pretty new handbag with the bow on the front to give me strength (Oh the joy of a new handbag and what it can do for ones soul !)
The 'very young' girl on the counter booked me in....for today in fact !  So now I must go and face my demons.
I have now realised that my body is YES ageing before my mind and although I still feel at least 18 in my head, I am in fact 41 in the body......(well in the eyes at least !).

Out of all the people in the world I would have never ever thought that vanity would strike me. 
I am just not that sort of girl (yes GIRL !)  
BUT I say this with all honesty, it's not the wrinkles or sagging 'bits' that frighten me. It's the fact that life ticks away silently when we are just going about our daily  business. Our children all of a sudden grow up into teenagers and threaten to leave home and all I want to do is to tie a bib around their neck and feed them mashed vegetables !
My babies are growing up into big people (with very young eyes ! lol)   and I am indeed ageing quietly in the corner.  
I am so blessed to have started my family early.  Well in today's books it was early. I was 24 when my daughter made her very apparent entry to the world and by the time I hit 30 my last little treasure arrived with lungs full of screams and all of a sudden I was a crazy mother of 4 who breastfed her brood for what seemed like an eternity.
It is no wonder that push-up bras are required and the eyes are failing at the rate of knots !
It is all their fault ...........yes those kids of mine have a lot to answer for really.  The very next time they complain about not being allowed to go on the computer, or complaining about having to unpack the dishwasher, I will have to remind them of the sleepless nights as they cut teeth (all 100 something of them between the 4 of them !)  and I will remind them of how horrid it is to have to call in the tooth fairy when it took me so many sleepless nights to cut the actual tooth that had just dared to fall out !
The trials and tribulations of a mother !
NO WONDER I need a pair of glasses I tell you!

So after this early morning rant I shall now prepare to make the journey to buy a new set of eyes........well glasses but eyes sound way more dramatic.
and as I hear the silent sighs of delight from one particular friend of mine who has been wanting to drag me to the store herself by my pig tail. I must now prepare to age a tiny bit more.......one step closer to the crochet years and the sitting by the window watching the world go by.

I will more then likely now see things that I have forgotten even existed and maybe I won't tie ribbons in my floristry class bigger on the left then the right ?
My world will improve so much that this post will seem so completely irrelevant.
BUT it has made me giggle. Hopefully it has made you giggle as well !
To age is to become wiser and stronger and powerful and happier.
Our memories make us and shape us into better human beings and we too are then able to tell our own children how far we used to walk through the snow to school with no shoes on (even though it has never snowed in my region !). It will mean that we are officially allowed to repeat the story as many times as we like for the next 20 years (and no rolling eyes allowed either !)

OOPS I have just seen the time !
I must hurry to this appointment NOW !

There is no going back now. There is no point in hanging from the clock hands and trying to turn time backwards. It is time to embrace my impending maturity and arm myself with my pretty pink handbag and walk head up into this loathsome store (Is that even a word ?)  
I will pick a pretty pair of glasses and pretend that I am a classy YOUNG librarian with attitude !  Somebody who is actually in her early 20's and has no children to make her 'bits' sag. 

So off I go......wish me luck

and I will see you all this afternoon with some more 'Prettier' pictures and vintage finds (the vintage part not being me ! (lol)

Send me warm wishes and everlasting youth.

Till then
x

p.s I have decided to take my kids along to be part of the torture. After all surely they have contributed to that fact :-)