Focused at Fifty

1. A flock of one million red wing black birds in early spring, turning on a dime, showing their "red wings" all at once! 2. A sunset in Berks Cty that looked like a Maxfield Parrish painted sky. It was so beautiful it took  my breath away. 3. The birth of a beluga whale. 4. The birth of an elephant. 5. Watching a mother wren teach her 4 babies how to eat from a bird feeder. 6. A baby deer running across our field in Oley to come investigate me. She came within 10 feet until I heard her mother grunt to her and call her back. She ran back to Mom! 7. Saving a birdhouse of baby barn swallows which had fallen down, and I carefully put it back up on the pole. Momma bird came back and took care of them! 8. Six or Seven years old, Dad showing us a nest of baby bunny rabbits in the back yard. 9. Two otters frolicking and playing in a stream in Pacific Rim National Park in Washington state. 10.  The horseshoe crab migrations and egg laying nights in Fortescue, NJ. 11. Se...

My sister celebrates her birthday this next week. She will be turning ??. (Wink Wink). Let’s just say she is my older sister. Sheryl and I have lived in the Philadelphia area for over 20 years. Through these years, we have become close friends … best friends. And as I think as siblings who are best friends, no one knows me better. She knows me better than most of my closest and oldest friends. We are in constant contact, at least once a day, finding out how the day is going, what’s happening, what’s new and exciting, etc. My brother Adam is just as close with Sheryl and I. It is a rare and wonderful thing that siblings can remain this close as they get older and develop their own lives. And believe me, we do not take this lightly. Our vacations each year invariably involve family. That is how we like it. That is what we have always known and wanted. My parents, Robert and Abby, instilled this strong sense of family in us as we grew up. I think we became that much closer when Mom pa...

I am a week into this "natural" diet and am feeling changes which are interesting, uncomfortable, but ultimately satisfying. The first couple days have been a little uncomfortable. I have suffered from mild carb and refined sugar withdrawal.  Just some headaches, belly aches, hunger pangs, and tiredness. But after a week on this diet, I have more energy finally, am eating less, eating better, and actually enjoying new and different food combinations. The drawbacks are that I have to spend more time preparing foods. It takes time getting used to not having the variety of processed food items. I am learning to enjoy fruit more though. Just the juiciness and sweetness of it is so satisfying. And happily, I am starting to loose weight! A couple pounds here and there. But I have to tell you, I am not as sluggish, feel less bloated, and as I stated before, have more energy! On to the second week!

 

So John and I have started a “natural” diet for 2 weeks. We discussed out eating habits and realized that we were eating too many processed food items, and that old fried “bar menu” was becoming a weekly staple of our diet. Not to mention pizza night and Chinese food night. Sure you can have healthy pizza and healthy Chinese food (the vegetarian “Buddha” delight comes to mind) but who wants to do that when all you want is a pepperoni pizza with extra cheese or General Tsao’s Chicken! This diet is based on an all natural food diet by Todd Soura, the owner of the Doylestown based Action Personal Training. I found it in the 2010 late spring edition of  Bucks Magazine.  The corresponding print article comes with the subtitle “ What life would be like if we removed the assembly line from the grocery store .” He is quoted the following from the article:  “This is my 10-day Non-processed Food Plan. The basic aim: cleanse the system of refined sugars, flour, bread, and artifici...

I actually enjoyed waking up his morning at about 5:30 am. The birds always seem to sing the loudest and are most energetic at dawn. I fell back asleep after about 15 minutes of listening to them.

How do we perceive others around us? We often look at others and knowingly or unknowingly judge them with regards to what they are wearing. Why do we do this? Is it correct? Are we being unfair? While I was sitting at the airport bar waiting for my flight to San Diego, I spied a 60-something woman with what I thought were the most garish earrings. Another man was wearing a shirt which looked like he wrapped himself in the American flag. One other elderly man looked like he woke up that morning and thought, “You know what? Today is a great day to wear denim from head to toe!” Lastly, I looked upon a woman with two daughters who were dressed rather conservatively. She, on the other hand was dressed like someone spray painted spandex clothing on every inch of her frame and then she felt that a pair of Lucite heels would be the best way to top off that outfit! How and why do people choose what they wear? A great many of us are influenced by fashion. This influence comes from TV, movies, ...