Focused at Fifty

The 3rd anniversary of my Mother's passing comes on April 10th. For good reason, it is always a sad time in my life. I dread the exact date as well as the two weeks before when she was in the hospital and then hospice care at home. In fact, I was going to hospitals and rehab centers to visit her for 3 months after she had the accident in late January of 2009. Often, I would take breaks and just rest or check my messages in the waiting rooms. I swear that I read each magazine several times over. It became annoying that a greater selection of magazines to pass the time was not present. Or maybe they were and others just took them to the patient's rooms or home with them after visiting. Either way, it was a pretty sad selection. Anyway, my Mother just always loved her magazines. For years she had subscriptions to various women's magazines and others including Country Living, Colonial Homes, and Philadelphia Magazine. I have a subscription to Country Living, partly because ...

 Pink Tree This past Sunday, I worked my butt off in the yard. There is SO much to be done! I am going to do my best to try and keep up with it. I tried last year and did reasonably well. It can get overwhelming so quickly though. With everything growing a month early, I need to start now. I got all scratched up and my allergies went crazy but I persevered! The cherry tree (I think it is a cherry tree) that was felled by the October snow storm has bloomed beautifully. We weren't sure if it would survive after replanting it. I say it's a cherry tree but I am not really sure what it is. Ha ha. It just looks like cherry blossoms. It doesn't bear fruit though. If anyone has a clue, lemme know. :)  Anyway, thank G-d that it did not die. We still have it staked out and will continue to do so for the next season or two just to let it strengthen up a bit more.   Forsythia Branches in McCoy Vase  The forsythias are just dazzling across the county. Our bac...

I have realized over the last couple months that there are some things that my readers still do not know about me. I wanted to share some of the little known facts about a one Marc Alan Haynes.  I figured it would be a quirky thing for me to write about and hopefully (fingers crossed) an interesting blog to read. These are in no particular order. If I like a song, I will listen to it on a continuous loop until I get sick of it … or the people around me get sick of me listening to it. I took classical piano lessons for 10 years while growing up and still play. My forte' is classical, specifically Beethoven, Mozart, and Baroque classical music. I realize now that it is one of the best gifts my parents gave me. I hate forks against my teeth. If while eating, my fork hits my teeth, I shudder like someone dragging nails across the chalkboard. I prefer things or items in "threes" or "sixes". I don't consider myself having OCD but if things are in "thre...

This was supposed to be a funny blog about losing my hair and gaining weight in my 40's. That was until I was sitting in work yesterday and started having chest pains. It was like a twisting twinge in the middle of my chest. I had pain, right under the middle interior of my pectoral muscles. I started getting nervous and sweating. OK, Calm down Marc, I said to myself. Lemme just call the doctor and make an appointment for the evening and just have her check me out. You are not having a heart attack, you are not having a heart attack. I spoke with the nurse on duty at my doctor’s office and she ordered me to come in around 1 PM for a walk-in appointment. She said we shouldn’t wait until the evening. Get in here! She actually wanted me to go to the hospital. I convinced her that I didn’t feel it was a heart attack (yet) and would leave work in a bit. I figured I would stay and finish up some case files. I could have stayed another hour but my mind was racing. Am I having a heart ...

I am feeling the spring fever my friends!  I saw my first robins of the season last week. The daffodils are up. The rabbits are out at night to feed!  Springtime has a way of rejuvenating and reenergizing the body, mind, and soul. I wasn't eager to get outside today and start the yardwork but once I began, there was no stopping me. (SOURCE) My normal outside work during the winter is cleaning up branches and refilling the bird feeders. Pretty mundane. It's not like you can do much. I ventured outside today just to take the tarp off of the bistro set on the side deck. I figured I wanted a place to enjoy coffee again each morning. It was in the high 60's without a cloud in the sky. I noticed a holly branch or two jutting from the tree right by the front door. No wonder my 70 something fabulous neighbor Charlotte seemed to complain about it. Every time she came over to drop off some home baked goodies or a bottle of wine, she would wince about getting scratched from it....

We all have weeks like this. You feel like you are just stumbling through life. Some people equate it to "being in the weeds", "drowning", or "just trying to keep your head above water."  That is how the first two weeks of March have gone for me.  And as a result, once again, I have become frazzled. I sometimes get down on myself and feel that I am just not good at this "adult life thing." I just want to crawl into a hole and hide. Now I am not talking about life such as being alive. I am talking about juggling my bills, my job, my home, the yard, my writing, the antique business, and my volunteer work in the community.  I get overwhelmed and something always gets pushed to the side or buried.  You have also, no doubt, heard the expression "Something has got to give!"  My sanity perhaps? :-) Over the past several months, it has been the antiques that has fallen by the wayside. The past two weeks, it became the writing and staying in...

I was driving home from work today westward towards the setting sun. It's a long drive home along Rt 78, just straight for a good 20 or so miles with the expanse of the sky ahead of you, the Blue Mountain Ridge to your north, and farmland to your south. I glanced up and spied a cloud moving quickly in the winds that looked like an elephant galumphing across the late afternoon blue sky. What is galumphing you may ask? It means to gallop triumphantly, but also clumsily, or heavily! In 1959, my father Robert Haynes and his first wife, Nanda Ward, wrote and illustrated a book, The Elephant That Galumphed .  It was a children's story about a young Indian elephant named Tajal who refused, despite parental disapproval, to walk quietly. He instead "galumphed."  One can imagine the noise associated with a young elephant just galumphing through the underbrush! The cloud I was watching (while driving) looked just like an elephant galumphing across the sky on strong ...