they can still be Ns even at 87

[towrite]

Esp. Cat's Paw - to give you an example of my Nmother ... I've just come back from a trip to NYC with her. She said it was my b'day and Christmas presents and she did pay for everything - dinners in several fancy restaurants, an expensive hotel, theatre tickets, a car and driver. It didn't take me long to figure out this trip was for her - her swan song to NYC (which she loves). Her choice of hotels, restaurants, plays - etc. Nothing I suggested was acceptable. She wanted this and manipulated it to seem like gifts to me when the truth was she couldn't go without me, not at 87. So I just tried to enjoy it without any misgivings or recriminations. But that's her, a true N even at 87!

Towrite

[cats paw]

Hello, Towrite-

  Whoa- still going that strong at 87- both physically and N-istically!  (forgive my little flight of ideas here- but could there be a song here like the in The Wizard of Oz when they were singing about how "we magically wonderfully thank thee"- )

   You said you just tried to enjoy it- I hope you did!  What did you see at the theatre?

cats paw

[Gaining Strength]

towrite - I am so glad to see you.  I have been thinking of you.

Your story is so reminescent of an experience I had with my mother.  I went to college at 18 but did not graduate.  It would be many years later that I learned that I had a learning disorder and I suffered from enormous anxiety.  But in my earliy thirties I went back and obtained a degree in philosophy.  Upon graduating the only recognition I received was from my mother. As a graduation gift she took me to NYC.  Well not really - she actually allowed me to join her already planned trip with my paternal aunt and one of my father's cousins.  And, like your mother, my mother paid for everything but any and all of my suggestions of activities were nixed.  It wasn't a trip FOR me in any way but it gave my mother a sense of acknowledging my accomplishment.

I really do understand. - Gaining Strength

[cats paw]

towrite-

     I hope I didn't come across as flip to you.  I had read what you posted about you don't f with Mother Nature or the Supreme Court, and I got a kick out of it.  I need to tell you thanks  for addressing me in the beginning of the post because it probably means that you read some of my other posts and you were sharing something.  Maybe what I meant by my humor was not clear or maybe it was not congruent with your particular story about NY.  I know, it's probably ok, but I just felt the need in case.

Gaining Strength-

     How cool! A degree in philosophy- and you went back in your thirties!  What I've read would not even fill a thimble, but I like "ideas".    At times people have told me I tend to be serious, and I am.  I know that as for myself, sometimes I consider what people are saying, and respond back in a manner that I'm trying better to understand the idea- or even the emotion trying to be conveyed, and it is in a spirit of inquiry or communication.  Does that describe a little bit how you tend to be? In other words, I hope you'll let me know if any of my communications to you are ever invalidating.

      Same goes for anyone who might feel that way - so I'm going to try not to worry about it unless there seems to be evidence to do so.

      Back to humor- do you guys remember the skit on Saturday Night Live with the affirmations- (by gosh-I'm good enough, and people like me)?  Sometimes I can just take a step back and lighten up when I get too bogged down with "growth".
       I'm glad that part of me is still there; I guess part of my inner child still has some joy.

OK enough rambling from-

cats paw