The Trouble With Lying About Your Age

                                                                             

I'm (on the right) with my adorable sorority sisters in 1981. l'll never tell which one was my partner in crime.

I've always done it. From an early age, my parents even encouraged it. One year, they had my older brother pretend to be nine when he was twelve in order to get into a drive-in movie for free. My dad quizzed him several times to make sure he could smoothly rattle off his fake date of birth, so that our parents would only be charged for two tickets instead of three. I could rest easy, as I was really nine, and in the clear. My brother worked well under pressure, and passed with flying colors during the practice drills. When my dad pulled up to the front of the line, the cashier asked him our ages. Before my brother could speak, my dad anxiously blurted out, "He's twelve and she's nine." They never asked my brother to lie again, but I was a different story.

As I grew, the lies grew with me. When I was fifteen, I passed for eighteen at my brother's college campus. The drinking laws were very lax in the 70's, so I just had to say the fake date and year I was born in before I transformed into an instant coed.

Things became more difficult during my college years. The drinking age changed from nineteen to twenty-one, and if you were caught with a fake ID, it was immediately confiscated. Fortunately, my tall, blond sorority sister came to the rescue with a copy of her driver's license.

It's true how everything comes around full circle. Now I fib about my age at the movies in order to get a senior discount. Some of my friends have caught me in the act, and hide while I purchase our tickets. It wouldn't be so bad if they weren't the same age, and older.

As for my lovely, kind and considerate older sorority sister, today she has a bionic hip, and still looks great in a bikini. Though at fifty-four she is a year older, she could pass for ten years younger. You would think I'd learned my lesson, but once a liar always a liar.

At a recent college graduation party for a family friend,  I decided to join in conversation with a group of women whom I'd never met. Introductions were made, and the topic of age came up. One woman said she was forty-five, another fifty-four, and then it was my turn. As they waited for my response to this silly question, I thought it only appropriate to respond with a silly answer. I concentrated on keeping a straight face when I told them I was seventy-two. Without missing a beat, the younger woman replied in all seriousness, "Well, you must have stayed out of the sun then."

Whoever Said That Brothers Don't Know Squat About Gift Giving?

Last weekend we had a small 4th of July gathering with family and friends. When my brother arrived, he quickly dropped something off in the guest bedroom behind the kitchen. Then he told me to look at it privately when I had a chance. At the time, I was busy scrambling all of the side dishes together, while my husband was manning the grill. I couldn't imagine what he had brought, but I thanked him as my mom was being carried through our garage landing like Cleopatra.

After dinner, we cleared off the table, and started putting everything away. We were trying to decide if anyone wanted to walk over to see the fireworks, when I noticed that a few of our guests were missing. I found my friend, and my mom's caregiver texting from across the kitchen table. At first, I was wondering if they were texting each other, "Can you believe that Julie doesn't know from good wine? Of course, I had to bring my own bottle to be polite."

Then I was wondering if they were texting for help, "I'm so bored. If you won't come pick me up, could you at least give me a creative excuse to leave?" Before I could snatch their phones, my brother asked if I had opened up his present.

I took a quick peek, and brought it into the the dining room for everyone to see. Never before had I heard so many oohs, and aahs. My brother had bought us a Squatty Potty for our anniversary.

The Squatty Potty slides easily under your toilet allowing you to squat like our ancestors did, so that you can "poop like a pro." Our dear friend immediately ran into our powder room to demonstrate the product for us, but since we have so few dear friends, this model will have to suffice.

This was just the icebreaker our party needed to really loosen things up. Flushed with excitement, we were on a roll. The next minute it was as if we were shooting our own Squatty Potty infomercial. One guest chimed in with how the Squatty Potty helped prevent hemorrhoids, while another said that she heard it got the job done toot sweet. Then my mom inquired, "Do you have to have the urge to go before you use it?"

A moment later we noticed that the Squatty Potty was missing. Then our smiling son returned with the portable step stool in tow. You could've heard a pin drop when he proudly announced, "It works."

Calling In The Senior Fixer

     

                                                        

 On Ray Donovan,  Liev Schreiber stars as a professional "fixer" to some of LA's most powerful players, while struggling to keep his own family together. Jon Voight plays his criminal father who was just released from prison. They are both multi-dimensional characters, though Ray has to memorize a lot less dialogue.

Some of Ray's duties include: silent intimidation, fighting bad guys, hiding bodies, gathering blackmail material, and having short but meaningful conversations in his walk-in closet that is larger than most people's homes.When one of his client's threatened to let him go he replied in his gruff  Boston accent, "I'm not the kind of guy people fire."

This made me think of my own special skills. Instead of  packing a pistol, I was armed with an AARP card. Yes I had all of the unofficial requirements for being a senior fixer. Like Ray, I was always up to the challenge. If my mom needed to know what time and channel her favorite TV show was on she called me. If she didn't remember to hang up the phone after she called, I would find a way to get the message to her. Soon she told her friends about my skills. When they didn't care, I flew fourteen hours to see my mother-in-law.

I noticed that she was more frail than she had been just a few months earlier. After she had gone to take a nap, my husband and I waited for her in the living room. While my husband talked, I moved from the dining room table to the living room couch. The couch was too low, and the chairs were too stiff. Then I realized that if I was uncomfortable, a ninety year old woman who weighed about eighty two pounds would be in agony. Truth be told, you would have to be built like a Kardashian to sit comfortably on any of her furniture for more than a few minutes.

My husband's aunt recommended a store that specialized in supportive chairs for people with back injuries. We tested the height, and arm placement to insure that my mother-in-law would be able to sit, as well as rise with relative ease. The store promised that the chair would be delivered the following week. They lied.

We found out that the chair still hadn't arrived almost two weeks later. I immediately went into Ray Donovan mode. I threatened, made inappropriate gestures, and even chugged some chocolate milk. Then I grabbed the remote control, and held it over the toilet during the Chicago Bears game until my husband made the call.

When my mother-in-law finally got her comfortable recliner, she regained some of her energy. She thanked my husband and me up and down, and sounded more like herself. Sure Ray brings home a larger suitcase of cash than I do, but that's not going to stop me from pestering seniors to help them help me feel better about myself.