I've been included in a Minnesota anthology "Under Purple Skies", now available on Amazon!

My second chapbook, "The Second Book of Pearl: The Cats" is now available as either a paper chapbook or as a downloadable item. See below for the Pay Pal link or click on its cover just to the right of the newest blog post to download to your Kindle, iPad, or Nook. Just $3.99 for inspired tales of gin, gambling addiction and inter-feline betrayal.

My first chapbook, I Was Raised to be A Lert is in its third printing and is available both via the PayPal link below and on smashwords! Order one? Download one? It's all for you, baby!

Wednesday, June 12, 2019

I'm Maturing; or Hey! Pearl's Doin' Stuff!

Now, normally I don’t believe in the verbification of words (even writing that was painful); but having said that, I have to admit:  I am now adulting at an unprecedented level.

Sorry.

I sometimes walk around my house, though, late at night – putzing, we call it in the Great White North – shaking the cat dish into an appearance of being full, randomly dusting small glass birdies, picking up something from one room and taking it to another  – and I wonder:  When did all this happen?

To be honest, I had forgotten how much work it is to run a life.  I’d been married, you know, for a good dozen years.  Over that time, chores peeled off, to me, to him, and pretty much stayed the purview of whoever gravitated toward them.  To that end, it is safe to say that I had not taken out the garbage, filled my own gas tank, or brought my own laundry up from the basement in that same amount of time. 

And now?  I've been forced to - ugh - grow.  I mean, I must be seven feet tall by now.

Look at me!  I’m picking up sticks in the yard.  I’m schlepping laundry.  For cryin’ out loud, people, I know when it's time to take out my recycling! 

Would you believe me when I tell you that I am the proud owner of a lawn mower, a weed whipper, and a snowblower. 

What's next?  Lawn furniture?  Card tables?  RUBBER BOOTS?

I tell ya; anything could happen.




15 comments:

jenny_o said...

Have you started shaking your fist at the kids on your lawn yet, or worse yet, at the weather falling from the sky? Those are the symptoms in the advanced stages of adulthood, also known as geezer-hood.

"Shaking the cat dish into an appearance of being full" - lol - it's true! And the cat falls for it most of the time.

Joanne Noragon said...

I don't much like it either.

Gigi said...

"Adulting" IS hard. And also includes a lot of putzing, unfortunately.

Starting Over, Accepting Changes - Maybe said...

Putzing, yep, I do a lot of that also. Adulting has it’s moments but if truth be told, we’d all rather return to childhood. There was a lot less worrying then.

Sioux Roslawski said...

Being an adult is a *itch. Really.

Jo-Anne's Ramblings said...

Being a responsible adult is such a drag at times, kids thing it's great being a grown up how wrong they can be.

Shelly said...

You’ve got that pioneer DNA alive and thriving in you. Next thing we know, you’ll be changing the oil in your car and such. Hat’s off to you, Pearlie!

DUTA said...

Those who know me say I was born adult.

Raymond Alexander Kukkee said...

You'll need a chain saw and a wood-chipper and rototiller next...haha!

Diane Stringam Tolley said...

Ugh. Adulting.
Do you have a broom to sweep the freshly-cut grass back onto the lawn?
If now, you have growth yet, sister!

jono said...

I decided to go it alone a couple of months ago and found out that I can still cook! I already did most everything else, but it is fun to get back a few life skills I hadn't thought about in a long time.

Geo. said...

Dear Pearl, I know I know. Adulting is rough sometimes --ok, a lotta times-- and verbification is a 5-jointed godless reptile of a word. I use gerund, 2 syllable word derived from Girondins who opposed the Jacobins during the French Revolution. Adulting has its advantages over childhooding because I'm all educated up now and when somebody tells me to do work, I say: "Wah! I'm a grape big man now, and you can't make me!!!"

Z said...

After my husband died - while he was ill, come to that - I had to do everything and actually it was all right, to do rather than wait for someone else to do.

Reading what Duta said, I had a revelation when I was 18. My Latin teacher said, of the Roman writer Horace, "People say you have to be middle-aged to enjoy Horace. But I think I was born middle-aged." And, suddenly, I started to understand that I just hadn't grown into myself yet.

R.Cazares said...

Yep, been there done that. I call it ‘puttering’ as in puttering around the house. It comes on usually after about 45 minutes of TV. Just can’t sit still that long without puttering!

Linda O'Connell said...

There have been times in my life when I've felt like the ONLY adult in the group, family, any given situation. Responsibilty is overrated.