I'm not sure, but I think I may have mentioned that in my wild and woolly days I was a photographer's model, even was a calendar girl. Well, Some people have asked me if I am not concerned that my boys might come across these photos and wouldn't that be...awkward, and rather embarrassing?
Honestly, no. It's unlikely they would ever see them, but if they did, so what? They've seen their mom in her birthday suit before. As I've mentioned before, my husband photographed me in the nude and also used me as his model for his wood carvings. He displayed the photos and sculptures in his office and workshop here at the ranch. The kids don't even notice them. They prefer the ones he made of dogs, horses and bulls, not their dopey mom.
Also, we all used to go skinny dipping. I don't do that with them anymore because they are growing up, faster every day, it seems.
And anyway I make sure they they meet lots of pretty girls to focus their attention on, not their dumb old mom. Pretty soon they will have girlfriends and be deep in puppy love and their mother will fade into the background. Which is how it should be.
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My second cousin, of whom I've written, has come to spend his summer vacation on the ranch, working the odd jobs that always need doing. He broke up with his girlfriend but doesn't seem upset about it at all. He just shrugged when I asked about her and said it was fun while it lasted but you know how those things go. I suppose it wasn't that serious. Then he said he still had a crush on me and I said, oh, pshaw, when did you ever have a crush on me and he said you know. But I didn't. Not then, whenever it was, and not now.
I do see echoes of the diffident, shy guy he was before he went off to the academy, but he is much more of a self-confident person than he was. It's hard to believe he's just 21. He takes charge like a much more mature man.
My boys look up to him and hang out with him whenever they can. He takes them out in the sailboat and teaches them how to sail it, tacking and reaching and so forth. He also teaches them water rescue techniques and lifeguard stuff that he has learned. They all go skinny-dipping. I'm tempted to do it, too. But I just stay on shore fixing the picnic lunch. My daughter doesn't swim with them, either, let alone go skinny-dipping with them, although she used to. She's getting to be all grown up and instinctively knows it's not wise. The innocence of childhood passes so quickly.
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I came across the assistant ranch manager, good old Mr. Shoe, sitting in the shade looking rather glum and I asked him what was wrong. I was afraid it was some ranch trouble, but he asked if I had a minute, which I did, so I sat down beside him while he told me of some of his personal problems. I couldn't help him with any of them, but just getting things off his chest seemed to lighten his mood. To help cheer him up, I told him I had some old shoes I was planning to throw away, but if he wanted any....
He perked right up and we went up to the house where I let him browse my shoe closet (yes, I have a shoe closet) and pick out a pair of heels. I really wasn't going to throw any away, I just said that. And no he doesn't wear them. He has a shoe fetish. It's a harmless quirk -- which I can kind of understand; I love shoes, too, but not in that way, heh. He is valued and I need him so I let it go. He said he would return the shoes after he was done but I said not necessary, you can keep them. He seemed a bit disappointed so I said okay bring them back. That made him happy and he asked if I would wear them after he returned them and I said sure I guess and that made him really happy. But I won't. Maybe I won't. Well...they are really nice shoes. It would be a shame not to wear them anymore.
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My mother and father are both baby boomers and they have always been the best in my mind. I love, admire and respect them more than I could ever express. They have always been my role models and from as far back as I can remember I always wanted to have the life my mother has had and always wanted to marry a man like my dad, which I did. The people who educated me, trained me, helped me achieve my goals, develop my abilities, were almost all boomers. All good people that I looked up to and relied on.
So I really can't get my head around all this hatred of boomers I see whenever I venture onto on-line sites where people let fly with all their resentments, hostilities, complaints and just plain bitchiness. I don't get it.
Oh? You're going to explain it to me? Listen, kimo sabe, I don't care. Put a sock in it. Talk to the hand because the face doesn't care. ¿Comprende?
These Sixties kids had no idea that they would become the target of burning hatred from their ungrateful spawn half a century later just for living their lives as best they could, making their way through a world they never created.
