Posted on 07/06/2015 1:52:26 PM PDT by jazusamo
After my 85th birthday last week, I looked back over my life and was surprised to discover in how many different ways I had been lucky, in addition to some other ways in which I was unlucky.
Among the things I did not know at the time was that I was adopted as an infant into a family with four adults, in which I was the only child.
All sorts of research since then has shown how the amount of attention and interactions with adults a child gets has a lot to do with the way the child develops. But of course I knew nothing about such things back then.
It was decades later, when I now had a son of my own that I asked one of the surviving members of the family how old I was when I first started to walk. She said, "Oh, Tommy, nobody knows when you could walk. Somebody was always carrying you."
Many times over the years, she liked to recall an incident when I was maybe three or four years old. She had taken me somewhere out of the neighborhood, maybe to a movie, and all was fine until we got back in sight of our home. That was when I picked up some rocks and started throwing them at her.
She laughed then, and many times in later years when she told that story to others. She thought it was so cute that I was well-behaved while I didn't know how to get back home without her, but then got mischievous when I saw our house.
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Dittoes on the Birthday wishes.
85! Wow, and he keeps writing constantly.
I just bought his Basic Economics book. Happy Birthday.
Happy Birthday! And if I may be a bit selfish... We need you to stick around for quite a few more.
He has written a couple of biographical books that are extremely interesting. His life story tells a lot about how he developed and created his mental gifts.
I am glad he is living actively into his late 80s. My dad did as well and still had a sharp wit and was full of insight. I remember once at about his age he was in his den reading the daily paper. He put it down and said, “Isn’t it interesting how many people die each day in alphabetical order?”
Roger that. A great man and mind.
Your experience and wisdom are a treasure to all of us.
“Isn’t it interesting how many people die each day in alphabetical order?”
LOL!
I will tell you another one.
After he had a terrible stroke at 90 he still lived another year. He couldn’t use his entire right side, speak more than a few words one at a time, or do anything without his nurses.
He still was allowed to be placed in a chair and read his newspaper. He fell out and was taken to the emergency room and patched up from the bleeding and bruises. Three weeks later he had it happen again as he reached for something with his one good arm. His nurse found him bleeding on the floor again and said, “oh dear boy, you’ve done it bad this time.”
Laying there he said, one slow word at a time, “You...”
“...have...”
“...got...”
“...to get...”
“...softer...”
“...FLOORS!”
I’ll see if I can top that one:
My aunt lived to 96 and spent her last years in a retirement home. She was sitting at a table playing cards with some other people when she suffered a brief TIA stroke. She “came to” a couple minutes later and resumed playing cards. After the truth came out what happened, some shocked person asked her why she didn’t say anything. My aunt replied very matter-of-factly, “Why? I knew I was holding a winning hand”.
Happy Birthday old man.
I cannot began to tell you the positive influence your life has had on my life and I also don't know how to adequately express how thankful I am for it.
I hope I live to 100 and I hope you are there to offer my family your condolences.
I’m going to share something personal. I often drive an 88-year-old woman home from church. She talks non-stop in a voice so low I can’t always hear. She talks about her life and her love for her departed husband.
She said something one day I will never forget. She talked about this and that and her husband and then softly, almost under her breath as though I wasn’t meant to hear, she said, it all went by so fast.
LOL.
As a senior now myself, I hope I keep all this as inspiration.
Thanks for relating that, it's a beautiful sentiment.
I'm not quite up there in years with her but I know what she says is true.
Thomas Sowell: consistent hitter. We are so much the better for it. Thank you. And Happy Birthday.
A number of his books grace my nightstand. But, you already knew that! ;)
I am so in love with his brain! *HEART*
I fully understand, Diana, he’s a great man and conservative intellect. ;-)
I was born too late. :(
We could’ve had a beautiful life together, LOL!
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