As years, shoe sizes go by

There are a lot of ways to judge our age -- our mortality. For some, it's their chronological age. For some it's the condition of their body -- for still others it's the age of their children.

My oldest is 25 today. That's a quarter of a century and that means it's going to be hard to convince anyone that I'm still 29.

My chronological age has never really affected me like it does some people. My 30th birthday rolled around, it was just another day. My 35th birthday snuck up on me. I laughed it off.

On my 40th birthday, my brother announced to the world that I had reached that milestone with window chalk and a huge cardboard sign in front of the Gazette -- and a call to the local radio station.

I laughed it off.

What has affected me is the growth of my children -- not that I didn't want them to grow, but I did cry when I had to buy Shane's first pair of shoes that actually fit me.

With Jeremy, my youngest, it wasn't so bad. I could wear his shoes when he was 11.

It helps that Brad will be celebrating his 54th birthday next Wednesday, which means that for the next two months he will be 10 years older than me (chronologically anyway.)

I'm not sure how old I plan to be for the next few years, I' m thinking about bumping it up to 35, a 10-year jump just seems to much of a leap.

With the coming of the New Year, many people are beginning to think about their New Year's Resolutions.

I've decided not to announce mine until at least June. That way if anything good happens, I can claim it as my Resolution and no one will know the difference.

If I lose weight, I can say simply tell people I had been planning on losing weight since the coming of the New Year.

If I come up with a published book, I can simply say, "Yep, I promised myself I was going to write the Great American Novel by the end of the year."

If I fail at everything I do, I can simply say, "I didn't make any Resolutions this year."

There is one Resolution I can announce at this time, however. For the next year, at least, I'm 35 years old with a 54-year-old husband and two sons, the oldest, 25, and the youngest 18.

That's my story and I'm sticking to it.