Thinking about things...

(Tevye)
Is this the little girl I carried?
Is this the little boy at play?

(Golde)
I don't remember growing older
When did they?

(Tevye)
When did she get to be a beauty?
When did he grow to be so tall?

(Golde)
Wasn't it yesterday
When they were small?

These words, in the song 'Sunrise, Sunset' from "Fiddler on the Roof" have been a favorite of mine for a long time. Having raised five children and been privileged to share in the lives of our eleven grandchildren, the words become more meaningful as time goes by.. and it goes by So fast these days. I truly don't remember growing older... so when did they?

Reading my dear friend Liz's thoughts about her approaching birthday the other day, got me to thinking more about 'aging' in general. I am blessed to have friends in every age group. I cherish my older friends and enjoy the youthful enthusiam of my 'younger' friends. It's contagious, you know. Hubby found a quotation recently: "Don't be concerned about growing old. Think how many don't have the privilege." Think about it.

Shifting gears -- we had a good DAR meeting yesterday, and accomplished a lot. Instead of inviting a guest speaker, each member present was asked to take 'no more than 5 minutes' to talk about herself - telling the others something we might not have known before. This idea came about when one of our longtime members died, and we realized how little we really did know about Sara. Rationale: we see each other at meetings, and then go our individual ways until next meeting. Most of us don't see each other in between times. So now we have shared some thoughts with each other in our Chapter, and learned much more than we knew before.

We're doing something similar in our Sunday School Class at church. When a member has a birthday during the coming week, he or she is given a few minutes to tell us more about him/herself. A dear friend celebrated her 86th birthday recently, and we were amazed at things she told about herself that we didn't know before. She said, I am "just Alice" to most people

The rain that accompanied us on the trip to the DAR meeting place soon abated and the sun was shining nicely by the time we finished the second meeting of the day -with the Huguenot Society. It was a full and busy day, but quite rewarding.