Old Women Having Fun

 

It’s easier to write when I’m all fired up mad or annoyed by something than when I’m mellowed out due to having a good time at one of the ‘laugh fests’ we have around the continuum care complex. Laugh fests can happen over the silliest things and silly things do not translate easily to the written word---at least at my keyboard. Like last night at dinner in the fine dining restaurant when I got seated with three others I know well but rarely get paired up with by the hostess. And maybe that’s because we tend to laugh a lot which grabs everyone’s attention as opposed to when conversations are strained because I’m at a table with Ms. Manners and her canary soft voice that barely makes it across that table.

Last night we ran through the usual opening question of “What did you do today” and as a reply one of the ladies was telling about how tired she was from working on a cottage that she’s putting up for sale soon and she said, “When I finally crawled into bed I yelled out “Yes! Yes! Yes! Then I worried that my neighbors heard me through the wall and they’d think I was you-know-whating.” 

“You know whating?” Lady Two asked with a confused look on her face and Lady Three answered, “Having sex, dear.” Ladies Two’s confusion slowly got replaced with a huge grin, “That’s what we used to say, isn’t it. It’s been twenty-five years.” “And we can gather you haven’t seen a x-rated movie or porn in twenty-five years either?” I added to the conversation. Lady One burst out laughing and said, “Fifteen years for me" and Lady Three shared, “Ten for me. I might be 93 but I used to have fun!” By then I was laughing so hard I was afraid I’d fall off my chair. For the rest of the night one or the other of us would say, “Yes! Yes, yes!” and we’d all burst out laugh. “Oh, this pork roast is really good,” and a chorus of ‘yeses’ answered. “Are you having dessert? “Yes, yes, yes!” “Are you going to the movie after dinner?” “Yes, yes, yes!” That’s a laugh fest at its finest.

Another night, another dinner and eight of us were around a table each taking a turn at trying to get the top on a take-out container that looked like it would fit but didn’t. I got up to get myself a cup of coffee and as usual they didn’t have the right size tops to fit the cups and I came back to the table complaining about that. “We have free coffee now but we can’t carry it anywhere because the tops never fit.” Someone else piped in with, “that’s because they buy them from the same company where they buy the take-out containers.” I kid you not these two things have been on-going problems here---not life threatening but mildly annoying and that night this issue turned into a comedy act.

If you manage to get the tops on a take-out box then when you go to take it back off it’s like trying to break into an cast-iron safe. One time I thought I’d end up in Urgent Care trying to pry one open with every conceivable tool in my kitchen drawer. Another woman ended up with the food on the floor. We swapped so many stories and laughs so hard around that table about miss-matched lids that the cafe’ manager came out and took all the coffee lids off the rack. And of course whenever the topic of coffee comes up the woman who single-handedly talked our CEO into making the coffee available all day long and for free has to re-tell the story. Big game hunters bragging couldn’t story-tell that accomplishment any better. 

Also this week at a social hour outside on our piazza the guys got started on a topic that had all us ladies scratching our heads when Guy One says, “I couldn’t decide between having pie tonight or having an affair behind my wife’s back.” Did I hear that right? Yes, I did. And Wife One was sitting right beside him and heard it too. Then Guy Two stepped into that pile of dung and said, “I’d always pick an affair over dessert.” There were 8-10 of us ladies around our outdoor fire pit and someone said, “We all know who to stay away from now on, don’t we, ladies.” And one of the women from my dinner table the night before yells out: “Yes, yes, yes!” I still don’t get in what universe a guy gets to pick between pie or an affair but three times this week my belly actually hurt from laughing too. So I knew I had to try to write about these little episodes that happen routinely around here at the CCC. I've written---probably too often---about the gossip train that goes through this place so hopefully this post gives a proper balance to what life is like around this place. ©