Is it Live or is it Memorex?

Since I was teen in the eighties the above picture is one I'm familiar with. Cassette tapes were the rage and we'd sit with our fingers on the record button just waiting for the new Amy Grant song to come on the radio (Saved by Love, released the summer of '88..) so we could record it for our own.

One company coined the phrase, "Is it live or is it Memorex?" for their cassettes, insisting they had the best quality.

Their question has been floating in and out of my mind for the past several months, with a slight change.

My new tagline reads:

Is it real or is it menopause?

Because, really. What is going on?

One day I'm merrily living life and then BAM! I suddenly look in the mirror and feel worthless from head to toe. My dreams and goals look like nonsense. My self image is still there somewhere. I can't find it though since it's being hidden by brain fog. If I do find it I certainly can't talk about it because my words come out all befuddled.

Oh hormones, I want to quiet you with salt and vinegar potato chips. And a bag of chocolate chips (because every good woman keeps these on hand knowing they aren't just for baking). A salty soft pretzel would be good right now. Bring on the carbs and sodium.

Instead I remind myself that it isn't real. None of the perceptions I have about myself on these days are real. I've also learned not to make decisions on these days or do any important work. The work and decisions can wait.

So I take extra care in my appearance, putting on actual make-up and fixing my hair even though I'm working from home. I take my Vitamin B6 and slather on the progesterone cream knowing that in a few days this hormonal influence will leave me and seek out the next woman in her mid-forties.

Signed,

The Girl in Stretchy Jeans

Comments

Kitchen floor woes

I spent a better part of this afternoon lamenting how much I hate my kitchen floor. It puzzles me as to why anyone would install such flooring. Not only is it ugly, but also impractical. It also puzzles me as to why, after nearly nine years in this house, I still have this floor. Well. It doesn't puzzle me that much ($$$). I clean it only once a year. Don't judge, I Swiffer and spot clean in between. And I have a dog who does her share of, ahem , cleaning it. But see all of those deep grout lines? Scrubbing around each brick tile and into those lines is beastly. It's much harder than getting foundation out of the lines on my face. Douse with cleaner. Scrub with rough sponge. Wipe with cloth rag. Rinse with rag. Rinse again in between each brick tile until it's done. Roughly two hours of scrubbing and rinsing. Similar process to removing makeup, but much more labor intensive. Yes, I could use a mop but scrubbing...

Sweet Zoey

Zoey - August 10, 2020 When we found her I didn't realize I needed her. Sure, she needed us, she was living in woods, alone, surviving on whatever she could find. She was nine months old, the vet later told me when I took her in for a check-up, still unsure I wanted to keep this undernourished mutt. We'd been on vacation in southwest Missouri, near the Arkansas border, in the middle of the woods. I was on the porch when I saw her trotting down the dirt road. A little brown dog. I whistled and she stopped to look at me from across the lawn. Then she continued on her way. Later that night, the family was watching a movie we'd brought (no cable service out there!) and suddenly this furry face popped up in the window, scaring my husband out of his seat. We fed her some people food and went to bed. She was still there in the morning. We asked around and no one knew where she came from. We fed her some more and she stayed. The next day we went and bought some dog food, f...

Front Row Seat

If you've been around me any length of time, you'll know I love having a front row seat when possible. Church. Concerts. Comedy shows. Auctions. I want to be front and center, where the action is, so I don't get distracted and miss something. I want to be part of the event and front is where it's at. Lately I've had a front row seat to some things that I wish I could unsee. My mother's Alzheimer's diagnosis and the last year and a half of watching her slow and steady decline into a world of unknowns has taken a toll. I tend to hold every emotion inside. Always have. I've learned -these past fifteen months or so- that this is bad for my health. Stress levels are impacting how I feel. Palpitations, and a diagnosis of "harmless" PACs, have left me trying to manage this stress. It's gotten easier but, I'll admit, I still have things shoved down inside. And then along came CDH. A diagnosis I'd not heard of before it was given to...

Suzanne Schaffer

Search This Blog