i want to thank all of you for the wonderful birthday wishes. it really means a lot to me - my own family (brother and sisters) are not so good at marking these occasions, self included... although we're trying to get better at it - anyway, it just makes it so much more meaningful when my forum family reaches out like you guys have today.

i have to confess (thank you, peg!) that i am all of 57 years young today, not 50! god, how did that happen? time goes by so fast... this year, especially, seems to just have gotten away from me. i guess i've been having fun. something's flying, anyway!.

i found a great quote while trying to do some research on the internet the other day, which i'd like to share with you all here before it goes up on the old refrigerator:

"In spite of illness, in spite even of the archenemy sorrow, one can remain alive long past the usual date of disintegration if one is unafraid of change, insatiable in intellectual curiosity, interested in big things, and happy in small ways." Edith Wharton

when chelsea was little, i used to "give" my birthdays to her - only partly in jest. subconciously, i think, because i felt that i needed to fight getting older - time being the enemy and all! - and of course living here in LA did not help that particular mindset... vanity thy name is woman... need i say more?

but i've never, ever lied about my age. never have i looked my age, either - people are always shocked when i tell them how "old" i am-. but it would just be too complicated to be dishonest about it; i'd have to then lie about chelsea's age as well as my own, in order to pull it off properly! not good enough at math for that - and, who really cares, anyway? i ask you...

i've earned every last wrinkle. can't take any real credit for looking younger than my years - that is pure genetics. i was telling someone just the other day, in fact... that because the severe pain of TOS hit me so young - it happened to be at a time which was way BEFORE it became fashionable for women to go to the gym to work out - i never did any of that stuff.

i really should be as big as a house by now. the fact that i am a size 4 is some kind of a medical mystery. i'll have to ask dr. karlis ulllis when i see him in a couple of weeks about this (he is the sports medicine/anti-aging doc that i stumbled across in my quest for cranial sacral work: www.agingprevent.com).

hey, maybe it will turn out like the portrait of dorian gray... he'll be able to figure out how to get rid of my TOS/RSD/FMS pain, by prescribing supplements and dietary changes... but i will immediately start to look my age and then some!!!

actually, that is a deal i would accept in a heartbeat!

anyway, thank you all again for the birthday greetings and wishes. you fill me up! don't know how i would deal with my TOS mess without each and every one of you.

alison
"Be Brave"