Later this morning I will wake up to see a fifty-five year old man in the mirror.  Actually I probably won’t really see the fifty-five year old man since the fifty-four year old man lost his glasses tonight.  Andrea says that she wishes she had a penny for all the times I have lost my glasses.  If we did have a penny for each loss we would have the kids’ college paid for in pennies (this is especially true if you add in the times I have lost my billfold, my keys, and the reason I went into the kitchen).  Tonight she also shared that she is impressed with how patient I am, she explained that she would lose it if she lost things as often as I do.  Not sure that was actually a compliment.

As the fifty-four year old man, minus his glasses, went to turn the lights off in the kitchen I put something in my mouth from the counter that was not chocolate.  I was expecting chocolate but without the advantage of sight I will never know what the strange taste was (very different than fifteen years ago when I was changing a diaper and put something I thought was chocolate in my mouth…tonight was a distinctly different non-chocolate taste and experience).  So in the morning, the fifty-five year old will be looking at the mirror without his glasses not knowing who is staring back at him or what that faint odd, non-chocolate taste is in his mouth.

Earlier this evening my daughters offered to take me out to lunch for my birthday but withdrew the offer when I revealed that we may be interrupted by the guy who needs to fix our fence. Our fence fell down in the tornado three years ago, I have kept it standing with everything but duct tape.  My wife also offered to take me out to dinner before we realized we will have to go late in the evening since my youngest son has a doctor appointment to figure out why he is having kidney pains again. This will put us looking at the menu as my second child, my oldest daughter, arrives home from college for her Friday, six am wrist surgery. Finally, as I was about to retire to bed, without my glasses and still with the non-chocolate taste in my mouth, I answered a call from my oldest son, who is also away at college, informing me that the doctor said his flag football rib injury is only a bruise.  I was unaware he was on a flag football team.

Tomorrow I am sure I will get many birthday greetings, including those on Facebook which will make me regret not remembering to do the same back to all those wonderful friends on their birthdays.  However, I don’t really expect to feel very different, except for the inability to read or recognize faces.  It will be a regular day like any other.  A day when I will laugh at the stories from my wife’s day, rejoice at my kids victories as well as their funny stories, worry about everyone’s health and concerns, check my bank account repeatedly, learn things I should have already known or have been previously been told, consider the things that are left to accomplish, try to remember to rest in the Lord, and wonder if I need to go order new glasses.

Oh, and try to remember that just because something looks like chocolate is not reason enough to put it into my mouth.

I think fifty-five is going to be alright.

Older,

Rick