Martha Bolton - Growing Your Own Turtleneck...and Other Benefits of Aging

Growing
Your Own
Turtleneck...

and other benefits of aging

Books by Martha Bolton

FROM BETHANY HOUSE PUBLISHERS

Didnt My Skin Used to Fit?

I Think, Therefore I Have a Headache!

Cooking With Hot Flashes

Growing Your Own Turtleneck

Its Always Darkest Before the Fridge Door Opens
(with Phil Callaway)

Your Best Nap Now

Martha Bolton

author of the bestselling Didn't My Skin Used to Fit?

Growing
Your Own
Turtleneck...

and other benefits of aging

Growing Your Own Turtleneck
Copyright 2005
Martha Bolton

Cover design by Brand Navigation
Cover illustration by Eldon Doty

Unless otherwise identified, Scripture quotations are from the HOLY BIBLE, NEW INTERNATIONAL VERSION. Copyright 1973, 1978, 1984 by International Bible Society. Used by permission of Zondervan Publishing House. All rights reserved.

All rights reserved. No part of this publication may be reproduced, stored in a retrieval system, or transmitted in any form or by any meanselectronic, mechanical, photocopying, recording, or otherwisewithout the prior written permission of the publisher. The only exception is brief quotations in printed reviews.

Published by Bethany House Publishers
11400 Hampshire Avenue South
Bloomington, Minnesota 55438

Bethany House Publishers is a division of
Baker Publishing Group, Grand Rapids, Michigan.

Printed in the United States of America

ISBN 978-0-7642-0003-8

Library of Congress Cataloging-in-Publication Data

Bolton, Martha, 1951
Growing your own turtleneck: and other benefits of aging / by Martha Bolton.
p. cm.
Summary: Martha Boltons take on being middle-aged will leave readers laughing out loud and will help you face the day with a smile. This veteran comedy writer adds occasional touching and poignant stories that remind readers what life is all about Provided by publisher.
ISBN 0-7642-0003-8 (pbk.)
1. AgingHumor. I. Title.
PN6231.A43B653 2005
814'.54dc22

2005008947

MARTHA BOLTON is a full-time comedy writer and the author of over fifty books. She was a staff writer for Bob Hope for fifteen years along with writing for Phyllis Diller, Wayne Newtons USO show, Ann Jillian, Mark Lowry, Jeff Allen, and many others. Her material has appeared in ReadersDigest, Chicken Soup for the Soul books, and Brio magazine, and she has received four Angel Awards and both an Emmy nomination and a Dove Award nomination. Martha and her husband live in Tennessee.

To my loving aunts Sibyl, Clara, and Wilma,
who have stayed forever young, who have never
lost their sense of fun, and who have proved that
true beauty only grows through the years.

Contents

Its Only Right

It does not require a majority to prevail,
but rather an irate, tireless minority keen to set
brush fires in peoples minds.

Samuel Adams

Its time. Actually, its long overdue. They already have them for parents with young children. They have them for expectant mothers, too. They have them for physically challenged men and women. While all of this is good and necessary and certainly helpful, I for one think that its high time grocery stores and malls started designating a few parking spaces for another segment of the populationmenopausal women.

Menopausal women could use a little consideration, too, you know. Do you men and young people have any idea what driving around a parking lot looking for an available parking space does to a menopausal woman? Even the streets of Los Angeles havent seen that kind of road rage. I once watched a middle-aged woman hit-and-run three grocery carts, sideswipe a newspaper stand, and nearly crash into a shelf of propane tanks just trying to beat an SUV to an open parking space. Even with all that effort, she still lost the race and stopped right there in the middle of the parking lot and had a good cry. My heart went out to her, but I still didnt move my SUV. In a parking lot situation, its every menopausal woman for herself!

Before grocery store managers designate these spaces for us, there are a few things they should keep in mind. First of all, a menopausal parking space will need to be extra wide. You know how claustrophobic we hot-flashing women can get in close quarters. We need plenty of room to breathe and move, even if it is outdoors. Theres nothing worse than pulling into a parking space and realizing the Volvo next to you has parked so close to the line that you have to climb out of your window and over your hood to exit your car. I would, therefore, suggest the size of these special menopausal spaces be about twice the size of a regular parking space. An RV- or tour-bus-parking size would be just about right. If it can fit a Winnebago, itll fit a middle-aged hot-flashing woman in a Honda Accord.

Another nice touch that store managers could do would be to circle the spaces with giant fans or misting machines. What menopausal woman wouldnt be moved to tears if she were to open her door and be greeted with gale force winds or a refreshing mist on her way into the store? (Im getting all weepy just thinking about it.)

But if grocery store managers really want to draw the menopausal crowd to their stores (and lets face it, we baby boomers are quite the shopping force), why not go all out and put our parking spaces inside the store, say in the frozen-food aisle. Menopausal women would drive for miles to get to park their car in there and have that blast of frozen-food air hit them the minute they open their car door. Forget double coupons! Forget free tickets to Disneyland! Forget giveaways and contests! Give us arctic air and well be loyal customers for life! And really, when you think about it, is getting to park our cars in the frozen-food aisle that much to ask, especially when you consider all the store managers who are already letting children drive those little kiddie carts around in their stores? I guarantee you wed hit fewer customers with our cars than the kids do with theirs.

Being able to park our cars right in the store would also save us time and energy loading the groceries into the trunk or the back of our SUVs. All we would have to do is drive our car up to the check-out counter, pay the bill, put the bagged groceries directly into our car, and then drive away.

But designated parking spaces at grocery stores is only the beginning. I would also like to suggest that officials at the Department of Transportation begin looking into the possibility of adding a special menopause lane to all our interstate highways. I realize this could get pricey and on the surface might appear to involve some tax hikes to pay for it, but hear me out. Its a known fact that menopausal women sometimes have difficulty making decisions, am I right? Wait, maybe I shouldnt say that. Aw, why not? Its my book. No, wait. Its a generalization and... Oh, never mind, Im going to leave it in because its true. We do have trouble making decisions. A separate menopause lane would help us with this indecisiveness because there would be an off-ramp every five hundred feet or so to accommodate last-minute exit decisions of the menopausal woman. The resulting decrease in car accidents due to multiple and unsafe lane change attempts should defray the cost of adding such a lane. And think of the gasoline savings. Here in the South if you miss your off-ramp, you sometimes have to drive an extra ten or fifteen miles before you can get off the highway and reverse your direction. Thats a lot of unnecessary fuel we menopausal drivers are wasting just because we cant make up our minds in time to exit when were supposed to. So in actuality, a menopause lane would be saving the country both money and precious fuel. If we as a nation are truly seeking to lessen our dependence on foreign oil, adding several extra off-ramps would be one way to help us achieve this goal. So a tax hike wouldnt even be needed because the menopause lane would pay for itself over time.