Everybody gets the blues now and then. My most recent bout was nearly two weeks ago on May 12, the day I turned 66, when for some reason I felt so blue I hardly wanted to get out of bed. Everybody who’s been through these funks knows how you just can’t see beyond the blahs no matter how many good things about your life your friends or husband, like mine, try valiantly to point out to lift you out of your funk. The thing I’ve noticed about the blues is, they ain’t over until they’re over and the fat lady has finished singing!

Daughter #2 had called on Saturday to wish me a happy mother’s day and birthday since her Monday late teaching schedule wouldn’t lend it self to calling on THE day. I’d gotten a birthday card from my steadfast and loyal Pittsburgh friend who hasn’t forgotten a single special day of our whole family since we became friends in the fall of 1967, who in fact went to the bother of flying to Connecticut some around the mid-1970’s with Pittsburgh treats packed in dry ice for my birthday (you couldn’t get regional specialties just anywhere those days).

Later in the afternoon Hubby talked me into a matinee at the local artsy fartsy theatre. La Misma Luna (Under the Same Moon). Maybe the movie we’d talked about seeing, about the problems of illegal immigrants, could show me how small my problems were in comparison. But as well done as it was without being sappy, the movie only seemed to add to the “life stinks” attitude I seemed stuck in. Even stopping for supper at a popular nearby restaurant, wasn’t enough to lift my spirits. Pity the saint-like Hubby who had to put up with me all day!

Arriving back home around eight p.m., there was the promised UPS birthday shipment with this ceramic pig shipped from Arizona (from the friend in Pittsburgh, because she knows about my pet pig Buster), and a beautiful handmade birthday card in the mailbox from Nina in Ohio. (Thanks Nina!) They had timed it perfectly! There was also a telephone singing message (happy birthday to you, happy birthday to you) from Daughter #1. So in spite of the fact that I was way over the hill at 66, and my ankle bothered me and the bone in my knee wanted to break through the skin every time I went down the stairs, and the bottom of the feet hurt and my toes burned after I went to bed at night, there seemed to be reason enough to stick around for 67. I went to bed a little sad, but at least I had friends and family who acknowledged me.

At Hubby’s urging I finally called my Reumatologist the following Thursday (the 15th). By Friday I had begun a short round of Prednisone (a steroid), and my infusion treatment was moved up from Friday the 23rd (today) to Tuesday the 20th (three days ago). While I was hooked up to the intravenous thing, I heard the technician speaking with another RA patient who was apparently reporting (by the one-sided conversation I was hearing) that she was having a bad bout of depression. The technician was kindly reassuring her that can sometimes be one of the signs of an RA flare. Maybe there was a real reason after all for my bad moon. Just hearing that made me feel better.

Though they couldn’t have known about my blues since we hadn’t spoken in awhile, I received the same video in two different emails last week from friends in Las Vegas, Sandi and Bob, and it reassured me I’m not aging all by myself, if that was the problem. And that fat lady has sung! Today I walked with a springier step up and down the stairs finishing the laundry, and the bone in my knee stayed where it should be, my ankle didn’t feel like it was breaking, my toes didn’t feel swollen and burning, and my fingers are limber enough to finish up the spring chores I started more than two weeks ago.

I’m technically in the AFTER Middle-Aged Woman stage, but I’ve decided to feature that video Bob & Sandi sent, Middle Aged Woman, in case anyone else finds themselves singing their own blues today or any other day. It’ll be here whenever you need a lift. The singer is Lisa Koch and the Minniepauz Cartoons by Dee Adams and it’s from Bloomingproud on YouTube. A little less than three minutes; enjoy!