The horrors of aging

According to most articles, aging encompasses spiritual growth in a degenerating body. OK, I said degenerating body. I look at mine. That's what I see. Sad. Depressing. Is there an upside?

There is a famous scientist/doctor (whose name I forget), who has a famous white beard. My point is that he likens human aging to the aging of whisky, cheese, wine. Aging makes them better, richer, smoother. I'm none of those.

What's on my mind, sadly, is those blank spots that are appearing in my memory banks. I'm a school librarian with about 200 students who come see me each and every week. There are some names I never remember. Lately, I look at some of those children and do not even recognize them.

Last week at a local chain store, I ran into someone from high school. Recognized her right away (that's a surprise), but not her name. When she told me, it didn't even whisper a syllable of familiarity. I still don't know who she was. Yet. Yet she said I called her by name at our first reunion (the 20th), the only one I attended. We just had our 45th one--wow, that makes me old!! I saw some photos on MySpace. I'm glad I didn't go. We all look so--well, let's just say--our age. I'm just trying to make sense of this aging thing and, so far, not!


My favorite line in literature comes from "Slaughterhouse-Five" by Kurt Vonnegut. When Billy Pilgrim's gram calls him near, he thinks she is about to impart significant advice before she dies. Instead, she whispers in Billy's ear: "How did I get so old?"

How did I get so old? By living. One day at a time. One week. One month. One year. When will I marry? Have kids? Send the kids to college? Retire? I married twice--marriage is not a safe haven!! No children. Who will take care of me when I can't? Do we really wish our lives away--waiting for all those things?

I retired from public schools seven years ago. It is deeply disorienting to lose one's sense of self after 34 years on the job. I didn't know who I was any more. Got a job as a librarian in a private school. After 4 1/2 years, I still don't feel secure as a librarian. I'm not very good because I cannot get my head wrapped in that job mode with little children (I was a high school teacher in that other life.) I'm looking forward to my second retirement.

Who will I become next? I want to reinvent myself like Madonna and Britney--well, not exactly as they did, but the concept of reinvention. Work in a plant nursery, a bookstore, a world market, a framing shop, anything that does not make me accountable for anyone but myself.

For real information on aging, please visit:
http://www.healthinaging.org/agingintheknow/chapters_ch_trial.asp?

Friday Evening

It is Friday evening. I'm still at school, still working. What is there to do when I go home? I say that stressfully because there is plenty to do. Here's my weekend agenda:
1. Work on de-cluttering.
2. Drill holes at bathroom window to hang sconces to hold two six-foot scarves, one sheer, sparkly bronze, the other sheer white.
3. Begin sewing Roman shade for other bathroom.
4. Hang shower curtain.
5. Clean water marks on laudry room ceiling. Let dry, then put on primer coat.
6. Paint shelves for cabinet converted from a chest.
7. Put things back in drawers painted and dry now.
8. Put poster in poster frame and hang.
9. Continue to de-clutter.
10. De-clutter area around iMac. Install iPhoto program. Download card. Edit photos and add to blog.
11. Continue cleaning out closets.
12. Go through kitchen cabinets and discard all items never used, regardless of quality.
13. Clean out area around wall in spare bedroom and paint one wall. Let dry. Put things back. Continue around each wall until room is painted.
Amendment: Prime, paint, paint each wall.
14. Remove old litter, wash pans, put in fresh. Wash all cat beds and towels.

How far will I get? Through Sunday?

Updating my computer!!

Yikes!!

What have I done?



“All parts should go together without forcing.  You must remember that the parts you are reassembling were disassembled by you.  Therefore, if you can’t get them together again, there must be a reason.  By all means, do not use a hammer.”
– IBM Manual, 1925 

Step One: Update my G4 Mac from OSX 10.2.6. Can I go straight through all other OS programs--Panther, Tiger, and the other cats and just ante up Leopard? Will I lose anything?

Step Two: Purchase external hard drive to copy all files to.
Problem: My 10.2.6 would not speak with the external drive--incompatible! You would think internal parts would not be so snobby, but there it is! I took my little external to school to see if it would speak with the library computer. Yes, they made friends right away, to my disgust!!

Step Three: Eureka!! I am cleaning house after learning how to de-clutter from a book I bought. Guess what I found? The Panther OS X 10. 3!! That's a whole step up. Downloaded it and saw immediate improvements but not enough to find the a real update. The external drive still was distant and so were all the cats!

Step Four: The more I did to update, the less cooperative the computer became.. Finally, I made another major decision: I would leave my old dial-up that always drove me mad with its slow delivery system and hire a high-speed service. So I did.

Step Five: Downloading the high speed internet. I put the CD in the drive and began early one morning. Gummed up the works in about 10 minutes. That download was not going to happen. Called technical support and whined and complained. The nice young lady took pity and booked me for a technician the next morning. Actually, I received a mysterious, preprogrammed phone call about an hour later, explaining that the technician would appear between 5 am and 11 am. Yes! Five am? Was this a legitimate report or the recorded voice of a home invader? Oddity! A little leeriness!

Step Six: Capture two birds with one hand. Download the installer, follow directions. I did both. Call the plumber to come at the same time to change out the old kitchen faucet for the new one I recently bought. Plus, he needed to adjust the stopper in the sink in the small bathroom. I never use that sink because of the fast fill-up and very slow drain. Also, the drain in the big bathroom needed to be cleaned.

Step Seven: The technician comes. He says: "aboout" almost like a Canadian. I asked where he was from. "Wisconsin," he said with that nasal twang. A nice gent, but he had a little problem finding my phone connection--even high speed internet must hook up with a phone system. One step at a time, this fine young Wisconsinian addressed each issue in getting that external modum and computer to get together!

Step Eight: Success! My computer and High Speed Internet are married now!! Hope there's no divorce in sight. What a lovely invention to have right in one's own home!

Step Nine: My computer is humming along now with an updated platform that allows me to interface with Face Book, U-Tube--I get video now!! I can download music. I bought two Black-Eyed Pea songs from iTunes!

Step Ten: Out of Order, but there nonetheless. My old digital camera no longer talks to my computer. My old iPhoto program no longer interfaces with Mac OS 10.5! I can access my photos, but I can no longer add new ones to the system. You know what that means? A new camera!! Out with the old! In with the new! Well, drat. I like the old and new together!

Step Eleven: Crank up the old iMac, add the old iPhoto software, attach the old camera. Edit photos and then upload into my blogs via iMac. I think it will work, but first...

Step Twelve: There's always a glitch! I must make room to get to the iMac. It is surrounded by clutter. I will be forced to de-clutter a new area, but it's all good!!

What to do about ceiling damage

Well I remember all those times the ex-husband insisted I stand and watch him "do things around the house"--mostly in the line of repair. My job was to watch and learn, as well as hand him things. I did not want to be his assistant. He didn't really need my help--he just wanted me there, not in a connected way, but just to take my time.

 We've been divorced seven years now and how many times, I repeat, how many times have I used all those things he MADE me learn that I did not want to learn. One is how to repair a cracked ceiling, not a specific he made me learn, but as in general repair of sheetrock.

This is how it looked after the roofers put on a new roof. What was a visible crack now looked considerably more like a fissure. OK, I exaggerate, but the crack doubled, tripled in size and depth, plus it now was opened and so very obvious. There was no way of not seeing this long crack that ran about six or seven feet in a broken line.

I asked at the local home repair business how to repair it. Does it fall open, they asked. Yes, to some degree. Well, then, they informed me, the sheetrock has been too wet to repair and you must replace it.

I know my limitations and knew I could never attempt that kind of repair, so what else could I do? That's when I reverted to the good ol' ex's demonstrations. Use spackling compound to "glue" those two pieces together. So I did. The finished job is not professional by any standards, but it will suffice until I can afford to have it properly repaired.

 

The repair actually resembles a healed scar, but is less noticeable than an opened crack! 

 

This is the water damage to the ceiling after the roofers put on the new shingles. The flashing around the skylight was not properly sealed and water got under the shingles, causing this horrid result!

Again, I reverted to the ex's training and  came up with this result: The photo is taken from nearly the same angle as the damage shot. The lighting is different and makes the color of the photo different. Both of the damaged ceilings were shot under incandescent lighting (bulbs), causing a yellowish glow, while the water damage was shot under natural light, causing the white cast.

But notice that you can hardly see the damage on the "white" ceiling. So far all I have used was one coat of Primer in oil-base. You can see faint outlines of the two stains, but I feel sure those will disappear with two coats of ceiling paint, which the ceiling needed to begin with.

As a word inserted at this point: I am publicly thanking the ex for his teachings even under duress! Thank you, Ex!

New roof, more ceiling damage

What to do in such a case? 

I had a new roof installed recently but gained several ugly new stains on my ceiling as a result. I never know what to do in these circumstances.

By learning to blog, I am learning to add links. Adding links led me to information concerning costs of roofing, information I never thought to check before hiring someone. I have learned that the cost of my roof is reasonable. Two problems remain: those huge new ceiling stains in the Great Room and a long crack between the kitchen and Great Room, where a previous owner of the house added on and did the work himself. He told one of his neighbors (my neighbor now) that he didn't care about lasting quality. He wouldn't be in the house long enough to experience any problems.

one crack between kitchen and Great Room

 two new stains after new roofing was in place

That same guy added a swimming pool and gazebo, but built up the side of the hill where house meets deck and reinforced the area with dirt and huge railroad ties, which have now rotted and are crumbling, as is the hill. Everyone tells me I have to reinforce with concrete. I know enough about concrete to know I cannot afford such an expense. So? My pool goes sliding down the hill? Then what? I have no idea.

But the roof. It still leaks along the lower side of the chimney and along one skylight. Serious leaks, The roofer came back and repaired both, replacing an old vent, which was supposed to have been replaced in the first place. And the area along the chimney was damaged  during the roofing process.

They also were reroofing the gazebo when I arrived home one day. I promptly called their office--all the workers spoke only Spanish--to let her know I would not pay for something I clearly stated I did not want. So they had to deduct that expense--$300. They have repaired the chimney area. I'm waiting for the next rain before I complete payment.

I know I did this process all wrong now. One nice thing out of all this is meeting the owner and his wife, both very nice people. He even invited me to their home for Thanksgiving because they thought I was totally alone. I thanked him and told him I have family nearby.

For more information concerning roofing costs and how to figure them, please go to:

http://www.nrca.net/consumer/fyi.aspx

Picking up pecans

My neighbor has a huge pecan tree that stands near my property where actually one-third of its branches hang over my side of the fence. I have to say branches loosely because they have been cracking during storms. Two huge branches have fallen, decimating the tree little by bigger. One branch fell onto his yard, one onto mine.

This is the tree limb that fell onto my yard. I've already cut it into pieces and hauled half to the curb for pickup.

                                                                         

                  The tree limb that has been in my neighbor's yard for a month.

                                              

I must digress to say that last year our area had a drought. The few pecans that fell were dried out. I think squirrels got the majority of the few pecans from that tree. Actually, there was little output for two years in a row. However, the preceding three years that tree produced bumper crops.

Since I must rake up all leaves, suffer from the sticky residue from the leaf production in the spring, plus clean up those curly things that drop with leaf growth, remove all limbs and other debris that falls from that tree, I am entitled to all pecans that fall onto my property. And there are plenty! OK, sometimes I slip over to the other side, but just barely.


A couple of weeks ago when pecans started dropping, I cracked a couple. Dried and blackened. Another pitiful crop! Thursday afternoon I took my saw, big limb cutting clippers, and hand cutter to tackle that huge limb that the recent storm broke off onto my yard. I think the new guy who lives in that house is a renter. He works at the local air force base; the couple who previously owned the house, I think, are renting to him, another airman. They are both military. He does not mow or pick up trash that he drops (cigarette wrappers) into his yard. He even brought home a piece of furniture in a huge box and plastic wrap and left the box and wrap right there at the head of his driveway, where it sat and sat and sat. Last week I dragged it down to curbside for trash pickup. I've also pulled horrendous weeds out of this pitiful little flower bed facing my house. 

I'm been in my house seven years now and seen three different families live next door. Not once has anyone ever planted anything in that potentially lovely little bed. However, I just know it's going to happen soon! I already have my answer ready for the time he asks why I'm tending to his business. I'll ask if he knows who Edmund Hilary was. If he says no, I'll explain that he was the first man to conquer Mt. Everest. Someone asked Sir Edmund why he did it. His answer will be my response if my neighbor ever quizzes me: "Because it was there."

Back to Thursday. I cut up that huge branch into manageable pieces, but it was dark by the time I finished, so I just left them--on his side where I threw them, knowing I was going to haul them to the street before the next pick-up. Yesterday after putting on my yard work clothes and donning my always ready yard gloves, I began the haul. Took a trash can to rake up little limbs. That's when I made my discovery! And great it is! We have a bumper crop of pecans once again!! I ran back into the house, got two big bowls and filled both those suckers squatting in one spot!! Got a grocery paper sack and filled it two-thirds full. Oh my goodness! My mother is going to be so excited! We can have pecan pies all winter! I am ecstatic!

By this time it was dark and I was frantically rolling those pecans into my gloves into that sack, picking up trash along the way. It was dark, I live by a bayou, and we have snakes. Is it snake season? Do they come out at night? I just didn't know. The grass was rather thick and too tall. There I was, just sticking my hands into all that mess, ready to pounce up and back like my cats if I so much as saw a jot of movement.

Pecans with debris. See the green and black husks?


                
                                             "Cleaned" pecans. Ready for cracking!


After I ate, I settled on the floor with my bag of pecans and debris and an empty dish tub and an old episode of "Criminal Minds." I pulled off black, damp husks, using my left thumb. It and its nail are black and sore this morning. Pecan oil stains very dark! I sat and pried the outer husks from the pecans for an hour last night. Finally had to quit because my thumb was so sore (the quick was tearing from the nail). Those husks were still wet from all our recent rains. I've always done the clean-up work with the pecans. My mother and great-nephew will do the actual shelling--a cracking job. My nephew thinks he is hot stuff for helping. And he is! I'll keep enough for myself.

There are bags more out there on my side alone. No telling what's on his side. He won't pick them up. Someone has to do it! 

In looking for a web link, I discovered that a handful of pecans a day are great because they belong to that rich family of antioxidants. If you're inclined, please take a look at the health information and recipes. Pecans are good guys! And ever so tasty!


Pecans: so good for you!

 http://www.ilovepecans.org/

Slight update: It's the next day and I know how the Phantom of the Opera feels. The light of day can be ugly. There aren't so many good pecans. About half, at least on the ground, are wizened nuggets, but still more than last year! Two pecan pies? Still sounds good to me!

New update: I have cracked and picked out a large bowl of pecans. My second estimate was wrong. Maybe one out of 20 pecans is bad. I'm ecstatic! Maybe I will learn to bake a pecan pie. I should. I'm a full-blooded Southerner! And we don't say pee-can. It's puh-con.

Anxiety and stress

I've been crying too much lately. And forgetting way too much. Embarrassingly too much! Figured I was in trouble again and made the doctor appointment. I have a wonderful doctor, easy to talk to, personable, and oh-so-knowledgeable. Have you ever considered what position your doctor was in his graduation class. I won't claim first for mine, but he's up there. (Another doctor, I feel sure, is way down there.) But I digress.

I had to book the PA because MY doctor is so much in demand, being a good doctor and all. However, she is just a cute, young version of him (he's about early 40's). I have come to trust her, too. 

While I waited briefly for her to come in, I just sat and cried. She wanted to know what was wrong. So I just spilled my heartache. A student had called me a Nazi the day before. She started laughing and laughing. Wait, I'm thinking, that's not very caring or polite. She explained. "I'm a coach for girls in grades 6-12 at a private academy. I have to be tough on them. Would you believe they call me the Leprechaun Nazi?" So I had to laugh. (Yes, she's tiny and I understood why she laughed.)

I explained a number of family-related things going on that were breaking my heart, that I had no control over anything in my life, that I had regained six of the 30 pounds I had lost taking diet pills. That was in just two weeks. But the male doctor said I couldn't take any more until March, so I pretty much begged to have a single "subscription" She laughed again, making me laugh. "You wouldn't believe how many people use that word," she said. Ha Ha on me, a retired English teacher. OK, prescription. I would make a walking advertisement, I'm afraid, for diet pill addiction. They give me control over my raging appetite, so much energy I almost never get tired, and a much more frequent positive attitude.


And forgetfulness! See, I almost forgot to tell about how much I am forgetting. In fact, during my previous doctor visit (the male), the one thing I forgot to bring up was how I forget. (Yeah, pretty funny, huh?) So I asked this young woman if the onset of Alzheimer's was beginning. She ran me through a brief test, which I readily passed. "Anxiety and stress. Are you experiencing any?"

"Anxiety and stress often mask as Alzheimer's with the forgetfulness. Your brain becomes clogged and information can't get through," she explained. She asked if I saw a therapist, advised that I exercise, and do something fun.

I put a link to a website dealing with anxiety and stress, things that can happen to anyone. It's two days later and I'm already getting a grip, thanks to my smart little PA. I don't mean to seem glib, but talking to someone professionally, cutting up a huge tree limb struck by lightning, and putting a puzzle together with family seemed to get me started again. I did all those things just yesterday, the same day I saw the PA. And got my diet pills once again. All in all, a fabulous day!


www.helpguide.org/mental/generalized_anxiety_disorder.htm

What do you do when....

1. Someone tells you to your face you're lying when you are not!

2. a teacher all but calls your child stupid ("She just doesn't have it up there!")

3. when you don't think God knows who you are?

4. you think you are cursed with gremlins who create havoc around you?

5. you know you are losing more and more words?

6. the organizational gene is missing from your DNA?

7. the punctuality gene is missing from your DNA?

8. everyone shows up early and you're right on time but seem late because those early birds are already there!

9. you need one more dime to have enough money for a purchase at the check-out counter.

10. it is your turn to check out at the register and you realize that you used the last check last night and you know your credit card is maxed out?

11. you just flirted with that attractive man who you just realized is 20 years younger or that you are 20 years older and now you're embarrassed!

12. you're always late to the business meeting? Always, even though you try to be on time!

13. no one listens to you.....

14. your best friend gets all the attention from the boys and you get none at all (you're both 12 and one of you is devastated!)!

15. you realize it is midnight and your carriage will turn into a pumpkin at any moment and you're just not ready to go!

Feeling powerless

Some people have it--most don't. Some flaunt it--others hide that they don't have it.

So how does one get power? What sets those possessors of IT apart from the crowded herd? I'm one of those without it--without any sense of real power, the kind that makes people quake when you come around, or jump to it if you approach  when we are unaware. We are always aware of you. Do we want to be like you? Not so much that, as the life style. In other words, we want to feel empowered.

I was once told to behave as if I expected to be treated in the best manner possible. Then I would be. But there must be some indefinable something written on my face, because they offer me up to the gods all the time as a sacrifice, as one miscontrued,  not saved, but used in the best circumstances in the worst ways. Maybe I over-exaggerate, but my experience shows that I don't get adequate respect.

F----ing Motherhood

Warning: This post bleeds...

What is a mother?

"You fat f....er!" Words of love to her tween daughter, oh so cold, so reprehensible, so scathing of human value, her own, her daughter's. She's just out of jail, this one, this mother. She slithers back into the domicile--can it be so wilfully called a home?--and spits her poison, first in one corner, then another, on one child, then another. How many of these f....ers, do I have? Just don't hang on me. I need air to breathe. I need a little fun after three months of cooped up hell.
I'll tell you one damn thing, you hag, I am someone in jail. They know my name. They know who I am. They like me in jail. You b....ing hag, you m.....-f...... You call yourself a mother? You can die right now. Who would care? All my little f....ers and me--we hate you. Ask any of 'em. They would slit your throat in a second. That's what I'm teaching my chilren--how to cope, how to survive. You selfish b----! Where the f... is my child support money? Give me my child support!!I need some things. Gotta get a pedicure and manicure, get my f...ing hair cut. Gotta take a long bath, get out of these f----ing clothes.
If that f----ing G--- calls, tell him to F--- off! He's been shackin with that f---ing b---- the whole time I was in jail! He better not be tellin' my f----ing kids they have a new mother. Hey, baby, bring your f----ing mama a glass of water. I need to get rid of this headache.

In horror they watch her slip to the floor, water glass crashing, the two-year old clinging to her legs, gasping, Mamamamamamamamama! The oldest child, the 11-year-old must stand there and drink in her own horror. He mother used her to commit suicide. Used her like nothing, as if she were some perverse stranger on some perverse island caught in some perverse drama.

Call 9-1-1, the girl gags on her own horror!

Leave her. We're not calling anyone.

At just the opportune moment, the fallen lump, the wasted wreck of breath, the useless container of self-parody, self-pity, self-regard, self-importance opens her eyes. "Tell G---that I tried to kill myself. Tell him I can't live without him. Tell him to dump that B----. She's nothing! I'm the one he wants.

The diahrrea begins dramatically. After all, it's the drama queen at the center. Her children were so excited to see her, despite her selfish cruelty, her sporadic indulgence toward them, her frequent explosive display of fat, vile words she spews all about them.

Then she walks out, taking herself to the hospital. G--- will know how important he is to her. He must let her come back. He must.

____
What are the options for this woman who has gone so far astray? Government hand-outs? To get them, she must take her children. How is this fair and just? Children must be punished to have this kind of "mother"? Whose justice is this? They have a home with the grandparents, although it is not very loving, but it's clean. There's food and clean clothes. There's room. Reduce these children to a one-room apartment just so this wanton can get hand-outs? Why? By whose authority?

A life span

Have you ever seen your mother choking for breath? I did today. She had a biopsy taken of some stuff in her lungs. When she returned from the procedure, she came in gagging and coughing. It was a mid-week medical drama unfolding before my eyes! If I hadn't forgotten it was my mother in that condition, I would have fainted! Six or seven people packed that room, working as a team to help her breathe. After she caught her breath, she asked if they had water-boarded her! My mother, the comedian! She's 88 and what's that word we use to describe older but still vital old folks? Oh yes, spry! Too weak! My mother is crusty!

When you're the person who is 60, you have to face your own mortality. If your mother is 88, then what? Who wants to see a mother --sorry, can't say it--see a mother go away? What will I do without her?

I took Mother a copy of "Eight Cousins" by Louisia May Alcott, my favorite book in the sixth grade so she could read in the hospital (after she recovers from the waterboard torture). That was the first romantic book I ever read--and one of the only ones, too. There are eight cousins--four girls and four boys (if I remember correctly). Back in that day, first cousins were allowed to marry. It's a sweet story. Mother will like it!

Addendum: Mother thought "Eight Cousins" was just OK. The book she has most enjoyed from my school library is Newbery winner, "Daughter of the Mountains" by Louise S. Rankin. She never rereads books, but she did that one. 

Here's a link to reviews of the book. Mother is not the only one to like it!

http://www.amazon.com/Daughter-Mountains-Newbery-Library-Puffin/product-reviews/0140363351 

Older boomers

If you're an early Baby Boomer, you are probably experiencing what I'm experiencing: the blush, no, make that crinkling of age has appeared--not the first wrinkle--that happened years ago!, but the creping of skin, the sagging of breasts and testicles, the dimpling of fat.

That's bad, but worse--or worst--is the way the 40 crowd treats you. Oh, sure, those with great self-confidence get the good ol' gal/guy treatment, but most of us see it in their eyes, hear it in their voices, feel the first sniggers of disrespect because we've passed that line from upper middle-age into the throes of senior citizen. Doesn't matter if we don't feel it or look it (so we would like to think), but it's there--that snippet of pity, that crawling, squirming worm of disregard. We've arrived--but it's a place we never thought we would enter. Not old age! Not us! We were the vanguard of free love, women's freedom, equal rights--all the necessary and good things. Now what? Say it's not true!

But it is. Age spots, little ugly --say it--warts. I've thought myself a witch any number of times. My face and body look exactly the way that fairy tales describe those old hags. I'm becoming one. A witch. A hag. I baked in the sun with the whitest of them. Now I face the consequences.

This past summer opened my door of realization that I had not only entered old age, but was well into it. For so many years I waited for love, for the possibility of love. Married twice, each time an ugly disaster, life changing, life breaking. Remember in high school when possibility was the key to the future. Possibility. (I don't plan to attend my next class re-union in the fall because of how I look. Not only that, I don't want to see how they've aged, especially the one boy I so muched longed for all through high school. I wasn't his type. No possibility, then nor now. )I've been divorced from the second one for seven years and realized this summer that I cannot look toward possibility in love again. Would I want to show this body? No, I don't think so (spoken in the vernacular tone so popular today). I don't think so. What's more--I no longer want romance. An aquaintance asked me this summer if I was dating anyone. I popped out with: I don't date. And it's true--I don't date. He never called. Good for him.

I don't want to sound so pessimistic. That's how I feel today, Wednesday, October 1, 2009.

                                                          
                                                      This kissing couple shows how I would love to feel!



                                                          

Attitude

It's all about attitude--life is. Will you be weepy and downtrodden or chirpy and optimistic? Sometimes one, then the other? Can you wake up one day and decide to change your attitude?