The Death of Nannie
This is a detail of a drawing I did of Nannie back in 1983. You can see from her face that she was full of life - so much so, that it took 109 years for her to let go of it. Her body just wore out.
This is the full drawing. Nannie loved roses, so I overdid them in my drawing. They look more like one of her bouquets than roses growing on a bush. The cat sitting at her feet was typical. She loved cats - she had 20! - but this was her favorite - Missy.
My grandmother of 109 years of age died on Easter Sunday morning, 2011. We buried her on the Saturday before Mother's Day, two weeks later. It was appropriate. She was the end of an era.
I know that phrase has been over-used to describe a variety of different national and international figures; but my grandmother really was the end of an era; not only because her life spanned five generations, but also because she saw the introduction of nearly every major invention and discovery since the gasoline-powered automobile:
radio (1901,1916), air conditioning (1902), airplane (1903), plastic (1907), color photography (1907), Model T (1908), talking motion pictures (1910,1912), insulin (1922), 3-D movies (1922), television (1923,1925,1927), liquid-fuel rocket (1926), color motion pictures (1927), penicillin (1928), jet engine (1930,1937), ballpoint pen (1938), helicopter (1939), color television (1940), electronic digital computer (1942), atomic bomb (1945), microwave oven (1946), hydrogen bomb (1952), laser (1958), microchip (1959), first manned spacecraft (1961), audio cassette (1962), compact disc (1965), first manned lunar landing (1969), video cassette (1971), cell phone (1979), personal computer (1981), Apple Macintosh (1984), Microsoft Windows (1985), HD TV (1989), World Wide Web (1990), DVD (1995), etc.
Because she was a voracious reader and a perennial student, I know she read about all these breakthroughs with interest. When my cousins and I visited her house growing up, we always found stacks and stacks of magazines - everything from National Geographic and Smithsonian, to Look and Life. Those magazines were a big part of our education, and Nannie was always a ready teacher to answer any questions we had.
In spite of her many interests - which included art, music, writing, cooking, gardening, teaching and church work - her greatest love was nature: she was a true naturalist. Everything else that she did centered on that love: so when she painted, it was flowers or landscapes; when she wrote poetry, it was about her garden or birds or her neighbor's yard; when she sang, it was about creation or the Creator. Always nature. That was what made her soul sing; and so she began each day with an eagerness to learn, an inspiration about life and beauty, and an expectation of what she would find in her garden.
Eat Right, Be Healthy, Live Long, Look Good… and Do It All on Less Than $250 a Month
My grandmother at 100 and 108 years old. She has really taken good care of herself.
My mom at 83 and me at 57.
The fast food industry has been blamed for the obesity of America. I think it's fast food, junk food, ignorance and laziness. On the left: Morgan Spurlock, writer-director-and-star of Super Size Me. On the right: the results of "McDonalds Hits Africa," an ad spoof.
Art immitating life. Pixar blew out the stops in Wall-e, with the way they addressed the problem of obesity, though director Andrew Stanton later denied that was their intent. In the movie Up, they again cast an overweight character, the Boy Scout Russell. This trend indicates that obesity is becoming accepted in America.
I don't believe in being cruel to anyone. But in the old days, public ridicule would keep certain behaviors and lifestyles in check. Today, we're told to be nice to everyone, not to offend anyone, and, by all means, to go out of our way to accommodate people's weaknesses. Jesus wouldn't have fit too well into our indulgent society.
It's Easy, It's Simple, and My 109-Year-Old Grandmother is Proof!
That's right: my grandmother will be 109 years old this July, and she is on no medication. My mother will be 84 this year, and everybody tells her she looks like she's 69. And I've had the same body weight since high school, when I was playing three sports. (Okay, it's distributed a little differently... but still!)
I have friends in their twenties that struggle with being over-weight. Some are my size (and I'm no giant) and are as much as 50 pounds over-weight. They are young men with middle age bodies. I almost can't go out to eat anymore because I feel like I'm on the cruise ship from the movie Wall-E with all those adults that look like chubby babies. Yes, Michelle, our nation has an obesity problem!
But don't panic - help is on the way. Dr. Waits is here with some simple things you can do to eat right, be healthy, live long and look good... and, yes, do it all on less than $250 a month.