It appears a few if maybe more North Iowans were saved today from having some serious eye damage caused by looking directly at the sun during our near total eclipse. Say what you may, there are always those who think protecting their eyes from the sun’s burning rays is hogwash, but it’s a very real danger, and oft times permanent.
In spite of the heavy cloud cover, there were people standing around outside buildings in the Downtown and scanning the sky for some sort of visual experience around the hour of 1 p.m. to a degree where I was beginning to consider it comical. While pulling up to the drive-thru of a bank I said to the teller, “The world is not coming to an end because that’s all were having is just another eclipse of the sun, and so what if we haven’t had one like it since 1918?” She got a good laugh out of it, and will likely remember me all the more the next time I’m in her lane.
There wasn’t much downtime at my office today with the phone calls and walk-ins to where I was wishing I’d packed a sack lunch. The highlight of my morning was getting one of my listings closed which has been hanging on for over 60 days. We could have had it closed much earlier, but we had to wait until the current tenant was completely moved out. Most times tenants move much earlier just to get themselves settled in a new home, but that wasn’t the case this time around. I’m just glad the new owners were patient enough to wait the extra days.
Over the weekend I went clothes shopping and found a pair of slacks that looked like they’d fit me, but was a bit wary to purchase them because they were of the slim style which are meant for our twenty-something young men. When I got home I tried them on, and to my surprise they fit comfortably. I wore them to work this morning and when I encountered a well known, I said, “Look at my new slim-fit slacks that were made to fit men decades younger than me and they actually fit me nicely.” The look and response I received was a classic when she said, “I wish I could be so lucky.” I really wasn’t bragging, but rather a confirmation that we all must keep from pigeon-holing ourselves and others just because of the number of years it’s been since we came down our chutes.
In spite of my ability to wear a younger man’s clothes, I’d never want to go back to being twenty-something. For me, those were the years filled with tests. Either I was testing myself, or others were testing me. They were also years where I still wasn’t sure what I wanted to grow up and be. The most annoying thing about that decade was an attempt by others to pull me into their socio-economic “herds”, and even today, I’m exceptionally happy I managed to get thru those testing years intact.
The above photo is from my “gifted” photo album. Seeing the above identical twins brought to mind a few sets of twin males I’ve known over the years. Most don’t realize that twin boys are uniquely charming when pre-pubescent, but when they grow older, and especially just past puberty, they can be confusing as well as exceptionally devilish. I knew one set of twins who were able to dupe their girlfriends into believing they were who they purported to be, but in fact they were going out with the twin brother. Yes, twins can be quite the delight, but also wickedly naughty.
