- Terry BallantyneSpirit vs The BodyJanuary 30, 2021Aging has never been easy! Let's recap: Your joints get loose and achy. (gravity and hormones).Your vision is not what it used to be, cue the squint!Food is not as vibrant tasting.Likely your ankles are resisting a fast pivot.Your teeth and gums may be acting up.Skin: too many issues to name. That's the hard physical truth! Then there is the social/emotional side: Putting on makeup (if you do) is not as much fun as on a 20 year old face.You can't scamper up a ladder...
- Terry BallantyneIn it togetherMarch 28, 2020We finally find ourselves with something in common. Rich or poor, red or blue, Christian or Muslim, boy, girl or non binary, we are finally, indisputably, once again ALL part of the human race. A totality. I used to think it would take a visit from Martians for us to put down our petty squabbles and appreciate this magnificently beautiful planet we live on and to celebrate the one in 20M-100M shot of even getting to take the ride called LIFE. To savor simple pleasures, to marvel at the miraculous...
- Terry BallantyneThe Lighter Side of HairNovember 15, 2019It's funny about hair. We all admire a beautiful head of lush hair on a head. But put just one hair in your soup and watch people recoil. How can one hair be horrible and thousands be attractive? Ladies, we spend lots of time and money in our youth getting a bikini wax, only to watch, as we age, our south of the border hair goes gray and scraggly. Or your eyebrows are disappearing and they need tint or colored wax to frame your face....
- Terry BallantyneHarvest of a LifetimeOctober 7, 2019It's harvest time. The light is golden, the cycle of the earth is coming to another close. The Harvest Moon of September has come and gone. There is a lovely peace in the fall, anticipation of the renewing aspect of winter. Things slow down, you turn inward to contemplate the lessons of the year, of your life, and how to apply them to 2020. We live currently with a backdrop of uncertainty and many feel these are the darkest of times, but I disagree. Any...
- Terry BallantyneBroken BonesSeptember 2, 2019As a Realtor I can't tell you how many women come to my open houses and tell me they know they need to downsize but "My husband is not ready". He will never be ready ladies. Accepting your golden years is a shock. You still feel pretty good and because it's so incremental you really have forgotten how much stronger, energetic and durable you were 10 or 20 years ago. It seems reasonable that you can keep going. And since your bones don't report in...
- Terry BallantyneHow do you know when it’s time?August 11, 2019It is clear to me in talking to hundreds of folks over 60-70, myself included, that they don't feel old. They don't feel much different than they did around 35. If they are in reasonable health, they still feel as though they should be able to move the couch across the room, tear up a flower bed, repaint the shed, left that planter, trim the hedge on a ladder. You know, all the stuff you have done all your life. Haven't they always done those...
- Terry BallantyneThe Great Liberation at 60 !July 27, 2019I never thought I would embrace my 60s. I had a thumping libido, I was a competitor in yoga classes, I never shrunk from a challenge: physical or mental. I started a catering business at almost 40 and worked, after my day job, in a dark kitchen standing on concrete floors from 3:30PM to 3:30AM. It was wonderful. I shared the commercial kitchen with some sweet guys who made empanadas on the same shift and the rich, savory smell of roast pork and crusty dough...
- Terry BallantyneLosing An Older ParentJanuary 11, 2019No matter how close or distant a parent was in the emotional plane, the locational plane or the acceptance of you plane, when they go, a huge chunk of your history goes with them. This is the only person who can remember your childhood clearly. Siblings may recall parts but if they are close in age, their memories will be fuzzy or distorted and if they are much older than you, they likely were not paying much attention to you! So saying goodbye to the...
- Terry BallantyneThe Circle Begins AgainJanuary 1, 2019It has been quite a year. In some ways it feels like the guardrails were removed and we’ve been careening through these last months turning corners on two wheels! As we close out 2018 we all have a lot on our minds. Global weirding is all around us: cluttered oceans, climate change, political strife, mass migrations, racial tensions, opioid addiction, homelessness. It’s grim stuff for the holidays. What’s most interesting though, is that somehow, in the face of everything the news hurls at us hourly, the overwhelming...
- Terry Ballantyne
- Terry Ballantyne