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Once Upon a Time & Happily Ever After

Rediscovering Life after Retirement

Categories: Rediscovering ME, Uncategorized

Finding Leslie

Dear Ones,

Over the past few weeks, probably since I first started seriously thinking about starting a blog, I began taking more conscious steps toward trying to find myself.  Most of the steps I have taken to this point have been baby steps.  But in little ways I am doing things for me.

Baby steps toward rediscovering me.
Baby steps toward rediscovering me.

For example, three weeks ago I went for a manicure.  Edie asked me to select my polish before she started working on my nails.  I looked over the sample colors of polish each painted onto a acrylic  nail tip fastened to an over-sized keychain ring.  After carefully considering all of the color choices,  I finally decided on a light kind of earthen brown color.  Kinda safe.  Kinda boring.  Kinda librarian.  Kinda Baptist preacher’s son’s wife.  Kinda grandmotherly.

When I showed Edie the color I had chosen, she crinkled up her nose in disapproval.  She and her sister Mary then began holding shades of red and wine-colored nail tips on my left pinky, commenting on how the different colors looked with my skin tones.  I had never really considered how a color might compliment my skin, my hands.  To the contrary, I have always wanted to hide my hands, my ragged cuticles, my chipped nails.  But the girls convinced to try a very bright ‘fire engine red’.  I told the girls that Paul really, really didn’t like red polish.  Especially for a pedicure but not much better on a manicure.  Half teasing, I told Edie that I would need to change the color to ‘Cincinnati Reds red’ thinking that Paul might like it better if he thought it was a shade named for his favorite baseball team.

The bright red looked good!  Fallish.  Kinda pretty with my fading summer suntan.  I had stepped out of my comfort zone.  But later that night, Paul did comment on my color choice.  I told him I had chosen ‘Cincinnati Red’ just for him and he asked me to hold it up to his Reds tee shirt to compare colors.  Close but no cigar.  During the next two, almost three weeks that I wore the red, Paul asked about it several more times but it seemed to grow on him and then became a non-event.

Last Friday it was time for a fresh manicure.  I toyed with the ring of polish choices.  Pink is nice.  Or mauve?  Maybe something in a pale purple color, Paul’s favorite color is purple.

Then I saw this incredible, slightly burnt orange color.  Ultra shiny, very fallish.  And one week later, I still like it…on my hands!

Moral of the story:  It is ok if I choose a nail color I like for my nails.  I don’t have to justify my choice to anyone.  They are my nails after all.  They are my nails.

Hugs and kisses,

leslie

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About Leslie Roberts Clingan

I am an aspiring blogger and children's author, wife, mother, daughter, sister, - in-law, responsible pet owner and recently retired elementary school librarian. I hope to figure out the next chapter of my life as I transition from crazy, busy work world onto totally idle retirement and now to something in-between.

Comments

  1. Sharon

    October 23, 2014 at 11:27 pm

    I noticed your pretty nails when you sent pics the
    other day. So glad you are branching out in that
    dept too! Love you!

    Reply
    • Leslie Roberts Clingan

      October 26, 2014 at 9:46 pm

      I still hold my hands out sometimes and admire that I don’t have hangnails and torn cuticles! Amazing. So glad you told me about gel polish and the solar powder. Love you!

      Reply

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In what felt like the blink of an eye, I have gone from full-time wife to my sweet husband, hands-on mom to my two beautiful daughters and elementary school librarian to a retired, empty nester with lots of time on my hands. Join me on my journey to rediscover who I am. Glad you are here...
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