Celebration Magazine Blog
#CelebratingLifeAfter60

by Dave Friant Been thinking this past summer about a lighthearted mind game while the ticker continues to do its’ pumping. Nothing deep. Simply imaginary tamperings with the sweet spots that characterize our lives. I suppose it sounds a bit Twilight Zone-ish. But no Rod Serling in this examination to provide commentary. Also declined is soft music accompaniment by Peter, Paul and Mary as well as the experience of Deep Forest Green aromatherapy healing candles durin

by Shanon Weaver Should Mary Peterson be at home knitting? She once asked her instructor at Master’s Path Karate exactly that. He looked at her and answered without hesitation: "Not you, Mary. Not you." He was right. At 64, Mary is an orange belt in Tang Soo Do, learning to use nunchucks and a staff, working toward her next belt and training to become a certified instructor. Just one year earlier, she stood outside the studio wondering whether she was too old to walk in. Grow

by Mary Frances Hansen A big smile can be a powerful blessing for someone who isn't having a good day. It can instantly lift someone's mood and brighten their day. Your smile can be infectious! Life is what you make it, and you can choose to make it a great day, not only for yourself but for others!!!! The Dalai Lama says, “ A simple smile is the start of opening your heart and being compassionate to others!” A smile is a message of joy, warmth, love, and fellowship. I lov

by Shanon Weaver Long before Ada Simmons learned just how much one determined person could change, her blind grandfather planted a stick. As a child, Ada once found him behind his house in rural Alabama and asked what he was doing. “I’m planting,” he told her. She looked at the ground. “Papa, that’s a stick.” His answer stayed with her. “It is to you. But it’s a flower to me, and it always will be here. I’m putting it here for a reason, and I’m going to check on it every week

by Mary Dowling How many times do we fall back on all the clichés we learned throughout our years? Well, one of my favorites is "take a Leap of Faith" without fear! We moved here from New Jersey in 1968 and lived in various areas of Texas. Oak Cliff, Duncanville, Dallas, and then Frisco. Since we lived in so many neighborhoods, we made some wonderful lifelong friends through our communities, church groups, schools, PTAs, and other organizations we joined. Once we moved to Fr

by Cynthia Plemmons, Certified Urban Poling and Activator® Instructor I admit it: I’m still a Tampa teenybopper at heart. Growing up in the Bay Area, music was everywhere. Tampa’s winter touring circuit brought national and international acts within reach—even for a 10-year-old spending babysitting money. My first concert was the Beach Boys in 1967. Music, Nature, and Growing Up in Tampa Bay My friends and I lived for music. One later became a California music critic and wrot

by Jill Rumbley-Beam I absolutely love fall. It’s my favorite time of year. I love it because I love Halloween. Halloween comes from an ancient Celtic harvest festival called Samhain, which was celebrated in Ireland and Scotland 2,000 years ago. It later mixed with Christian holidays, like All Saints' Day, and Irish and Scottish immigrants brought these traditions to America in the 19th century. I know some people don’t like Halloween, but I do because I love being creative

by Katie Butler Johnson Some consider candy corn a flavorless, waxy, sugar bomb. I’m not one of them. I LOVE CANDY CORN! When bulk packages of candies - like Skittles, M&Ms or Kit-Kats - start stacking up on grocery shelves in mid-October and Halloween is on the horizon, I grab a few for trick or treaters. But, before hitting the checkout, I’ll often toss a bag of generic candy corn (just for me) into my shopping cart. And, I admit, I rarely leave the parking lot with that ba

by Phyllis Jenkins Driving up I-20 from Texas to Louisiana, we always found the traffic heavy during this time of year. Families joined us on the highway, traveling for the Thanksgiving holiday. The closer we got to Shreveport, the more my mouth watered. I was already hearing the hot grease pop as the catfish fried in the skillet, smelling the turnip greens cooked to perfection, and the cornbread, golden and ready to devour. This is the meal my precious mom prepared year afte

by Lillie Miller There is something wonderfully strange about the Creative Arts Department at the State Fair of Texas. You may go to the Fair for a corn dog, the Midway, or a giant cowboy who was Santa in his former life. But you’re really missing out if you don’t wander through the Creative Arts Building. There you’ll find quilts, a perfectly canned pickle, various paper mâché interpretations of Big Tex, black and white outhouse photography, gourd art, a watercolor of a belo

by Scott Hickman The Spectacular Follies brings music, laughter and holiday magic to Lewisville with Fa La La La Follies, December 10–13. There’s something special about the holidays—the music, the memories, the laughter and the traditions that bring us together. This December, the Spectacular Follies is wrapping all of those things into one festive package with Fa La La La Follies, a joyful holiday celebration filled with music, dancing, comedy and plenty of surprises. Audie

by Marilyn Meshell In July 2024, my mother, Nancy May, and I went on an Alaskan train trip with Celebration Senior Travel. We stayed in Anchorage and took daily train trips to see other parts of the state. It rained every day we were there, except for one, but that did not stop us. We put on our Celebration provided ponchos and off we went. One of our day trips was to Seward where Debra had arranged for the group to go whale watching. That day was overcast, breezy, drizz

By Kathy Pierson Joyce loved an adventure. Always an avid camper and physically active person, she walked three miles a day, five days a week. In 2017 she walked/jogged a half marathon in a little over three hours at age seventy-eight. After Joyce’s husband died in 2010, she and her brother, David, tucked his Harley Davidson motorcycle into a trailer and pulled it from his home in Michigan to Montana to visit her children. From there they toured several points of interest on

by Kim Marvel During this season of ghosts, goblins, and Halloween, here is a story about skeletons – our personal skeletons. In eight months, my wife and I underwent a total of three knee replacements – one for me and two for her. As my betting friend quipped, we pulled off a “perfect trifecta!” We shared the same surgeon, surgery center, and post-operative steps to recovery. Having the identical procedure three times in close succession provided us a personal perspective on

by Judy Allen, Master Gardener If you love plants, then you must be a learner! Every plant teaches us something – about the plant, its preferred environment, the wildlife it supports, and the pollinators that are (or are not!) attracted to it. This fall, we are “embracing the learn” with our first Garden and Nature Expo, a collaboration of the Texas Master Gardeners, Texas Master Naturalists, Texas Parks and Wildlife, and Texas A&M AgriLife Extension Service. The Expo is bein

by Tina H. Now that I'm 29, I’ve started recognizing more and more names I heard growing up but never really knew. You know those names your parents, or in my case, my in-laws, would casually drop into conversation, as if everyone automatically understood who they were talking about? I couldn’t keep pretending to know who these iconic figures were anymore, so out of curiosity and FOMO, I began doing some research. The more names I looked up, the more often I caught myself thi

by Patty Clark I was raised on the old saying “Waste not, want not.” My parents meant leftovers, electricity, and wrapping paper that was recycled for eighteen Christmases. Sweet nurturing wisdom I suppose, which is why I rinse out used Ziplock bags as if I’m preparing plastics for their second tours of duty. But I am embracing a much broader interpretation. After my dinner parties, I combine abandoned vinos into one carefully funneled House Red like some Depression-era barte

by Ella Madis My name is Ella Madis, and I am a junior at Texas State University studying English and Art History. Dave Friant, a frequent contributor to Celebration Magazine (and my Papa), has helped me develop my writing and inspired me to share some of my archival research. Through frequent visits to the Witliff Collection, an archive held on the top floor of the Texas State Library, I discovered the writings of Marc Simmons, a groundbreaking historian of the American Sout

by Valerie Doty Do you read a lot of mystery novels? Is watching True Crime your guilty pleasure? Do you love solving real life mysteries? Me, too! I have been a software developer most of my life and finding a software bug is like solving a mystery. For those unfamiliar, finding a bug is like someone handing you a 20-book encyclopedia (we’re all old enough to remember the encyclopedia taking an entire shelf in the library) and telling you to find the typo and fix it. This ba

by Katie Butler Johnson I had dinner with the King of England! Well, that’s really stretching it a bit. He wasn’t technically “King” at the time - just heir apparent - Prince Charles Mountbatten-Windsor. When Prince Charles crossed the Atlantic and arrived in Dallas to present Ross Perot with the Winston Churchill Award at a formal dinner in the Chantilly Ballroom of the Anatole Hotel on February 18th 1986, my husband and I were there, dressed to the nines and seated at tabl