My hair is probably on fire. Is my hair on fire? I smell hair fire. This whole past week has been fanning the hair flames of my stress world; but that’s not your fault I don’t think. Is it? Can you tell I’m stressed? Holy MOLY… Life, The Universe, and Everything were all BIG in my face this week. Big week of living life stress bigness.

BIG.

We got some rather unwelcome health news this past Monday. Nothing unexpected, really, but unwelcome nonetheless. This getting older crap is not for cowards!! And I must admit, there are times while I’m kinda frightened. Well OK maybe a whole lot frightened. Fortunately, we have excellent support from friends, our biological family, and our “family of choice;” not necessarily in that order. And of course, not to forget The People Upstairs (a.k.a. God, whoever they are). A quick note about God (whoever they are): I do not subscribe to any religion. Rather, I love the anonymous quote I read many moons ago: “Nature is God’s reflection.” Yeah, I like that one a lot. To me, that means everything from the smallest subatomic particle to the immense myriad of planets, stars, galaxies, and so on that comprise this amazing Universe of ours. It includes all creatures large and small, and yes, boys and girls, it includes us.

OK so that wasn’t so quick, but anyway… We truly believe we will get strength from The Universe if we simply ask Them for help and keep our minds in gratitude mode. After all, we really are blessed beyond measure in oh so many ways.

There are, of course, numerous ways to deal with stress. Meditation and prayer are two very good ones. Sharing our problems with those we love and trust is good also. Distractions like entertainment such as concerts, plays, movies or TV shows can be helpful. Maybe go for a walk or ride a bike. And of course we need to care for our bodies by eating well, getting enough water, and making sure we get a healthy amount of sleep.

My Beautiful Girlfriend and I also have another tool for coping with stress: GOODIES. I remember seeing a meme in the form of a silly placard on the interwebs at one time or another: “STRESSED is DESSERTS spelled backwards!!”

I really like desserts.

We have a place called Mac’s Meats a few miles up the road from us in Rothbury, Michigan (nudge nudge, wink wink). We call it The Carnivore’s Candy Store. Yes, of course they have wonderful bacon, sausage, ribs, and such. But they also make some very nice baked goods. Their Long Johns are big and fat and must weigh in at over 3 pounds (maybe not, but we share one and that’s plenty). Our youngest grandson dubbed them Maximum Meats, and of course after we chuckled I responded: “Yes, and when they start to run out they rename the store Minimum Meats.”

For me, pizza is also dessert, as are potato chips. Those things really should be controlled substances. But I also like peanut M&Ms, Reese’s Peanut Butter Cups, oh and Holy Wow those amazing Ritter Sport chocolate bars that are packed with whole hazelnuts. All these and more are delicious, and I find myself accidentally buying some sort of chocolates from time to time. OH, and I also like cookies. Ice cream is nice also. Sure, my Wonderful Sweetheart and I had some muskmelon for dessert the other day; but the next day we had Ben & Jerry’s (Cherry Garcia… mmmmmmmm). So when I’m stressed, desserts start to call my name; and try as I might to resist, I do indeed heed the call. Yes, I know that too much of this stuff is not exactly calorie friendly. Since I’ve retired I do a lot of home cooked meals, so we eat sensibly much of the time. We work on our sweets intake in much the same way as we work on procrastination. Both of us have committed ourselves to quit procrastinating either tomorrow or the next day.

In the meantime, you gonna eat that last piece of pizza??

When I was MUCH younger, watching these two guys was a great stress reliever. Still is, in my professional opinion.