On Dec. 30, your local “Paper Lady” will celebrate another year around the sun – 55 years to be exact. As I was going through literally hundreds of pictures on my camera and phone I realized just how quickly time flies by and you are left with just the memories of yesterday. You seem to blink and another year goes by. So I decided to reflect upon the special moments I can recall while I can recall some of them.

One of my first memories was when I was a very young child. I remember petting a deer and seeing elk through a fence. Then I remember going to an outside market with tables close by and picking out an Indian doll. The doll was the size of a Barbie but I was so intrigued by its beautiful dark hair, authentic attire, and its little moccasins.

Later my parents were surprised I could remember any of this because it was when the family had gone to Colorado on vacation and I was only 2 years old.

I also remember walking several blocks to the 7-Eleven in Yukon to buy some one cent bubble gum. My little girlfriend and I had found some pennies while playing in the backyard. So since my mom and I walked my brothers to school each day and we passed by the little store in the mornings and often stopped to get treats on our way home, I had no second thoughts that we could go get gum and make it back before our moms even missed us outside.

We were just coming out of the store with wads of bubble gum in our mouths when Jennifer’s mom frantically pulled up and told her to get in the car. Of course, at age 3, I was smarter than that and took off running. Then my madder-than-a wet-hen mom jumped out of the car, broke a switch off a sapling in front of the bank and switched my legs and backside all the way home. Surprisingly, I still like bubble gum to this day and this memory still makes me smile.

I have great memories of being on my grandparent’s farm from age 5. We had just moved to Tiger Mountain and were staying at my grandparent’s house when I started begging my parents for a puppy. We had cows, horses, chickens…why couldn’t I have a puppy? So I was over the moon when my Grandpa Ray came home with a 6-week-old Chihuahua puppy. He was so cute with a smokeybrown stripe down his back and a round little belly. I named him Smokey Joe and he taught me how much work a puppy can be. If he was hungry, I had to feed him. If he was whining in the middle of the night, I had to get up, potty him and hold him. My grandpa made sure that I learned very young that having an animal meant having the responsibility of that animal.

Ironically I had that dog until he turned 21. Yes, he was loved for as long as I could love him and we made many wonderful memories together. He was even around when I had my first child which was pretty special to me. Smokey Joe was the best boy ever and I am grateful he taught me how to be a “dog” mom which probably made me a better real mom. Now 50 years later, I’m still an animal lover and a “mom” to many fur babies and I wouldn’t have it any other way.

I have so many memories and so much I am grateful for after 55 years on this earth. From grade school and high school memories with great friends to magical moments of when I became a mom to my daughter and son and so much more, memories flood my mind.

So, I am thankful for another year around the sun and 55 years of memories – both good and bad. Life has taught me to love, to give, to laugh, to cry, and to believe the best is yet to be.

I may make many more memories in the years to come or I may become just a memory if the Lord chooses to lead me home. However, I will always be grateful for every day that He gives me to share it with the friends and family who I love dearly.

I leave you with some birthday words of wisdom from a few names you may or may not remember but I thought were funny and so true.

Famous Birthday Quotes

“As you get older, three things happen: The first is your memory goes, and I can’t remember the other two.” — Norman Wisdom “You know you’re getting old when the candles cost more than the cake.” — Bob Hope “There are two great days in a person’s life—the day we are born and the day we discover why.” — William Barclay “You can live to be a hundred if you give up all the things that make you want to live to be a hundred.” — Woody Allen “The secret of staying young is to live honestly, eat slowly, and lie about your age.” — Lucille Ball “Youth is the gift of nature, but age is the work of art.” — Stanislaw Jerzy Lec “Just remember, once you’re over the hill you begin to pick up speed.” — Charles Schulz “Age is a case of mind over matter. If you don’t mind, it don’t matter.” — Satchel Paige “Grow old along with me! The best is yet to be.” — Robert Browning “And in the end, it’s not the years in your life that count. It’s the life in your years.” — Abraham Lincoln