INSPIRING AT 95

    On Valentine's day I helped celebrate the 95th birthday of a woman who is much loved at the church I attend. In her younger days she was a dancer and entertainer and has performed with Ginger Rogers and Florence Henderson and even dated Clark Gable (be still my heart). Someone had created a documentary of her life and we watched it as we ate birthday cake and drank root beer floats. Celebrating on Valentine's day was so appropriate, for her life is a love story. It is her love of life and love of self that are inspirations to me today and hopefully for years to come. In the documentary she recounted how, when she first moved to New York, she ate chocolate bars for every meal because they were cheap and she could not afford anything else. After hours and hours of grueling practice each day she would drop into bed exhausted and aching from her bloodied feet. But she never gave up and with patience and persistence became successful in her careers as a model, a dancer, an actress and a talk show host. The same experience that made her successful back then still exudes from her today and each time I find my patience and persistence waning towards my writing career I am reminded of her inspiring story. She was born on February 29th and she celebrates it throughout the month of February. So I say bravo to this extraordinary woman, for she continues to live her life to the fullest each day, and at the young age of 95 I want to have lived my life so fully that someone will write about me the way I write about her. Happy Birthday Maxine.