I'm wondering...

At what point do you tell your aging parent this: no more. You cannot continue to frown upon the life I live and the decisions I make. I will not listen anymore?

At what point do you look up and notice how good and kind friends are when you need them to be just decent (you are all that way! every one of you, temporarily or permanently out of state, emailers, dinner and/or walking companions, latte enablers – all!)?

At what point do you get a new, sexy bike helmet (I tell myself that, knowing damn well that no bike helmet is really sexy) even though you could maybe (though not certainly) get by with pounding out the dents and still strapping the old one under your chin?

At what point do you admit to your neighbors that, for reasons having to do with the soft warm air coming in from the outside and the harsh long week you’ve just had, you are drifting off to sleep, even though they are still there, in your house, engaged in a fantastically lively conversation?

At what point do you tell Oscar that his blog has been magnificent of late (while sitting and commiserating about how awful a latte is as compared to the real thing, on the other side of the ocean)?

At what point do you quit getting a charge out of spooking the neighborhood kids by showing them the extent of your hip bruise from the bike accident (they all get a thrill out of how extensive it is and I feel I am doing them a favor by shocking them into always wearing a helmet and being cautious out there on the roads)?

At what point do you hear the storm, open the patio door, stick your feet out into the rain and think: I can get through all this, really truly?

[the above? my past 24 hours in a nutshell.]