Is This You? Eyes and toenails

A retiree has options for after lunch. One may be to go another round of golf. Another could be a bit of shopping and strolling down the avenue just window gazing. Of course on those rare occasions when the mood strikes maybe even a nap.

Now this doesn’t have to just be for various retirees. It could also take into account the rich and famous. Those lucky ducks who work from home or only work half a day. But the next part of this discussion is aimed at the older set that’s why I alluded to the retirees.

One more afternoon activity I might mention is the cutting of toenails. Yuck! I know this is not the best conversation to have, but if you think of all the things you do to yourself during a few days’ time, it could actually be worse, couldn’t it? Sure it could, but please keep those activities behind your closed doors!

I bring up toenail-cutting for several reasons. But first, let’s discuss why I mention to do it in the afternoons. Well, right off I say you’ve been up for a while, maybe spread your wings a few times and are a bit more limber than if you just woke up in the morning. Limber is a good thing when attacking your toenails.

Secondly, it’s light outside. The sun should be up with the possibility of extra streaks of light coming in through the windows. Brightness is also a good thing when preparing for this activity.

Reason tells us if we walk barefoot across the kitchen linoleum and we hear scrape, screech, well, Houston, we have a problem!

Or if you put on socks, any kind of socks — cute ankle socks, calf-huggers, knee-highs or woo-hoo nylons — and you spend more time getting the sock up and over and unhooked from those end-of-toe grabbers? Well, it may just be time to attend to those 10 penny nails! Par them back to little finishing nails, as it were.

Another great thing about going after the nails in the afternoon is you can treat yourself to a warm, quiet, long shower or bath first. Usually if you’re home in the afternoons, there’s a good chance you’re home alone. Take full advantage of this situation anytime it’s at your feet. Get it — toenails, at your feet? Let’s keep stepping along ...

Shower taken and now to attack. All sounds pretty straight forward, doesn’t it? Well, wait just a second, my dear funny bunnies. Here’s what actually happens to some of those of retiree stature. All of a sudden your legs have grown to lengths that outperform your arms like 10 to 1, making it nearly impossible to reach clear down there. Noticeably, too, is the fact if and when you do get your clipper-wielding hand close to the mark, suddenly you find everything is out of focus. Dang glasses, you might think — you can’t see with them and you can’t see without them. More than once my glasses have ended up tossed across the room and landed over by the porcelain throne. This glasses thing gets worse, I have heard, with age. Single vision glasses aren’t too bad. But try to get bifocals to see your toes, hand, and clippers all at the same time. Then apparently more than one person in history has gone running off into the night after trying to cut toenails when wearing trifocal lenses!

I can see two options here. One is to visit your nearest nail salon and have your tootsies soaked, nails cut and shaped and buffed. How inviting does that sound? Well, if you’re like me, just like if I were to hire someone to clean my house, I would have to clean it first so nobody would see how I really live — the same applies to going to get a pedicure. I would have to do my toenails before I would want anyone, even someone I don’t know, to see my toenails!

The second option may just be the ticket. I know a podiatrist, uh, a foot doctor to us regular people. This foot doc has one day a week set aside for toenail clipping. Cool, huh? You just go in, without any foot pre-preparation because if it has happened to toes he and his minions have seen it all. Again, yuck!

So as Father Time starts to pull at our toenails, making them further away, start to grow sideways, get snarly or whatever, you just might look into the foot doctor. Take good care of your feet, they’ll certainly get you where you want to go. And if you’re lucky they’ll take you places you only dream of — and you’ll be wearing sandals!

Trina lives in Eureka, Nevada. Share with her at itybytrina@yahoo.com. Really!