Make-‘em-laugh-3

Waiting. (iPhone photo by Jack Hughes.)

—It seems my younger brother may be slightly put off by my garnering all my lady-friends.
He’s still married. My beloved wife died seven years ago. I find since I gain friendship easily with ladies.
I’m safe, I guess; no longer in pursuit of a wife. I live alone, and I’m not bored or lonely. Relationships with women are new to this kid; and 50 years late.
I also am a graduate of the Hilda Q. Walton School of Gender Relations. “No pretty girl will talk to you!” I’m surprised I do as well as I do.
My brother and I were in Lilly (PA) last month, trackside to photograph trains. Lilly is railroad-west of Altoona, eastern base of the railroad’s crossing of Allegheny Mountain.
“Here, take my picture,” I said, handing my brother my iPhone. I was sitting about 15 feet from the track, and my camera was set up on my tripod.
“Wha-fo?” my brother asked.
“So I can text that picture to my aquacise instructor. She seems to care,” I said.
That aquacise instructor is just a friend, but one of many ladies who care when I go to Altoona. Railroad photography is a balance challenge.
They are all my lady-friends at the Canandaigua YMCA swimming-pool, where I do aquatic balance-training. Lifeguards, etc.
I make ‘em laugh, I guess. And they love it, plus many others outside that swimming-pool.
And I’m not trying. Just shooting the breeze makes ‘em laugh.
A while ago a YMCA lifeguard came over and gave me what most red-blooded American males consider the “come-hither” look. Smiling, eye-contact, etc.
No; it was “talk to me, make me laugh!” She’s still a little suspicious, but “talk to me, make me laugh!”
Entirely unexpected for this dude. “No pretty girl will smile at you!” Yet here she was smiling at me.
The other day my dry-land balance-training therapist at a nearby hospital wheeled out a full-length mirror so I could see my feet were pointing in error.
“Oh what a depressing sight!” I wailed.
“Of course,” the therapist laughed. “You’re older.”
The difference between now and 30 years ago is 60 pounds,” I said.
When I walk out of the bathroom stalls at the Canandaigua YMCA swimming-pool I wonder why in the world the pretty ladies wanna talk to me.
Similarly my doggy-daycare kennel is staffed by multiple attractive ladies.
“As you can see, the boat didn’t sink.” I said that to a kennel owner on returning to pick up my dog after a Transit retiree Erie Canal cruise.
I had that lady rolling on the floor — she was the only one there, and she’s cute.
A few days ago one of my swimming-pool ladies said “laughing gets the endorphins flowing.” I guess that’s what I’m doing = make ‘em laugh.
Not long ago I suggested the kennel ladies join me for an eat-out at a nearby restaurant.
“How did that old geezer get all them honeys hangin’ all over him?”
Make ‘em laugh!

• “Transit” equals Regional Transit Service, the public transit-bus operator in Rochester, NY, where I drove bus for 16&1/2 years (1977-1993). My stroke October 26th, 1993 ended that. I retired on medical-disability. I recovered fairly well.