JOY ALONG THE WAY: THE OLD FAMILIAR THINGS

A brief conversation with an old friend recently prompted such cliches as, "There's no friend like an old friend" and "Old friends who shared the same experiences are the comforting ones. They know what you've been through."

The editor of our daily newspaper used the descriptive adjective, "Age advantaged." I like that. It can apply to many things -- the advantage in worldly wisdom of a 6-year-old over a 3-year-old, old wine over new, the comfort of an old shoe, an old violin over a new.

I would even branch out into the age-advantaged qualities of comfort derived from doing, and handling old familiar things rather than new when anxiety or sorrow strikes.

That's why I read the same old books, over and over. I know just where to turn to find some phrase, paragraph or page that never ceases to comfort, thrill, calm or charm me. The books are age advantaged. Here on page 31 of a tattered old book I read the lines of the author who has just read a sober and labored treatise about the possibility that maybe, in the long run, good might be triumphant and that probably there is a God.

The author says, after the reading, "... I crossed the brook ... and sat down there in a place I chose long ago ... a place already familiar with pleasant memories as a favorite room ... and as I sat there ... weighed down with a strange depression ... the evening fell, a star or two came out in the clear blue of the sky, and suddenly it became all simple to me, so that I laughed aloud at that laborious big-wig for spending so many futile years in seeking doubtful proof of what he might have learned in one rare hour upon my hill. And far more than he could prove -- far more. ..."

I look now in wide-eyed wonder and almost uncomfortable bewilderment at the strange new pictures telescope Hubble is sending back and want the night to hurry and come so I can go out and see the heavenly bodies that I know, that are, to me, age advantaged. Comfort!

On a top cabinet shelf is a row of handsome mugs that have come to me in various ways. One testifies to the fact that I walked in a special parade. Another has the command, in pretty, flower-entwined letters, to "Get well soon." There is one with the Declaration of Independence on it, easy to read. Another wishes me "The top of the mornin'." Cheer!

The mug (cup) that I use is the last of a set of blue, decorated Ironstone cups. It has been held when my hand has been trembling with sorrow, shaky from laughter, steady with serious thought. There are two chips on the inside rim. One is in the shape of a miniature, upside-down Pike's Peak. The other is an outline of a wee map of Ireland.

"How long are you going to use that cup?" someone once kidded.

"Until it breaks," I answered. I hope it never does. How many times I've slipped my finger through the just-the-right-size handle, held its warmness in both hands! I could walk in the dark with it, brimful, and never spill a drop, if I'm not crying or laughing. It is comforting, steadying, age advantaged!

When and if it breaks, I'll glue the pieces together, set the cup on my shelf of old familiar things and take down the mug that says, "Get well soon," for I'll not be feeling well.

REJOICE!

~Jean Bell Mosley is an author and longtime resident of Cape Girardeau.