Dear LPG,

I am a typical older lady of my generation I think.  I have lots of good friends and when we ladies get started we are really good at putting the world to rights. 

One day recently we got talking about how nice it would be to win a couple of thousand on the lottery (even though most of us don’t bother with it any more).   Well, the subject provoked the obvious questions about what we would do with the money.  The question fired the imagination of everyone included in the conversation and got us all into a state of friendly disagreement.  One was determined to go on holiday while another said that she felt that a pamper session at a spa would be her choice.  Another was going to give her imaginary money to her niece who was in the process of saving for a house while yet another was going to have a couple of rooms in her house decorated. I thought that mine would be best spent on going to visit a relative that emigrated to Australia in the 1980s.  The one thing that was in plentiful supply that day was advice, each to the others, about the disadvantages of their wishful plans.

The whole episode got me thinking that we are often so sure of our own perception of situations that we find it hard to appreciate other alternatives, and now that I come to think of it, I can hear myself criticising many of my children’s decisions as I see them go through the stages of family life that I have already passed through and where I think that they would well benefit from my experience. 

The bottom line is that we do have to remember that we are all different, times are different and different people have different life priorities.  So whether we are talking about situations from a real life or hypothetical point of view we have to remember that each  and every one of the people living around us have to make their own mistakes, and all we can do is be there to offer the shoulder to cry on, if and when, it is needed.

LY, Blackheath.

LPG found some information for you

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