Is it just me?

So I was having lunch today with a Writer/Director friend of mine who was regaling me with her latest tales of being treated badly by younger members of her crews. Some pretty horrifying ageism is alive and well in reality TV, if you ask me.

It's no secret. You can be a lot of things and still be employable in TV... as long as you are not OLD.

Our conversation moved on to family and then the pictures came out of the wallets. I handed over my picture with #1 son, favorite daughter-in-law, peanut, amazing husband and the teenager. She's met them all before and knows #1 son. She remembers teenager from when he was 9! She marveled at my gorgeous family and all their changes... and then a thought hit her.

She blinked at me a couple of times and said... "does this mean you're like a... grandma?" She lowered her voice for the last word, because you never know who's sitting at the next table.

I swallowed hard. I'm not the picture of a grandma... but honestly, who could deny a face like that? Besides, I looked it up and the average age for grandparents today is 47... the new middle age has been reset to 60. I'm somewhere in between. (Note: any family member who post my actual age here, will have their author privileges revoked!)

I had made a vow to myself when I knew Peanut was coming into the world that I didn't want to do that creepy thing of asking to be called some lame-ass nick name like Dodie or Pooky or anything to avoid the G-word. I'm just not going there. I'm Peanut's grandma, plain and simple and I'm going to fly that flag with pride!

So I smiled at her and said, "As a matter of fact I am a grandma... isn't he adorable?" Then I told her about how I took yesterday afternoon off from my heavy writing schedule to go with peanut and DI-L to the little lake to feed the ducks. I may have sacrificed some forward motion on the page count, but it was totally worth it.