Trina Machacek: Calendar Girl

There are months during the year when I notice it is already the eighth before I turn the page on one of my calendars. Other times I turn it before the month ends. It depends on how the month, week or even the day is going. Some months just need to be shortened and I need to move on and some months are so busy that the time flies by and I miss the turning point. For the most part though I am just a regular page turner. Flipping along as time marches on. But! Yes a day dallying “but.” But I look forward to the page turning because I have a thing about picking the perfect calendar. After all you will live with it for a whole year.

Here’s a funny story. I used to buy a new calendar for my other half for Christmas every year. It was always the swimsuit edition for him to put up in his shop. It was a tradition. We joked about how much air brushing was needed to get all that skin and water and sand so perfect. Then he would look at me and see a “real” woman and he still liked me better. But the girls of bikinis and sun were there to adorn the spot by the phone by the door for all the guys who came in the shop to enjoy. Again it was a tradition and it was for fun.

Then we moved on to another business in town and we had a real office and desks and the calendar followed us into that space. Year after year the girls were put up next to his desk and I got a kick out of the guys coming in and enjoying the view. Some men openly looked and remarked and some just kinda peeked and smiled. That went on for several years until one year around April we had a visit from a man of the cloth and he made mention of the girl in the picture. I don’t think he openly objected, but the comment made my other half feel awkward and that was the end of the girls, and the calendar. That afternoon there was a new calendar up with pictures of antique tractors and our tradition was over. It was sad but eventually I saw the beauty of the antique tractor. HAHA

So now I have the freedom to choose the calendars I put up in my house and I take it very seriously because I have to live with my choice day after day, month after month all year long. I started looking this year in October. That’s when the 15-month calendars start to come out. That’s weird and just wrong. After all I bought last year’s calendar and plan to use it to the end of December so why would I want a calendar that begins in October and miss the last three pictures on the calendar I bought last year?

I have several calendars in my home. One for writing on. Birthdays, appointments, red circles when the moon will be full. Don’t want to miss that show each month. Then I have little stick-up ones. Those are hard to come by. I shop where they are given out so I feel free to take an extra one to put up in my kitchen and on the end of a box of Kleenex I usually have on a table where I work. Then there is a little folding one on my kitchen counter that I use when I am on the phone. That one is always late to get changed monthly because I really don’t like to talk on the phone so that calendar doesn’t get used much. That talking on the phone is a phobia a few people in my family have. We all worked for the phone company over the last bazillion years and have had enough talking on the phone already! Oh I still talk, just ask my friends. They are the ones with their fingers in their ears.

The last calendar I have is my favorite. I look and look during calendar buying season for just the right one that hangs in the bedroom so I can see a dreamy faraway place each morning that makes me smile with the thought of someday going there or remembering a time when I was there. It’s usually a calendar that has beautiful pictures of far off places of sand and sun and trees and rocks and blue skies and mountains and dreams — but no bikini clad girls. Just dreams and remembrances. Happy New Calendar Year from this calendar girl.

Trina lives in Eureka, Nevada. Find her on Facebook, Instagram or at itybytrina@yahoo.com.