Are you sure you want to hear about a day in the life of a woman in her nineties? You are? Well, here goes. . .

I’m one of the lucky ones. I’m alive, and I’ve got my wits, my limbs and most of my faculties. I don’t hear well sometimes, especially when I’m tired. My eyesight is failing. I’ve had cataract surgeries and various parts removed; most of them I don’t miss. I’ve lost babies; it was long, long ago now, but when you lose a baby you never ‘recover’. . . you simply become a different person, a woman who has lost a baby and carries that hurt with her forever. I know exactly how old the boys I lost would be today.

Anyway, enough about that. I watch the news, and I know how fortunate I am. I live comfortably in a suite at the Queensville Inn, which my son Lyle owns and manages. I have another good son and a daughter-in-law I like far more than I let on. Poor Dee. . . I think she was afraid of me for a long time, but she’s a good woman and has raised good sons herself. I only wish our family had some girls in it!

But I have granddaughter stand-ins, like Jaymie Leighton Müller, who lights up my day and for some reason enjoys visiting this occasionally crotchety old lady. She has made my life better just by being in it. And her step-daughter Jocie is a spot of brightness; when they come to see me for a tea party it’s a momentous occasion.

So. . . my day: I wake up and spend a while just saying my prayers. Yes, I pray in the morning, not at night. I thank the Lord for another day, and then after I pray I get up. That takes a while. Arthritis makes every morning a torment until I get all my joints working again. Thank heavens for a mobility wheelchair, because it makes getting around a lot easier, but I try to move on my own in the morning, using a walker. Some folks think I’m confined to the wheelchair but I can still walk.

I have breakfast. My son’s girlfriend—gosh, I hate that word in reference to a sixty year old man’s lover, but that’s what he calls her—Edith brings me breakfast. She’s one of those bubbly people and I have to restrain myself from snapping at her when she chirps a bright ‘Good morning, Martha, dear’ at me.

From then on my morning is predictable. I read the paper by the window to catch the best light, I scan the news channels, and then wash and get dressed. I have lunch—sometimes in my room, sometimes in the Inn dining room—and then my afternoon varies. Friends visit and we have tea in the dining room. Cynthia Turbridge comes in a couple of afternoons a week and takes me through some wheelchair yoga stretches. I read, and then watch TV, true crime shows, my shameful addiction, what the kids call a ‘guilty pleasure’.

Dinner and bedtime come early when you are in your nineties. I have dinner in my room, often, but at least twice a week I eat with my sons and Edith and Dee in the dining room. Dee and Johnny come sometimes and bring a meal to share with me in my room. I see my grandkids sometimes, but not often; they’re young and have their own lives.

So that’s a day in the life except. . .

Jaymie has introduced me to her author friend, Melody Heath, who calls and sends me books. That’s exciting.

Sometimes, Jaymie Leighton Müller gets caught up in a murder, and that is a shamefully exciting time for me. She visits and confides in me, and even asks advice. This latest is a dilly and I know she’s worried about her family. I’ll try to help figure it out, but this is a stumper. That is not fun, it’s upsetting.

And through it all I think how good it is that I haven’t outlived the excitement of being alive.

That’s what I wish for everyone. . . that you never outlive the fun of living.

A Calculated Whisk, A Vintage Kitchen Mystery #10
Genre: Cozy
Release: September 2021
Purchase Link

In the new Vintage Kitchen Mystery from the author of Cast Iron Alibi, Jaymie Leighton Müller is confronted with two murders and the threat of danger far too close to home . . .

When a woman living under a cloud of suspicion for her husband’s death comes to vintage kitchen collector Jaymie Leighton Müller with a mysterious request, she’s not sure whether, or how much, to get involved. The police believe they have new evidence of foul play in what was initially ruled an accidental death, and the woman’s terrified they’ll try to pin the crime on her. Before Jaymie can decide whether to help her, though, the woman’s found murdered in the woods near Jaymie’s cabin.

Still unsure whether the woman was truly innocent in her husband’s death, Jaymie decides to get to the bottom of both murders. But as she digs deeper into the couple’s past and discovers a tangled array of long-buried wounds and family secrets, Jaymie begins to sense that danger is still lurking in the woods near her home. With a killer on the loose and her family in danger, Jaymie must uncover the culprit before she loses all she holds dear, including her own life . . .

Includes a vintage recipe!

About the author
Victoria Hamilton is the pseudonym of nationally bestselling romance author Donna Lea Simpson. Victoria is the bestselling author of three mystery series, the Lady Anne Addison Mysteries, the Vintage Kitchen Mysteries, and the Merry Muffin Mysteries. She also writes a Regency-set historical mystery series, starting with A Gentlewoman’s Guide to Murder. Visit her website at victoriahamiltonmysteries.com.

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