E  S  S  A  Y   Great news! Baby boomers are getting face lifts in record numbers, but even better than that, they have spurred a revolution in recliner chair design. That’s right, recliner chairs have gotten their own face lift.

Out of fashion are the big and bulky recliners your parents might have favored. They never fit in with your sleek décor anyway. But now that baby boomers are ready to recline, they want something more aesthetically pleasing and the furniture industry has responded.

A little history might be helpful here. La-Z-Boy (there’s something so perfect about that name) introduced the recliner in 1928. Apparently it was an immediate and long lasting hit with lazy men, and since they were often bought in pairs, there must have been a decent number of lazy women conjoined with their lazy mates.

The new and sleeker recliners not only have a smaller footprint, some are equipped with device charging stations and beverage coolers. They have even begun to motorize them so that the recliner will stand us up when we’re ready to get out of the chair (but why would we want to get up?). It’s not hard to imagine recliners that come with IV drips and other hospital-like features so that aging boomers never have to get up out of their chairs.

Four out of 10 recliners sold in 2014 were sold to baby boomers. Face it. Our generation is ready to get off its feet and stay off. But we want to do it in style. No more hiding the recliner. We want it out in the open for all to see and it has to look attractive. As usual, whatever boomers want, boomers get, as manufacturers clamor to please us.

Still, the old boxy recliner models are not going away. La-Z-Boy representatives say that they will never stop making the traditional recliner. So if you’re not jumping on the latest “sleek recliner” trend, La-Z-Boy can still accommodate your lack of fashion sense.

Either way, boomers appear ready to take this all lying down.

Jay Harrison is a graphic designer and writer whose work can be seen at DesignConcept. He’s written a mystery novel, which therefore makes him a pre-published author.

E  S  S  A  Y   Here’s something to know about me at the start. I’m not a fan of guns and not knowledgeable about them. Gun, rifle, pistol, even an Uzi. It’s all pretty much the same to me. Up until the time of the incident at the shooting range I had never seen a gun up close, much less held one in my hand.

It was a dreary Saturday afternoon in autumn, one of those days when you just want to eat hot soup and contemplate the coming winter. A young man of my acquaintance suggested to me that I ought to know how to handle a gun for my own protection. I doubted that. I immediately flashed on to a vision of a home intruder grabbing the weapon from my hands and turning its power on me. This is something I’ve read happens to inexperienced gun owners.

Exactly why you need to use a gun, the young man said – so that sort of thing won’t happen. I could think of another way to prevent it from happening: keep the doors locked and guns out of my home. But I remained silent on that point. He was a young, twenty-something relative, eager to please, and I was pushing sixty, a guest in his home, and wanting to keep harmony in the family. Besides, as I said, it was a gloomy day with nothing much to do.

We drove through a light rain to the shooting range, he chattering on about how I was going to love the feel of the gun in my hand, me mostly silent – no point arguing about it now. We were already launched on the mission.

The range turned out to be a large metal building, rather forbidding looking. If there’d been any sun that day it probably would have reflected off the walls in a blinding glare. But as it was, the building just sort of loomed at the end of the road as we approached it.

Once inside, I learned that I would have to read a handbook, see a short film, and then take a test on gun safety before I would be permitted to touch a weapon. I found that comforting. Good idea, I said, as the almost deafening sound of gunfire rattled around the tin can of a building. People were busy shooting all around me and I was glad to know they’d all passed the safety test. Or so I hoped.

It turns out I was the threat. I passed the test but somehow didn’t get the message that I should not point the gun at people when I’m talking to them. Here’s how it went: First, I was surprised, when I actually had a gun in my hand, at how easy it is to shoot it. It takes a little effort to release the safety but once you’ve done that you can almost shoot the gun by just looking at it. Of course it doesn’t tell you that in the instructions. I guess they assume everyone knows. Second, when you’ve spent your life looking at people when you talk to them it’s a hard habit to break. The rule is, set the gun down before you turn around so you do not point it at someone. Not once but twice, I turned around from the target to talk to my companion, gun in hand and waving wildly to make my point, and he hit the ground in a very admirable, quick reaction.

“Oops, sorry,” I said each time.

But really, can you be expected to change a lifetime habit after just reading a little booklet? The young man looked pretty shook up after the first incident, and just plain tired after the second, so we called it a day. I didn’t shoot him, of course, but I’m startled all over again when I think how easily it could have happened. I rolled up my Osama bin Laden target (he was the villain of choice just then) and we left the shooting range. The sun had come out, our spirits were at least somewhat restored and, best of all, we were both alive.

Norma Libman is a journalist and lecturer who has been collecting women’s stories for more than twenty years. You can read the first chapter of her award-winning book, Lonely River Village, at NormaLibman.com.

E  S  S  A  Y   So, I’m driving home about 5:00 last Friday night, and have safely made it across our busiest road, the one that leads from our small town west into the wilds of the nearby rural county. Because it’s Friday it’s particularly busy, with folks hurrying home to a good meal, a football game at the local high school, or simply to start a relaxed weekend. I’m within a minute of home when I have to jam on the brakes to stop for not one, but two waddling fowl. In what I’m fairly sure must have been a daring escape from a nearby farm, a cheerful multi-colored duck and his traveling companion, a fairly complacent white chicken, leisurely stroll across my path without a care in the world. One can’t help but ponder just why these fine feathered friends are out on this beautiful autumn evening. Have they indeed escaped the confines of pens at Farmer Jones’? And if so, just how far has their journey brought them tonight? While there are still plenty of rural areas within ten or fifteen miles of our little town, that seems quite a long distance for these two to have traveled without being either maimed or killed. Where exactly are they headed?  Are they simply strolling or deliberately  heading for the feed store about three blocks up the road?

If so, I totally get it.  I myself am a regular visitor to our local wine and cheese shop for the Friday wine tasting…who doesn’t want to get out at the end of a long week and sample the newest and best of the local cuisine?

I swear, I could not get these two out of my mind, so cheerfully making their way uptown, totally oblivious to the myriad dangers that lurked enroute. Were they okay? I asked myself during the night. Had some kind soul with an extra chicken coop in the yard felt sorry for them and taken them in?  Was their farm family worrying about them too and searching for them in the Friday night dark?  When I mentioned all of these concerns to my  daughter,  she showed scant sympathy for either the fowl or me.  “But Mom,” she logically pointed out, “Haven’t I seen you eat fried chicken more than once, and don’t you ALWAYS order duck when it’s on the menu in a restaurant?”  Guilty as charged, I’m afraid.  And yet…I’m still wondering a week later HOW duck and chicken are, WHERE duck and chicken are, and indeed IF duck and chicken are at all. I choose to believe that they’ve found a happy place to settle themselves and their wandering days are thankfully at an end.  And if this seems both naive and optimistic, well, consider that I work with children, I read a fair number of stories aloud to them that anthropomorphize animals, and let’s face it…I’m an eternal optimist.  I’m in your corner, wandering barnyard fowl, I’m in your corner….

Barbara Tulli is a retired elementary school librarian in Virginia. Now she devotes more time to writing, reading, traveling and sleeping past 5:15 AM. Read more at her blog Just Beyond the Tracks.