I often hear my mother’s voice saying things like “Eat now, because you might be hungry later,” or “Nobody likes a sourpuss.”  But lately, I have been hearing my father’s voice saying, “I ache all over.”

My brother Don and I are the oldest of a group of cousins on our mother’s side who are beginning to ache like we do. A to-remain-un-named cousin emailed the following last week: “Every day I have a new ache or pain it seems.  I have been relatively problem-free all these years and now it's all starting!”  Sound familiar?

At the moment I can legitimately say that I am in pain.  But it’s temporary pain from physical therapy designed to keep my recently replaced knee from causing future pain.  In this case, “no pain, no gain” is correct.

But what about the other aches and pains?  Perhaps we can’t avoid them.  But we can avoid telling the world, “I ache all over.”