DatePicker

DatePicker

I am using the datepicker. I have two questions. I could not find the answers in the documentation.Or the answers are there and I didn't recognize it as such. 

1. is it possible to allow the user the option to type in the date  if they don't want to select from the calendar? they want to be able to either type in the date or select  it from the calendar.
 
2. when the calendar displays, the word "today" is gray-out - disabled. is this normal? I am a bit confused at its purpose - to click on it and it populates the input with todays date?

Here is my function for the datepicker:
<script type="text/javascript">
  $(function() {
   $('input').filter('.datepicker').datepicker({
    changeMonth: true,
    changeYear: true,
    showOn: 'button',
showButtonPanel: true,
    buttonImage: 'jquery-ui-1.12.1.custom/images/calendar.gif',
    buttonImageOnly: true,
dateFormat: 'mm-dd-yy'
   });
  });
</script>
There are two dates on my page:

<div name="txtbegdate">
              <td style="text-align:right">Begin Date Range:            
               <input type="text" id="txtbegdate" class="datepicker" type="text" readonly="true"                 name="txtbegdate">
</div>   
      <div name="txtenddate">
              <td style="text-align:right">Begin Date Range:            
               <input type="text" id="txtenddate" class="datepicker" type="text" readonly="true"                 name="txtenddate">
</div>   
.