And So This Is Christmas

                 And So This Is Christmas




December 23, 2014

Dear Mom and Dad,

And so another Christmas has come.  It’s kind of debatable right now whether it’s going to be a white one this year.  There’s a chance of a little snow, sure, but today feels more like a spring day right before a storm – warmish and with gusty winds.  An odd prelude to Christmas.  The weatherman says that’ll change before long when a fast-moving front comes through.  I kind of hope it brings a little snow with it. 

Christmas is somehow always a bit better if there’s snow outside the windows.

You’ll be glad to hear we’ve decorated again this year at our house.  The tree is up and lit, the Christmas nick-knacks are placed in their customary homes for the holiday and all the stockings are hung with care.  Tony’s at least is.  It gets a little harder bringing all the Christmas finery down from the attic each year you know.  And then to put them all away afterward.  Old bones and old muscles like to protest the exertions, but we managed again this year with a lot of help from our son Tony.  If you’re curious, he’s 33 now.  I know, I know, it’s hard to believe, even for us.  Mom, you left us long before Tony came along so you missed out on all his “wonder” years.  I think you’d have got a kick out of watching him grow, seeing him go from an infant to a boy and finally into the man he is today.  There were rough patches, of course – all of us have them on our journey through life, but he’s doing all right. 

He’s doing just fine.

Dad, you were lucky enough to see him in some of his early years.  You left us when he was just a pre-teen, but I’m sure you could see he was growing up to be a fine young man.  Please know that he remembers you fondly.

You guys have missed a whole lot in the world since you crossed over.  Some awfully bad things happened since you left, most of them better left unspoken, but there were very good things that happened also.  The Wall came down in Germany.  That was a surprise and a wonderful thing.  Along with that the Soviet Empire dissolving too.  Very unexpected.  We got a black president some years back and he’s done quite well in the office which surprised some and didn’t others.  But along with that we’ve had lots of gridlock in Washington also.  Maybe that’s not such a startling thing though.  I’m sure in your lives you saw plenty of things from that bailiwick that were not in the interest of the nation.

So much more history has happened in those years, too, but I’ll try to not bore you in this letter with all that.  Suffice it to say a lot of things happened, some would have made you cry and others you have stood up and cheered.  It was what it was.

Technology has come a zillion miles in the last few decades also.  We have stuff that we take for granted now that would have been considered impossible in your day, pure science fiction.  Phones in our pockets that we can use to talk around the world.  Computers that help us do almost everything.  Hell, a lot of our phones are computers that do most everything!  The tech today is soooo cool!

The world has changed so very, very much from your days.  The world is as different since you’ve been gone as it was different from the civil war times to your days. 

Perhaps even more so.

Your son and daughter-in-law are doing all right too, I hope to tell you.  I retired last month, as unlikely as that sounds, and Judy will follow me early next year.  A milestone for us for sure!  We’ve grown older as the time has past, older than you might even guess.  I’m almost of the age that you were, Dad, when you had your last illness and I’m way older than you ever were, Mom.  It’s so very odd being older than your folks, so very unnerving.  Yes, to boil it all down, we’re not “spring chickens” any more.  We don’t have our doctors on speed dial right now (don’t ask, it’s a new telephone thing), but their numbers aren’t too far away.  The wife and I have typical ailments for our age group I suppose, but we’re handling them as best we can.  As I’m sure you did in your day.

Your other son Chuck is doing all right too.  He’s still out on the West Coast and living the life of a Californian.  It’s home for him now and has been for many years.  We visit occasionally and talk fairly frequently on the phone or text each other.  (Again, don’t ask.  Texting is…  naw, ya don’t need to know.)  He’s my lil’ brother and will always be family.  He’s a good man, Mom and Dad.  He, also, has his demons to battle, but he continues to fight the good fight and wins more than he loses.  You’d be as proud of him as I am.

Judy and Tony and I are still in the same house we moved into in the late ‘70’s and have diligently labored keeping it looking decent.  We’re comfortable here and hope to remain here as long as is possible.  It is our home, with all the connotations that word contains, and I wish you could stop by and say hello some day.  Maybe for just a cup of coffee and some good conversation.

We’d really like that.

We’ve got a new dog, too, don’t you know.  She’s a mutt of uncertain heritage, but seems to be a good girl.  She’s a rescue, a bright 4-year-old whose past will forever be a mystery to us, but her future will be one of love, comfort and companionship.  Some bad habits will need to be rectified, sure, but that will come.  I think you guys would like her!  We call her Trixi.

And so it is Christmas.  Time again to let our thoughts fly to memories of family, friends and celebrations of days gone by.  Rooms full of husbands and wives, aunts and uncles, grandparents, children, evergreens decorated with treasured ornaments, gaily-wrapped gifts calling our names. Dining room tables groaning with wonderful meals made by the skillful hands of loved ones.  Smiling faces of relatives and friends basking in the glow of another holiday on this good Earth, another Christmas.

I remember how much you guys loved the holidays.  How, even though on many years the money was very, very tight, Christmas was always a priority, always a high point, and always the pinnacle of the year.  Money was somehow always found.  I remember how Dad would drive over to Gram’s house Christmas morning and bring her over so she could share the day with us and how she would bring her famous, freshly baked breakfast rolls.  We all sure liked that!

I think about you guys often, you know, but never more than around the holidays.  Our present family Christmas traditions are distinctly ours, of course, and that is as it should be, but their roots are always, always yours. 

Thank you for that.

In only a few more hours it will again be time to wake to the magic of Christmas morning, to bid each other tidings of good cheer, to immerse in the ties of family.  To relish a good cup of coffee and to enjoy the opening of the gifts which were so enticingly spread under the Christmas tree.  To enjoy the smiles and happy faces of our loved ones.

I wish you could be here.  I wish it so much…

And so this is Christmas…



 

Tuesday. Mid-December. A Workday.

Tuesday.  Mid-December.  A Workday.

The rain was coming down on Tuesday, not in driving buckets or torrents of storm-lashed water, but in misty cold veils and swirling eddies of raindrops and vapor.  The sky was a leaden-gray color and the wind blew - now in gusts and later in lazy zephyrs and whirls.  It should have been colder as it was mid-December, but it wasn’t.  The 48-degree temperature more resembled a day in early March – fitful in its unpredictability and unable to be nailed down.

I should have been a little depressed, I suppose.  I’ve been known to mimic the weather with my mood on occasion – sunny on bright days and morose on days such as this one.  But I wasn’t.  I was perversely in a good mood and feeling quite optimistic.  I had the radio tuned to my favorite classic rock station and was enjoying its offerings at a higher volume than normal – pretty doggoned loud, actually, as I sang and hummed along with the familiar tunes to the best of my ability.

My quest for the day was a lunch with a friend of mine at a restaurant north of Akron to be followed by a stop at the office where I used to work to drop off some Christmas cards and a platter of cookies and candy for the troops.

The parking lots of the businesses and factories that I passed that day were full and the work of the world was being accomplished as I rumbled past, glancing occasionally in their direction as my pleasure directed me.  This was the start of my fourth week of retirement and the business of business was starting to seem a bit removed from my new norm, the workers seeming an odd bunch as they scurried and hurried here and there doing whatever it was that they did.  I observed without comment or much thought.  The world was as it was and I was now removed from that portion of it.

For that I was glad.

And it was a workday Tuesday and I was off for a relaxing lunch.  That still seemed a remarkable thing.

The rain was not quite strong enough for the intermittent setting on the wipers, so I had to reach up and hit the handle now and again to clear the view.  The miles drifted by under my tires, hissing with that wet road sound that we’re all familiar with and the radio kept me rockin’ with AC/DC, The Stones, Jimmi, Zep, Queen, ZZ Top and all the other immortals.  I was cookin’, I was grinnin’ and the miles were passing by.

I arrived at my restaurant destination at the agreed upon time and soon was sitting in a booth with my friend Larry.  We’d not seen each other much in the past three years and we had oodles to talk about.  He brought me up to speed on what had been happening in his life since his retirement and I caught him up on what interesting things had gone on at the office during that same time period.  We gabbed and laughed and enjoyed each other’s company, each one of our stories triggering similar tales from the other.  The food was also excellent, Larry’s filet steak and whiskey, my honey-glazed chicken and lemonade.  Our sitting there as equals was a situation a little different than it had been in the past as we were no longer supervisor and subordinate, but two old retired friends who were comfortable in each other’s company and who wished each other well.

It was kind of odd and kind of nice at the same time.

Several things that Larry said that afternoon hit me as important enough to remember – insights, perhaps, on the way he thought and the way the world worked, at least to his eyes.  He recounted one of his last trips to the office – on a visit about a year ago perhaps – and a question that he had asked his replacement.  Dave was the name of the guy in question and he had worked as Larry’s assistant for many years before Larry retired.  He was assigned to Larry’s old supervisory job and had been performing those duties with expertise and competency during my last several years on the job.  The position in question was that of County water department supervisor. His responsibility was to operate, maintain and, when needed, expand the county municipal water system.  Larry had worked there long enough to truthfully state that it was “his” water system.  He’d build more than half of it while he was employed there and it was, in all respects other than formal title, his baby.

During that last visit to the office and during his conversation with Dave, Larry had asked him, “Is it your water system now?” stressing the word “your”.  He was of course referring to the invisible reins of responsibility that would fall on the new supervisor when he was, at last, comfortable with the myriad facets of the job.

Dave answered simply, “Yes.”

Larry said he was happy with the answer and the underlying meaning that both men knew the answer entailed.  Dave was, at last, “The Man”.

It’s funny how certain things strike you.  That statement packed a lot of meaning in a very few words and I’ll remember it for a long time.

After a few hours of good food, good drink and good conversation, Larry and I bid each other adieu and I adjourned again into the wet windy afternoon.

I drove the next 40 minutes or so, feeling fine and enjoying the world going about its workday around me. I passed through the various neighborhoods and communities between the restaurant and my former workplace in a bubble of contentment, enjoying my present role as observer and not participant.

I arrived there, totally by coincidence, at about the same time I used to arrive when I was working second shift.  I dropped off the goodies which were well received and distributed the Christmas cards to my former work-mates.  I chit-chatted with the folks, the first-shift ones who were heading off to home shortly and the second-shift ones who were settling down to their long evening of work.  It had only been three weeks since I’d been an employee there, but the disconnect was obvious.  My desk was now someone else’s, the furniture was somewhat rearranged, the work I had once done was being done by others.

I was now a visitor and it was obvious.  They belonged to the class of the gainfully employed.  I no longer did.  I was the visitor, the retiree, the Old Guy who used to work there.  Only three weeks separated my station from theirs, but it was as big a divide as day and night, plus and minus.

The quick and the dead.

But when I left, my mood was not sad or mournful at my change in station, my new place in the scheme of things.  I wasn’t melancholy or wishing I could return to the ranks of the wage earners.  Through the corner of my eyes I thought I could see the envy written on my former fellow employee’s faces, the subtle urge for them to also call it quits, to also return to their homes as I was now doing and to be done with the toil and turmoil of work.  To call it a day…

To join the ranks of the retirees as I had done.

But perhaps what I thought I saw was only a reflection of my own smiling face in a shiny piece of metal in the office.

I bid them all a fond farewell as I left and again motored south into the rapidly approaching December night, again grooving to the old rock songs and the hissing tires on the asphalt, again retracing the route I’d taken hundreds of times in the past from work to home.  Before I knew it I was again pulling into my driveway and saying hello to my wife, my son and my eagerly appreciative dog.

I was again home, I was still retired and all was well with the world.

It was a Tuesday in mid-December and a workday.

The Secret

The Secret

He came up to me, startling me at his silent approach, and whispered in my ear.  His voice was raspy and hoarse and caused an unexpected shudder to run through my body, as if an evil spirit had just then walked on my grave.  I thought the gesture was a bit odd.  This whisper in the ear was taking place at my retirement party and most of the conversations taking place in the conference room were loud and totally understandable by all the folks there.

But this wasn’t a conversation.  It was a command.

Let me step back for a minute.

I just retired a couple weeks ago.  My last workday was a Thursday and my retirement party was the next day, a Friday.  I’d been a loyal employee for the government office where I worked for a little more than 13 years.  Before working for this place I had been a refugee of sorts, a victim of a massive downsizing from my previous job.  I’d held various computer-related positions in a huge telecommunications company for almost 20 years.  I’d figured I’d finish my career there and retire with, dare I say honor after a respectable time employed there.  Then I had become downsized – cast adrift in my mid-50’s from the soulless behemoth that had employed me and left to fend all alone.  I knew it would be gruelingly tough getting another job at that age and it was.  Or at least I thought trying to get re-employed for the three months I was between jobs was a long time, but apparently three months was rather quick in that job market and at that age.  Anyhow, I was taken aboard at this county government office, given a job and made to feel welcome.

For that kindness I was very much grateful.

That was over 13 years ago and those intervening years had flashed by like the time between two of your breaths – inhale, work almost a decade-and-a-half, exhale.  Done.  Almost that fast.  That time period, although in retrospect it passed by extremely fast, also contained 20 percent of my life with all that entails.  New friends, different jobs and tasks, people leaving my life by choice – retirement, better opportunities, promotions, and by fate - discharges, illness and death.

I could tell you stories…  Oh the stories I could relate…  Ah, maybe later…

My retirement party had been going on for a while, everyone having cake and cookies and punch, kibitzing with each other, shaking my hand or patting me on the back, wishing my wife and I well and saying good things about me whether they were true or not.

I like to think most of them were true.

I was enjoying myself.  It wasn’t often that I was the center of attention and this time it was in a good way!  It was a bittersweet party though, knowing it was the last time I’d be seeing a lot of those people every day.  Yes, we’d see each other from time to time, at parties, lunches, doing some hobbies together perhaps.  But it would be the last time as members in a fraternity of fellow co-workers and friends.

But I was a bit mistaken on the fraternity aspect.

There were also at the party about a half-dozen previously retired employees wandering around the conference room where the festivities were taking place.  They were apparently invited there to welcome a new member into their hallowed fraternity, namely me.  Most of them were quite familiar faces – men and women whom I’d toiled with over the years and who had “pulled the plug” when they deemed it time to retire.  They mingled with the other folks – the currently employed folks that is – the group I’d just emigrated from.  I glanced at the retired ones and received an occasional measuring glance back as if they were sizing me up for a new suit of clothes.

Or a burial plot.

Not long after the congratulatory speeches were completed and a little before the party participants began to wander off, either back to their jobs or home, one of the retirees sidled up to me and whispered in my ear, “Meet me out in the hallway in five minutes.”

I nodded, as the invitation seemed innocent enough.  Or, I thought, as if I had been waiting for just this person to whisper just those words to me all along.  As if it were as inevitable as the graying of the hair and the decaying of the body.  Perhaps it would have been better, much better, if I’d grabbed my wife then and we’d sprinted back to our car and raced home, never looking back.  But I was quite innocent at that time and meekly acquiesced to the upcoming meeting.  Or was I unable to refuse?  I later fond out that if this meeting had not occurred then it surely would have occurred not much later.

There were things that I needed to be told.

I slipped into the hallway at the appointed time and saw my old retired acquaintance standing there.  He motioned me to follow him and I did so.  We slipped into an office not very far away.  The room was almost dark as it was past quitting time and the regular employees had already left for the day.

My guide did not turn on the lights.

His shadowy face turned to me and said in that raspy voice, “There are things you have to know as a retiree.  Things that cannot be shared with anyone still working.  Not even with your wife.  Not a whisper!”  He glanced around making sure we were alone, making sure his words would not be overheard.  I involuntarily held my breath. 

“Everyone who retires…” he said after pausing for a second.  “Everyone who retires is told a secret.  It’s something that cannot be shared with the working folk.”

“It. Can. Not.  Be.  Shared.  Do I make myself clear?”

I nodded, a tightness expanding in my chest and a headache beginning right at the base of my skull.  “I understand.”  A shiver crept down my spine with the sick anticipation of the man’s next words.

“OK,” he said, “here’s what you need to know.”

And he told me the secret.

I soon returned to the gaily-decorated conference room, heard the laughter of my friends and saw the knowing looks of the retired ones.  The ones who now were my forever allies.  The ones who were forever entwined in my life, closer than a husband and wife, closer than blood, closer than the bond between brothers of the Skull and Bones Society.

I chatted with the people some more, swapping stories and smiling at their responses, but the day was drawing to a close, the light was about gone from the sky and everyone knew it was time to call it a day.

My special day was done.

Not too long afterward the party broke up.  The employed scurrying off to begin their weekend, knowing they’d be back there in a couple days to resume their hurrying and scurrying, the retired ones heading out to their homes to return to their private lives.

Whatever that meant now.

My wife and I said our last farewells, gathered up the remains of the retirement cake and headed out to the car.  My wife said, “What was that all about – when you slipped out of the conference room for a bit?”

I replied, “Nothing.  Just needed a little ‘me’ time away from the party.  Got a little emotional.”  I gave her a small almost sad smile

She brightly returned the smile and patted me on the back.  “It’s OK, big guy.  It isn’t that often that you retire.”

I nodded sagely back at her.  “You got that right, sistah.  It’s definitely a once-in-a-lifetime moment.”

As we drove home in the gathering darkness of the late autumn day I wondered who would be giving her the secret when she retired in four months.  Who would impart those momentous words to her and change her life forever.

I’m still wondering.

Birds in the Basement and Doggy Mayhem

                       Birds in the Basement and Doggy Mayhem


As some of you may remember, our old dog Barney joined the alleluia chorus a few weeks ago.  He was an old dog, 14 plus years on this earth, and had been suffering for quite a while with diabetes and blindness.  He’d toughed out the last half-decade and we’d grown quite fond of him, but we knew his days were numbered. Finally he called it quits and shucked off this mortal coil.  We were saddened, of course, and mourned his passing, each of us in our own way, but after a week or so without the patter of doggy feet in our house, it was time to find a new pal to help keep us warm at night and to liven our days. 

Our search started on the Internet where I poked around a bit and located a number of rescue sites.  We’d decided that we didn’t want a puppy and also didn’t want a purebred as a lot of them were subject to some pretty nasty diseases and we’d just come off being the “parents” of a special-needs dog. 

It was time for a mutt.

I ended up looking at hundreds of pictures of dogs online – big ones and little ones, shaggies and smooths, fidgety part-Jack Russells and sluggish Basset-mixes.  And, of course, LOTS of whatjamacallits and fuzzy whothehellknows.  I soon picked a likely black-and-white fellow from a group called Paws and Prayers and put in an application for adopting him, but I was too late.  He’d already been shuffled off to his new home.  I plugged onward, looking again and came across another rescue group called One-of-a-Kind in Akron which had about 150 animals pictured on their web-site.  A lot of them were cats, nice enough I guess, but we were interesting in a dog, so I paid more attention to the canines they had available.  I wrote down the names of eight likely looking dogs on a scrap of paper and that Friday my wife and I took a drive to Akron for a look/see.  The two dogs in particular I wanted to see were available, but when we did a meet-and-greet with them, neither one seemed too interested in my wife.  That was a deal breaker, of course as the new mutt needed be accepting of both of us from the get go.  We asked to see a few more and one of them seemed immediately friendly to both of us.  We played with her for a few minutes and decided that she was the one for us.  After we signed some papers and wrote a check, the dog was now ours!  We were booked solid with activities for the upcoming weekend, so we decided to pick her up on Monday. 

The dog was named Trick as she had been rescued sometime in October and they were apparently commemorating Halloween with the name.  We changed it to Trixi to recognize she was a girl and to keep it similar in case the dog had grown used to the name Trick.  She is a 40-pound mix of Shepherd/Terrier/Boxer, a brindle-brown color with a white blaze on her face with white throat and chest and white paws.  And she had the biggest ears you ever saw!  One usually was sticking straight up and the other one lying sideways on her head.

A real cutie!

Since my wife was at work, my son and I picked her up on Monday and brought her home.  She rode in the car beautifully and took to the house like she was born there.  She was totally happy with the three of us and everything looked fine. 

Of course, there was a LOT of learning to do on both of our sides – hers and ours.

Trixi is an active 4-year-old and the old dog was a sedentary 14.  Two totally different kinds of animals with two totally different lifestyles.  Barney, the old dog, slept 20-22 hours a day and was slow, set in his ways and, other than giving him his insulin shots each day, quite easy to take care of.  Trix was bigger, stronger and way, way faster!  We all were hustling just to be able to keep up with her.  She was luckily crate-trained, so when we put the crate in our bedroom she took to it quickly.  She ate the first kind of dog food I’d picked just fine and was settling in well.

Of course, we realized later, she was just toying with us…

Two days ago, about 7 a.m., I heard a noise coming from our attic – a kind of scratching, ticking sound.  We’d had, what I thought were squirrels up there a year or two ago and I shuddered thinking they might have come back.  I surely hoped not…  A little later my wife noticed our new dog being super attentive to the back wall of her closet.  There seemed to be noises coming from inside the back wall.  Trix was VERY inquisitive about that.  A short time later, while I was doing some cleaning upstairs, I heard a screech coming from the basement.  My wife had gone down there to take a shower.  I wondered at the sound, as my wife does NOT screech! 

Ever.

I apprehensively descended to the first floor where I could hear her screeching more clearly.  She yammered something about mmmfwggled yachitnakerlak.  Well, at least that's what it sounded like.  When I finally arrived at the basement I saw my poor wife, naked, dripping water with a towel wrapped around her head.  I said, “what???”

She replied that there was a bird in the basement. 

Sure enough there was!  A full-grown starling was making swoops and barrel rolls and Immelman loops in our basement!  And the wife was still squawking every time it headed her way.

So now, what to do? 

I had no butterfly net and nothing else came to mind quickly.  The dog was going bananas about that time racing from one end of the basement to the other, barking and leaping for the intruder in HER house.  I suddenly remembered I did have a big landing net for fishing hanging just around the corner in my workshop – hell, that might work.  I grabbed it and started swinging it wildly around for the birdie as it was still doing its swooping and diving, the dog was still racing around like a nut-job and the wife was still screeching. 

I missed it totally, but eventually got it moving the right direction and it finally headed upstairs.  The dog and I followed the avian menace at a gallop and I soon saw it had become stuck behind the curtains on the kitchen window, flapping around and trying to escape. I lunged around a bit, poking my net into the space between the curtains and the window and finally trapped the bird in the landing net. 

Quite a lunker!

The dog had passed the point of exuberance by then and was approaching full-on basket case jumping for the bird and trying to crawl up my back to reach it.  When I opened the door and flung the poor thing outside, Trix squirmed her way out with the bird and began to chase it.  Uh-oh!  Not a good thing.  I immediately hollered for her and, to my utter surprise, the dog stopped and returned to me!  I grabbed her collar and soon she was back inside. 

I knew I was lucky that day.

So you might think that was enough excitement for a while, wouldn’t you?  Well partner, you’d be wrong.

So you see, the very next day…

I had driven to a doctor’s appointment early that afternoon at another town and had been gone from the house about an hour and a half.

You first should probably know that this is the time of year when my wife bakes her Christmas cookies and makes her Christmas candy, so there was baking and candy making “stuff” here and there in the kitchen and dining room.  Unfortunately the chocolate bars that were destined to be melted and transformed into yummy candies were lying on the dining room table, surely unreachable by canines.

Surely.

When I returned to the house from my appointment I could immediately see several things.  Number one was that my wife had left. She’d mentioned that she needed some more ingredients and was planning on a run to the store.  That had apparently occurred.  The second thing I noticed was torn paper on the dining room floor – torn Baker’s chocolate wrapper. 

I thought to myself, OH SHIT!

I looked into the living room and there was good ol’ Trix tearing the wrapper off of her SECOND Baker’s chocolate bar.  The first one had been devoured already!

I grabbed the second bar out of her mouth and thought OH SHIT again.  MY DOG, OF WHICH I’VE HAD FOR ONE WHOLE WEEK IS GONNA CROAK FROM EATING CHOCOLATE!

I immediately called my vet, expecting a command to race her up to the office for emergency whatever.  She was calm, though, and told me I would have to make the dog puke. 

Fun, I thought, “and how,” I asked, “was that to be accomplished?”

Put about 1-½ tablespoons of table salt down her throat was her answer.  Do it outside.  It’ll make her puke.

Oh boy, I thought.  I have to take this big ol’ beast that I’ve only met last week, grab its mouth (beware of the razor-sharp teeth!), yank it open and shove salt down there. 

Uh-huh. Yeah. Sure…

So I did.  The first big load of salt went in OK, as she was unaware of what was happening at that point and what was heading down her gullet.  The rest of the salt that I wanted to get in there was mostly delivered onto her face, her flapping big ears and the ground.  But I got enough in her, apparently, as about two minutes later she was garking and hacking up about what looked like a gallon of glutinous brown gunk – it looked like mostly chocolate.  A few more hacks and smaller regurgitated glops came out and then she was fine.  She even seemed to forgive me for pouring that nasty salt down her throat.

She was fine the next day and all seems well at this point in time.

So far…

So after all this excitement of the past several days I’m beginning to wonder what other diabolical pleasures await us in the upcoming days?  The only thing I can say is that life will be INTERESTING with our Trixi around.

Two Dogs

eddeftwedx

                                                                       Two Dogs




I really didn’t think it would hurt as much as it did.  I mean, he was very, very elderly and had been chronically ill for a long time.  It really wasn’t a big surprise when he went.  No, not at all.

But it still hurt.  It hurt a lot.

Of course I’m talking about our old Schnauzer dog Barney and, if you’d be so kind, I’d like to tell you a bit about our ol’ buddy.  If you are one of those folks who are averse to dying dog stories, you may be excused now.  I’ll surely understand. I suppose this blog is more a therapy session for me than a necessary piece of literature but be that as it may.

So let’s begin Barney’s story.

First, to understand Barney’s place in our family you’ll have to go back a couple of dogs.  Let’s start with the one we named Dusty.  Dusty was a pound mutt, kind of a terrier if you had to put a name on her.  Long multi-colored fur, some brown and black – sort of a Benji dog if you can remember that show.  Dusty was replacing our first dog, Dutch, who had epilepsy and had passed at age 7.  Dusty was a lot of fun while we had her and a joy to walk.  All the girls you passed would oooh and aaah at her – she was a cutie in her heyday.  While Dusty was still with us, my wife’s girlfriend had received a dog as payment for a baby-sitting fee – long story, don’t ask.  She already had a number of pets and was trying to find a home for the new one, she just didn’t have the room for another dog.  She wheedled and wheedled and finally cajoled my wife into taking him “for just a weekend – to see how it goes.”  Of course that weekend ended up being for the rest of Bailey’s life.  That dog was a silver-and-black miniature Schnauzer, a boy dog, maybe a year old.  Really good dog as he turned out to be.  You can read all about Bailey on another blog that I wrote some years ago.  Anyhow, Dusty and Bailey were good buds for quite a while and we enjoyed their company over the years.  But when Dusty got to be an old girl we became concerned that Bailey might be lost without a companion when Dusty was no more, so we took the plunge and bought another Schnauzer – a salt-and-pepper colored puppy this time to keep Bailey company when Dusty was gone.  We named the new guy Barney to sort of commemorate The Barnum and Bailey Circus, as those two were definitely circus clowns.

A few years ago it was Bailey’s turn to sicken and pass on leaving just Barney with us.  He seemed pretty content to at last be the “top” dog, so we brought no more animals into the house. 

Barney, unfortunately like a lot of Schnauzers, was prone to several common diseases, and he got a couple mean ones – diabetes and cataracts.  We finally got the diabetes under control, it was nick and tuck for a while, but by that time the cataracts had advanced too far to be fixed.  So we were then blessed with a special-needs dog – blind and needing insulin shots twice a day plus expensive vet dog food.  When I say we were blessed I really do mean it.  A special-needs pet needs more attention and more love and we were happy to provide it.  We were conscientious stewards about taking care of him.  A dog is for life and we firmly believed that.  Still do.  He did pretty well for all his infirmities, learning how to get around without using his eyes and tolerating the insulin shots.  He was a tough little guy, living in his dark world and still acting like a puppy a lot of times.  We enjoyed and were blessed by his good company for about another five years and grew used to his habits of sleeping a lot and occasionally bumping into things here and there.  He had a good spirit and loved taking walks with you as long as you were careful to “steer” him a bit with the leash so he didn’t bang into trees and such.  He loved to play and you learned how to play games that he could handle.  I mean, he sure couldn’t fetch a ball, could he?

But the wear and tear of his 14 years finally caught up with him last weekend.  We took him to the vet’s when he’d stopped eating and drinking.  That’s usually a sure sign that the end is close.  The vet did some tests and found he had Cushing’s Disease and that was all she wrote.  The euthanasia needle had to be a blessing at that point.  I doubt he ever felt a thing, as he was already comatose.  He crossed the Rainbow Bridge around 9:30 that evening and joined our other furry buddies waiting for us over there.

We weren’t too terribly surprised, as I mentioned earlier.  This day had been coming for quite a while, but it did hurt.  My wife and son and I all grieved for our lost little friend, mostly privately, as that’s how our family does things.  Tears shed for a lost pet are truly a testament to the love humans share with them.  They are nothing to ever be ashamed of.

We were sad to lose our friend and grieved, each in our own way, but in our hearts knew that we’d find another companion soon.  We loved our dogs and our home was strangely still and unfamiliar without the company of a dog.  So my wife and I did some research on dog rescue groups nearby.  We tried for a dog at a rescue group on one web-site that looked real good on the computer, but were a little late, as he had already been adopted by the time we had seen him.  We looked some more and found another group that had what seemed to be quite a number of  “likely” dogs available for adoption.  It was called “One of a Kind Pets” and was located in Akron, Ohio.  We visited them on Friday and looked at quite a few canines.  One really seemed to strike a chord in our hearts.  It was because of her ears, actually.  This dog – her kennel name was Trick – had two big ears, one that stuck straight up and the other that pointed across her head to the first one!  So cute!  She was a 40-pound mix, brindle in color with white paws and a white flash down her forehead and into her chest.  A handsome dog we thought.  We did the necessary paperwork and check-writing then and promised we’d pick her up on Monday, as our weekend was totally full and we wanted to devote a lot of time to her when we brought her home. 

So today was the day!  My son and I drove up to Akron where the rescue group was located and picked up our dog!  We’d done a little renaming in the meantime and had decided to call her Trixi – sort of a feminization of the original Trick name.  She’s been with us most of the day now as I write this blog and we’re all starting to get quite comfortable with each other.  She’s a MUCH more energetic animal than poor old Barn was, larger in size and will likely run us ol’ folks ragged.  But she really does already seem at home here and, as far as us humans are concerned, she is home.

Please wish us well during our acclimation period and please, if you’re looking for a pet, consider a rescue animal.  Each one you rescue saves two – the one you take home and the one that will fill the cage that becomes empty and will be saved from the euthanasia needle before their time. 

It’s the right thing to do.  

Getting Close

Getting Close

So if you're getting a bit weary of hearing me blather on and on about my impending retirement, perhaps now might be the time to set this blog down and go do something important – chopping wood for the upcoming winter or putting up your storm windows perhaps. Those tasks are important and will pay off very soon. I extremely doubt that reading this will benefit you as much as those projects will, but if you're even a tiny bit curious about the jumbled thoughts whirring around in my gourd at the present time, pray read on.

You may recall I penned a previous blog when the countdown to my retirement reached 99 days. I called it my double-digit dance and went on a bit about the scarcity of days from that point until my retirement. Writing that seems like only a few weeks ago, but it actually is quite a bit longer than that. I'm now under a month, calendar time, and tomorrow marks 20 work days until the magic number of one.

It's coming right up, my friends. Right around the corner to borrow a cliché that's been too often used. But cliché or not, it's quite true.

This time next month I will have been retired for a few days.

I've spent part of the past year questioning most of my retired friends about their ongoing feelings about retirement and am at about a 96% response that “they love it” or “they're busier now than when they worked” or “they don't know HOW they ever made time for work in the old days.” I've had one or two exceptions which sort of mumbled and let me know that they had to do something and had gone back to some sort of paying job, but the vast majority were satisfied and more than satisfied.

So I try to integrate all those responses to my questions and try to imagine the world wherein I will not be an employed member thereof. Where I don't have to “punch a time clock” either actually or metaphorically. Where the 24 hours of the day will belong to me and me alone. Of course excepting the things I have to do to maintain my home, my health and my marriage. Those will obviously still be ongoing tasks. But I still scratch my head and wonder how I'll cope in that new world. I suppose a lot of this mental fidgeting is due to my unfortunate habit of over-analyzing events and situations, to conjure up horrible futures and worry overmuch about “the downside” of what's upcoming. Worrying about things that probably should not be worried about. Coming up with strange future scenarios where I... Where I... Hmmm... To tell the truth, they generally come to me in dreams – nightmares, actually – and cause my first hour or so after arising to be vaguely uncomfortable, as if I'm waiting for the proverbial “other shoe” to drop. Soon I'm back to my normal irascibility, but the vaguely-remembered sense of doom will sometimes return at odd moments and color the rest of the day.

Perhaps that melancholy flavor to an approaching “good” time might be due to the remembered retirements of family members and other friends from an older generation. What did retirement mean to them? The couch, the easy chair, endless games of cribbage or euchre and, not too far down that road, the sad faces of mourners at a funeral.

Yes, I realize that is not particularly how retirement is viewed now days. Since we're all (knock on wood) living much longer, retirement seems to be regarded now as a sort of new adult-flavored childhood with less stress, more time to do hobbies, sports and to interact much more with other folks. A time to write that short story, to learn that new language, to knit or sew, to golf, to learn that Asian cooking technique that seemed so baffling last year, to travel more and to learn more about what and who we are in relation to our wants and needs rather than how to achieve whatever it was we were striving for in our working lives.

I'm anticipating that all these pre-retirement anxieties will blow over fairly quickly once the actuality of not working happens. I'll find new trade winds to fill my sails with and new horizons to steer toward.

At least I hope that's what's going to occur.

I suppose my work life is similar to others of my age. I started working for a wage around age 16 and pretty much wrapped my life around one job or the other over the following 50 years, give or take. I've defined who I am by what I do. I'd venture to say most of us do that. I'm a doctor, a dentist, a lawyer. I'm a boilermaker. I'm a carpenter. I'm a stevedore. Or in my case, I'm a computer guy in one flavor or another over the years – student, operator, supervisor, testing analyst and so forth. Dropping that description of myself will be difficult although how difficult I'm not sure. I guess the new appellation I could put on my name-tag could be “former” computer guy.

I guess that sounds workable and I could live with it.

One thing I know for sure though. I know I'll miss my friends here at work. I've been around a lot of these folks for a decade or more and cutting myself off from them will be difficult. They were and are touchstones in my life. Sure we'll probably talk on the phone or text, have lunch once in a while, maybe there will be some communication on one of the social medias. But the human contact... that's going to to be tough to walk away from. So, so tough...

Humans, especially us older ones, hate change. We hate having our established routines dislodged and our comfortable day-to-day activities altered. It's hard for us to, in essence, start over – to forge new paths and to make new relationships. To walk down roads in lands we're aliens in.

But that's the reality of retirement, in my mind at least. It's change with a capital “C”.

So how am I going to handle retirement? Will I slip gracefully into it like an Olympic diver slides into the pool without a splash? Or will I enter my new position kicking and screaming for a go-around, a redo, another quick ride on the merry-go-round?

I suppose my present state of mind might be called apprehensive with a lot of hope. Or forward-looking with some scattered trepidation. A mix of ups and downs, pluses and minuses.

Obviously time will tell how retirement and I end up coexisting.

So, for the time being, let's just say I'm considering retirement as a sort of graduation, like finishing high school or college, and gazing steadily into a rose-tinted future that stretches far, far ahead of me, full of opportunity and fulfillment.

I surely hope so.

In any event, I'll try to get back to you, dear reader, when I reach the single-digit-dance phase. That ought to be interesting.

Did I Tell Ya it Rained on This Year's Road Trip?

Did I Tell Ya it Rained on This Year’s Road Trip?

I really don’t know how many of you might be interested in the minutia of the road trip our family took this year, but if you are, you are in luck!  This is it!  To be precise, here follows the exploits of Bill, Judy and Tony on a 2,000 mile odyssey this October; their ups and down, their encounters with the strange folk of far-away states and their experiences negotiating the odd customs and rituals of said far-away states.

So, fellow traveler – grab a cup of strong coffee, set yourself down in a comfy chair and get ready for the show.

Ready?  Then let’s have at it!

On the first day of travel, Tuesday, we were lulled into thinking that the trip just might be pleasant, weather speaking, as the sun shone as we headed out of Ohio in a westerly direction.  I’d checked the forecasts for the trip, however, and was not fooled by Mother Nature’s initial offering.  I knew better what lay ahead.  We said hello to our first rain near Indianapolis and it was pretty miserable for a couple of hours.  It gradually eased off somewhat near St. Louis and was hospitable again until we reached our destination for the evening at St. Robert, Mo.  It was a long first day and I was tired.  We all slept soundly that evening at the hotel and arose to continue our journey only slightly the worse for wear.

On Wednesday after a nice sunny drive west, we arrived at our first destination, Judy’s sister and brother-in-law’s house in Sand Springs.  This town is one of Tulsa, Oklahoma’s suburbs, about 8 miles southwest of the city.  After some catching up with Judy’s sister Lori (the brother-in-law Harris was working late that day) and unpacking, we adjourned to an Italian restaurant in Tulsa for a late lunch/early supper.  After returning we again noticed that their house is a very nice-looking brick and sits on a large lot due to their buying the lots on either side of them – a very smart thing to do in my estimation.  Harris, Lori’s husband and the brother-in-law arrived later in the day and we all continued our catching up.

Please note that I have a serious disability insofar as I unconsciously try to mimic the accent of people around me.  I fought it the whole trip but wanted to apologize to our hosts if they detected something off-key in my speech patterns.  It wasn’t intended as mockery.  Honestly!

Thursday we were up and off to Utica Square in Tulsa for a breakfast at a rather eclectic place called the Wild Fork.  A bit high-end and very generous in their servings (I got stuffed!).  Then, as the day was beautiful, we were off to Bartlesville in the beautiful Osage country north of Tulsa to visit Woolaroc – Frank Phillips (founder of Phillips Oil) ranch and museum.  Woolaroc – the name denotes wood, lakes and rocks – was founded in 1925 originally as a get-away place for Mr. Phillips and a place to entertain his friends in the oil and show business.  He was a heavy collector of Western art and artifacts and that’s how the museum started.  It was added to many times over the years and is now quite extensive in those areas.  His lodge house is still there, too, in the same condition it was when Mr. Phillips was alive and is very interesting with its rustic look and the many stuffed animal heads mounted on the walls.  He also loved wildlife and there are now many examples of native and exotic animals roaming the grounds – elk, longhorn cattle and bison along with lesser-known beasts from around the world. In the quite large museum we found many examples of Indian art and many, many beautiful bronzes of Western life.  (I totally loved the bronzes!)  It also contains his airplane and oil memorabilia.  They even have a stagecoach that used to run a route in Montana and is reputed to have 650,000 miles on it!  That’s a LOT of rough riding!

We returned to Tulsa after a great afternoon exploring Woolaroc.  That evening we ate at a very well regarded Mexican restaurant in downtown Tulsa named the Mexicali Border Café.  Good food, good waiter, great Margaritas!  We then went about 2 blocks to check out “the Center of the Universe”.  This is an odd little place in a pedestrian-only plaza that has some very unique acoustic properties – bizarre echoes and strange auditory effects when you stand in a specific spot.  Hard to figure out what’s happening or how, but it’s surely unique.  Afterwards we adjourned back to Lori and Harris’s home for more conversation.

The rains and storms started late that evening.

On Friday it rained most of the day.  We ate breakfast at home and shared some of our recent cruise photos to them on their big 60-inch TV.  Later in the afternoon we drove to a consignment store to wander around a bit and see if Oklahoma junk looked different than Ohio junk.  The answer was yes and no.  More cowboy stuff and less Amish stuff, I guess.  More Merle Haggard albums and less AC/DC.  Ate supper at a downtown Sand Springs hamburger joint.  Tasty!  Watched a couple movies with them at their house that evening – “Million Dollar Baby” and a comedy whose name escapes me.  Judy and Lori went grocery shopping during the first half of the first movie while Harris, Tony and I watched it.

On Saturday morning we ate some of Lori’s homemade oatmeal – yummy – along with some toast with jalapeño jelly!  Good stuff!  Drove to the Saturday Flea Market in Sand Springs and perused the goods available.  Since it was still a RAINY DAY (thought I’d remind you) some of the stalls were not open.  At least it was indoors as it was chilly.  I spent a pleasant 10 minutes or so while there chatting with one of the stall owners who used to be a scoutmaster.  Interesting fellow.  Back at the house we did the lazy Saturday thing of watching college football, which they take quite seriously out there.  The best game was a Baylor vs TCU matchup in which Baylor won 61 to 58.  LOTS of scoring in that one!  Knoshed on Lori-provided frozen yogurt cones during the games, too.  Thanks Lor!  Supper was at a tiny diner in downtown Sand Springs – fish sandwiches and onion rings.  Simple and nice!

Sunday was another oatmeal day – still good but…  After breakfast, Lori and Harris headed off to church and we drove over to Broken Arrow – another suburb of Tulsa – to visit with an old friend of mine and her husband – Linda and Bob. Linda was the youngest sister of a girl I used to date waaaaay back in the ‘60’s.  We’d lost touch with each other over the years, but got back in touch not too long ago using Facebook.  This was the first opportunity we had to see each other in about 40 years.  They had graciously invited us to their home that day and we’d happily accepted.  They introduced us to their white Westie dog named Maisie and we happily played with Miss Maisie while yammering away about old times, old friends and almost half a century of our lives.  We took a break for a good Mexican meal and a better Margarita, then, after a guided tour of the rapidly growing city of Broken Arrow, returned to their home for more conversation and memories.  I gave them a copy of the two books I’d written and they were tickled to get ‘em.  We bid a fond farewell around 7 and then returned to Sand Springs.  We grabbed a quickie supper at a local Sonic – just Judy, Tony and I that evening as Lori and Harris had eaten earlier.  More football was enjoyed on their big TV and Lori and Judy washed all our dirty clothes from the trip.  Sooooooo nice!  Thanks Lor and Judy!

On Monday we bid a sad farewell to our hosts and headed on an eastward course to Fayetteville, Arkansas, where we were to meet with an old Air Force friend and his fiancé – Al and Sandy.  We arrived at their house around noon in the rain.  (Did I mention that it was STILL raining in the area?)  We ate at a barbecue place nearby for lunch and returned afterward for a tour of their house.  They’d only just moved into this residence about four months ago and it was a nice one!  What was the coolest part of this particular house was the movie theater in the attic!  Yes, a movie theater!  12 movie seats, a huge projection TV and big screen.  Al was in the process of rewiring it and doing some maintenance.  But…  a movie theater in your home?  Wow!  I dropped off some more of my books with them and we visited until about 6 p.m. when we had to leave for Branson.

The drive to Branson, Missouri from Fayetteville, Arkansas consisted of a windy 2-lane mountain road for about 80 percent of the drive.  It was dark and did I mention IT WAS STILL RAINING AND WINDY?  Quite a white-knuckler of a drive for yours truly, for sure.  We checked into our hotel and dined at a Denny's for supper (we do love the high life!).  Hit the hay early as the drive had about done me in.

On Tuesday we ate at the hotel buffet which was about as good as those things get.  Scrambled eggs, sausage, biscuits and sausage gravy, waffles, juices, coffee, fruits, cereals.  Quite nice!  We then visited the Titanic Museum.  Judy and I had seen it some years ago, but this was Tony’s first time.  It’s a very nice place with all kinds of information and exhibits about the Titanic.  You’re given a passport as you enter with one of the passenger’s names signifying yourself.  At the end of your trip through the museum you see if you lived or died.  As you might have guessed it was too bad for our surrogates.  Then it was a trip to old downtown Branson for some souvenirs and tee shirts and a lunch at Steak and Shake.  Supper that evening was at a seafood buffet.  We went to the Baldknobbers Jamboree Show at 8 that night – a Branson “must see” with great country music and hilarious comedy.  Tony loved it!  Back at the hotel by 10:30 and had hot cobbler and ice cream.  At the HOTEL!  I just love this place.  This was an everyday feature of the hotel.  Nice!

Wednesday was our last day at Branson.  We had the great buffet again for breakfast and went to a big craft mall to walk around and drool at some of the neat stuff for sale.  We were basically just killing the morning while we waited for our first performance of the day.  There was a Coleman outlet store next door and we wandered its aisles for a while also.  And, can you believe it - THE SUN STARTED COMING OUT OF THE RAINCLOUDS!  Just in time for our last day. 

Our first show that day was an Elvis impersonator named Joseph Hall – a young Elvis and a really good one.  Two hours of singing and hip gyrations had us all sweating along with Joseph (Elvis).  Supper afterward was at a steakhouse where prime rib was enjoyed.  At 8 o’clock we went to a show called the Revollusionists.  It was a magic show with six young magicians doing their specialties – slight of hand, escape, close-up, big illusion and juggling.  Quite a mix.  They, as all entertainers we’d seen in Branson, worked very, very hard and put on a humdinger of a show!  We think we might have seen the juggler on one of our cruises but couldn’t be sure.  Back to the hotel for more cobbler/ice cream/cookies.  Love this place!

Thursday was our travel day and the less of it remembered or talked about the better.  Loooong hours driving the 763 miles from there to home.  We left around 6:30 am and got home nearly 10 pm.  So very, very tired.

So there you have it, for the folks still with me.  Ten days on the road – doing stuff, seeing stuff, enjoying (for the most part) each other’s company and relishing not having to go to work.

So thanks again to the three wonderful couples that put up with our shenanigans over those ten days and to tell them to make sure to say howdy when you’re in our neck of the woods.  We’d love to show ya around!

The Retirement Present

The Retirement Present

It was a normal sort of day, one that wasn't displaying any remarkable ups or downs. I was driving to work in the afternoon of this unmemorable day, listening to a talking book as I often do and watching the landscape stream by on either side of the Honda. When I was about half-way to work on the state highway I usually traveled I saw a speck approaching way off in the distance. As I drove closer I saw it was a man proceeding down the highway toward me. At first I thought he was walking, but his motions were not those you'd associate with a walker. It was a little herky-jerky if you follow what I mean. Kind of a wobble as he proceeded down the road. And he seemed so doggone TALL! When I finally got even with him I could see it was a guy riding on a unicycle! And it was one with a wheel quite a bit larger than ones I'd seen in circus acts or on TV and that had accounted for the guy's apparent height. He was smiling and happily wobbling his way south. I marveled at his balance and also at the fact he was performing this incredible perambulation down a state highway. A little too fanciful on the one hand and more than a little dangerous on the other. I shook my head at the crazy things one sees when you least expect them.

And that got me to thinking...

How is it that we humans are able to perform such magnificent balancing acts? How many decisions per second was that unicyclist processing to allow him to remain on that unicycle? Not only was he having to keep himself from pitching forward or falling backward as he was proceeding down the road, he was also having to keep himself from tipping left or right at the same time! If one had never seen a sight such as that and someone was describing it, you might guess that it sounded impossible.

Or at least very improbable.

But it's not. It's apparently not very easy, but it is attainable and can be achieved without any superhuman ability.

And that led me to also muse about that particular unicycle's 2-wheeled brethren, the bicycle. When you examine the mechanics of riding one, you realize that riding a bike is almost as miraculous as sitting on that unicycle and making it go where you want it to. You understand that if you set a bike up on its two wheels and let go of it, it falls down. If you give it a push forward and let go, it also falls down albeit a little further down the road from where you gave the push. But if you get on the bicycle and know how to ride one, you can go forever and never fall down!

The trick is “knowing how to ride a bike.”

Everyone who knows how to ride a bike has had to learn how at one time or another. That obviously goes without saying. And the actual ability to ride arrives all at once, in a single moment of time. Think about it and you'll agree. One moment you are NOT a bicycle rider and the next moment you ARE! You have learned the trick.

I remember helping my son learn how. We'd gone the training wheel route, him “riding” a bike with the training wheels for some time, but one day it was time for him to do the real thing. I removed the outboard wheels and we went to a big empty parking lot at a school just a block from where we lived. He was apprehensive and a bit fearful, of course. I assured him that it was time to learn how to ride “like a big boy” and it wasn't that hard. I crossed my fingers at this fatherly simplification of a complex task. So for a while it was my job to hold the bike up while he pedaled and trot along with him. And then watching him tip over. Then repeating and repeating. I will say he was quite tenacious, getting back up after each fall and trying again. Then, when it was just about time to call it a day and try again later, he got it! I let him go that time and chug, chug, chug he was riding the bike around the parking lot like a seasoned rider! His mind/body/muscle memory had finally figured out the hard-to-describe process of bike riding and he, at last, had it.

I was so glad as I was getting exhausted chasing him around and around the parking lot.

For those of us who DO know how to ride, it's a skill that never goes away, and how cool is that! It's not like algebra where you learn how to do all those manipulations of a's and b's and x's and y's when you're in school and a decade later it ALL looks like Greek to ya.

But riding a bike sticks with you!

Yes, after years of not riding you will be a bit wobbly for the first minute or two, but the ability of moving along on two wheels is still there, still ingrained in your muscle memory.

You're still a rider and the miracle of that skill is still extant.

So, at last, this long-winded prelude has brought us to the actual subject of this blog.

I'm retiring in a little under 2 months and, doing so, have decided to reward myself with a little gift to commemorate the achievement. I bought myself a new motor scooter just the other day. It wasn't an impulse buy, I did think about doing it for a while, but it might be called a rather odd purchase for a mid-to-late sixties dude. And also not a real practical conveyance for this area of northern Ohio.

But I'll say to all the detractors and the poo-poo-ers – mind your own business! If I want to join nerd city and putt-putt my way around town in my flashy orange-and-black scoot with my neat-o silver helmet on, that's exactly what I'll be doing! Us cantankerous ol' fuddy-duddys need to be given some latitude in their later years. Right?

So, had I been a bicycle rider in the past? A motorcycle rider? Ever?

Sure. I learned to ride a bike, like perhaps ALL of my schoolmates, back in early grade school and owned a number of bicycles as a kid. In high school I owned a motor scooter which I rode all over the doggone place. Later, in the military I owned two motorcycles and enjoyed riding around the foreign country where I was stationed. So I wasn't a pure beginner.

But that was 45 years ago. And I was 22 when I was last on a motor-driven cycle. That, gentle reader, was a VERY long time ago.

So I had some concerns about making the plunge of buying a new bike. What should I get? What can I afford? And more importantly, did I still remember how to ride on two wheels without falling down?

Perhaps a little sleep was lost at my home while I pondered those questions before making the purchase. Perhaps my nervousness was noticeable to those around me. But I finally sucked it up, metaphorically girding my loins, and made the decision.

The purchase was made last Saturday and I was told the scoot would be ready on Monday. I bought a helmet, a riding jacket and riding gloves that day, returned home and counted the hours until Monday morning.

My son drove me out to the motorcycle shop that morning and I was at last going to face the answer to my most pressing question: could I still ride? The salesman had told me that it'd come back to me “no problem”. Of course he probably said that to all his prospective buyers in my situation. And it was even probably true.

At least that's what I hoped.

So there I was at last, sitting on the scoot in the bike shop's garage with the big door open in front of me. One of the shop's mechanics had gone over all the controls and how they worked. The motor was running and all I had to do was twist the right handle a little bit and I'd be off. So I took a deep breath, did the loin girding thing again and twisted.

(Are you ready for the big reveal? OK, here goes...)

And I remembered how to do it within five feet! The scoot stayed up and moved forward and mostly in the direction I was pointing! Hurrah! The shop had a very-lightly used paved road that adjoined their parking lot where I could practice riding and using the controls before venturing onto the highway. I took advantage of that lane for 15 minutes or so and finally felt that I was comfortable enough to head home.

And I got there without any problems. Yes I was a little hesitant in my starts and a bit jerky in my stops and perhaps a tiny bit wobbly when starting to move, but the incredible feeling of being on a bike again, wind in your face, moving on down the road like a low-flying bird was oh so very, very nice! I put 16 miles on the scoot that day before having to put it in the garage and heading off to work in the car.

Of course it rained the following day and I didn't take the scoot out. No need to take any chances on a wet road and I didn't want to get my pretty scoot dirty!

But tomorrow is forecast to be sunny and nice.

I'll bet you can guess what I'll be doing then!

Don't Worry Baby, Everything Will Turn Out Alright

Don't Worry Baby

Everything Will Turn Out Alright

Of course he'd pick that song, I thought. He seems to get into the zone and just wants to hear those particular three or four songs, but most especially that one. I sighed and smiled. It wasn't a bad song. In fact it was a pretty good one, all things considered. Good tune, easy to sing along with. Can't really gripe about it.

We were sitting in a restaurant, one that we frequented quite often, eating cherry pie and drinking cup after cup of hot coffee. It could have been sometime in the afternoon, but it was more likely late at night, maybe even after midnight. Since the time period was late Eisenhower or early Nixon, each of the booths in the joint had a juke box selector right there on the wall. Ya slid in yer quarters and ya punched in the buttons. Then yer song played. They were all mostly rock 'n roll, of course. This was actually before they dropped the “'n roll” to make it just rock. Definitely back in the early '60's.

The quarter was finally inserted and the appropriate buttons pushed. The first was good ol' Elvis singing “Crying in the Chapel”. Of course it was. It was OK, I thought. Not my fave – a little on the mournful ballad side, but... Bill surely liked it. But when it was over and the next song started I smiled. This was more like it. The Beach Boys and “Little Honda”. First gear, second gear – all those so, so familiar lyrics. Of course we sorta jiggled along with it and sang the lyrics around bites of the cherry pie and sips of hot coffee.

That was back when Honda in America meant a two-wheeled vehicle of lower power. I think. Like the song said, a groovy little motorbike. Cool! And more fun than a barrel of monkeys! Hot dog! Dunno if a barrel of monkeys would make my day now, but they sounded like so much fun back then. And the song was by the Beach Boys, doggone it! Those surfer dudes out there in California where the waves were (apparently) big, the cars were all woodies (what's a woodie?) and all the girls were blond surfer girls with hot bikinis (that part seemed alright!). The Beach Boys! Son of a gun. What would that era have been without their musical offerings? Probably all Elvis mooning about crying or something.

Or about his pore hound dog.

For an Ohio boy, California and surfing and lil' Hondas were pretty exotic. Dairy farming, homework, small-town doings, camping with the Scouts on weekends, dad working in the factory and mom staying home and keeping house were the norm, the invisible ocean of here-and-now that we, like fish, unconsciously swam through. With the occasional musical Cliff Note that another whole different world was out there.

Of course these are all jumbled recollections of the past. Sometimes all it takes is a smell to transport you somewhere or to retrieve a long-forgotten memory. Or a taste. For instance, the taste of root beer takes me immediately to a small diner in my hometown, the Dyn-a-Mite Cafe in the very early '60's. I am playing a pinball game and drinking Hires out of a long-neck bottle. It's vivid, too. I'm there, doggone it! Other times it's a scent that's the triggering element. White Shoulders was my mother's scent. It and my mother are virtually synonymous in my head. As is the same with Estee and my wife. I'm sure you can bring to mind similar ones.

But it's music that, at least for me and probably for you also, is the trigger for a lot of memories. Not all songs, but a lot of them will take you somewhere. Usually some place pleasant. With a particular girl, a particular place. Some songs won't bring about a single memory but a melange of connected images – a vacation to the beach, a hot date with your sweetheart of the moment, a close friend, your sixteenth birthday or a very special kiss. Maybe a juicy story about the singer you remember or a concert you attended? There are many, many memories that can be triggered by a song. Hell, maybe only a chord or two from the beginning of the song and voila, Sandy of the dancing blue eyes and honey-blond hair is back in front of your face, smiling at you and holding out her hands for you to dance with her.

Oh yeah...

Anyhow, a lot of these memories came floating back to me last night. My wife and I, along with four other friends, attended a concert at our local fairgrounds. In the infinite wisdom of the committee that picks the artists that perform at our annual fair, the selection comes usually from the ranks of country and western performers. I guess it's a pretty good bet for them as the cowboy hat wearing dudes usually draw a good crowd and that's more money for the committee to spend on improvements to the fairgrounds. I'm usually surprised at that as I'm not a fan of most mainstream country western music. I suppose I haven't been enlightened as of yet.

But, as I said, it's usually a few artists of the country western persuasion that work the grandstand at our fair.

However, this year I guess the available talent also included an old rock 'n roll band who's name was very familiar. And they picked it! Along with two other performers of the country/western ilk, of course, but the headliner this year was... Get ready for it!

The Beach Boys!

I ordered the tickets as soon as they were available for the six of us and began counting the days until “the day”. And that day was last night!

It had been very hot last week here at home and I was concerned that the concert would be a scorcher, a sweat box with music. Our part of Ohio can be a fickle bitch in early September. You can sweat your butt off one day and be shivering and wrapped up in a sweater the next one. Luckily for us the heat wave broke a day or two before the concert and the cooler weather appeared. It actually was very pleasant.

Our noble fairground's grandstand was constructed sometime around a hundred years ago, so you could say it's not really state-of-the-art. The seats do have backs to them, but the seats and backs are all made of wooden slats and they will make your backside feel really sore after a couple hours perching on them. And they're narrow, too! I'm sure that's a relic of our parents and grandparents day when their backsides were not as, ahem, wide as ours are now? Of course the seats could have shrunk over the years, but that's not very likely, is it?

Anyhow, there we were, sitting with the other bazillion (seemed like) folks all squeezed together watching the sun go down, watching our watches and watching the empty stage. Of course the curse of every concert on earth was once again the norm as the 8 o'clock start time was not to be. Should have figured, I guess. All those geezers around me took so darn long to haul their carcasses up the aisles that the performers had to wait on them. I suppose geezerhood would have to include me and my group also, but I hate to admit it. And boy I didn't really remember those grandstand steps being so doggone steep!

At about a quarter after eight the announcer finally came out to make the obligatory statements about not smoking, no photography, no sound recording, yadda, yadda, yadda. And then... it was time for the show!

Now you have to realize that the Beach Boys have gone through a LOT of transformations over the years. A death here, mental illness there, various substitutions and what have you. So the product that was before us last night carried the name Beach Boys, but they were definitely not THE Beach Boys of yore. But, you know... They still were GOOD! We were guessing that one or two or maybe even three of the performers may or may not have been somewhere close to being one of the originals, but by the second song it was pretty much immaterial. They were very, very good! Every gray-and-bald head (and that was a lot of us) was a-bobbin' and a-weavin' as the songs came out, most of the music and lyrics old friends. We sang along, we tapped our feet, we wiggled and danced a bit as the tunes came thick and fast. And there were a LOT of them! The Beach Boys had been so prolific. Barbara Ann, 409, Be True to Your School, California Girls, Don't Worry Baby, Fun-Fun-Fun, Good Vibrations, Help me Rhonda, I Get Around, Little Honda (of course!), Shut Down, and all the surfin' ones – Surfer Girl, Little Surfer Girl, Surfin', Surfin' Safari, Surfin' USA and many, many others.

They did about an hour and three quarters with no intermission. They joked around a bit, but it was almost all songs and almost all of them well, well remembered. Hell, even MY throat was sore from singing along, and I just don't normally do that. Guess the ol' boy got a bit carried away last night. Go figure...

Even with the cramped quarters and the sore butt, the time just flew by and before we knew it they were done. We got 'em back for a quick encore with Fun-fun-fun and her daddy's T-bird, but after that the stage was dark and it was time to go home. The thousands of us soon filed out to the vast parking lots and finally to our cars. Soon we were home and the magic was fading.

But the old songs were still alive in there today, buzzing around in my head and still surfacing from time to time. I find myself humming a tune or voicing a lyric or two as the day has gone on. And the visions of a younger me walking along a golden beach, watching the surfers and the surfer girls under a clear blue California sky, eatin' caramel corn and dancing to a rockin' band still echo and reverberate in the county fair grandstand of my mind.

It was a good time.

And yes baby, everything did turn out alright!

Double Digit Dance

Double Digit Dance

I promised myself that I wouldn't write a blog about this subject until a bit later down the road, but have realized something that makes broaching the topic a little more appropriate now. It's kind of a matter of timing and of days.

Let me explain. I won't keep ya but a couple minutes.

Let's start approaching this subject a bit circuitously by saying this: there's a site out on the web that has lots and lots to do about cruising. You know, getting on one of those big boats and going somewhere generally exotic. Cruising. And on this particular website there is a gigantic forum where people can talk to other people about cruising in its various aspects – cruise lines, ports, getting to the port, new cruisers, cruise photography, special interests, home ports and other sub-topics. Trust me when I say there is a LOT of information out there. Sometime before my wife and I had our first cruise I happened upon this website and began doing my due diligence by devouring all my head could contain on cruising. While doing this I ran across a term which I had to research a bit to understand. Some of the forum posters would talk about doing their “single-digit-dance”. When I read further I realized that they were talking about being less than 10 days away from sailing. They were so happy their vacation was about to begin that they were dancing!

I thought it was kind of a cute way to say “our cruise is just around the corner.” Single-digit-dance!

Some others, having booked a long way in advance, were also getting excited when they got to the time where they could do the “Double-Digit-Dance.” Those cruisers had just dropped below 100 days before sailing. About three months and a week, give or take, and it made them happy also.

And so that brings us to my particular situation.

Today marks 100 days before I retire. Three months and a week, give or take.

Tomorrow I start my Double-Digit-Dance!

I didn't really want to write anything about my retirement until the day was a bit closer, but when I saw my countdown clock at work today and it displayed “100”, the numbers just pulled me in. It's actually quite mesmerizing. 99 days to go. Like the middle of March when you're in school and waiting for summer break. Or waiting for a loved one to return from an overseas military assignment. Or being that loved one waiting for the flight taking you back home to “the world.” And only having 99 days to go!

Or, to bring it back to where we started a few paragraphs ago, three months and a week until you sail.

I've been there. I've been there three times where I was counting the days before going on a cruise. I've done the Double-Digit-Dance then.

But I've never did “the dance” for retirement.

One obviously only does this one time. Usually, I guess. There are those who retire a few times, but for the vast majority of us there is only the one time.

99 days. Wow!

But wait a minute. I always thought it was OLD people who retired. I remember seeing folks retire from previous jobs I had held and they were... well, dammit, they were old! But me? I guess maybe those ol' fogies who retired back in the day weren't really all that old. Not really.

Were they?

I guess my generation's definition of what's old is anyone who's about 20 years older than us. Sounds about right.

So here I sit at my work-site, plugging away at my job and occasionally glancing at the calendar. Only have to turn 3 more pages and I'm done! I think. Only have to get in the car and drive to work about 62 more times, then all my driving from that day forward will be for ME!

How do I feel about all this? What are my thoughts as I approach this significant milestone in my life? What am I going to do afterward?

Tell ya what. Why don't we leave that for another blog, shall we?

Just suffice it to say, it's Double-Digit-Dance time for lil' ol' me and I, for one, am countin' the days! And it's easy. There's only TWO digits!