Dead of Winter

                                                           Dead of Winter
It’s another cold winter’s day here in our little piece of paradise on Earth, this perfect place we call home.  The weatherman told us today that the temperature was colder right here, right now, than it was in Nome, Alaska.  For the end of January, that’s pretty cold, my friend.  And to add insult to injury, we’ve got what’s called a “panhandle” low coming in tomorrow evening that’s forecast to dump from 4 to 12 inches of snow, the amount depending… 

Of course that’s the delimiter, the weasel word – depending.  It’s the weatherman’s “get out of jail free” card.  If the low goes a wee bit more north, we get the smaller amount of snow or maybe even rain.  If it’s a wee bit more south we get walloped with much more of the white stuff.  Of course the weatherman is always dealing with probabilities, with maybe this or maybe that.  Being an old weatherman myself, I always side with the guy making the forecast.  I’ve been there and know how much work goes into the seemingly effortless presentation on the nightly TV news.  But I also know there’s a lot of s.w.a.g. involved.  Swinging Wild Ass Guess. 

I really don’t worry too much about the weather any more.  I know that wishing and hoping that the weather would do “this” or do “that” is always an exercise in futility as the weather will be what it will be.  It’s really not a giant matter to me any more, either, as I’m retired now and don’t have to fuss with going to work in the inclement weather.  But my wife and son are still working, so they’ll have to fiddle with it. 

Good luck!  Just don’t wake me. 

But of course they will if need be.  I’m not going to get off the hook that easy.  So we’ll see how Sunday night/Monday morning turns out. 

I’ve been doing a lot of painting these past few weeks.  The interior walls of my house have needed a fresh coat of paint since…  hell, probably since Ronnie Raygun was our Commander-in-Chief or thereabouts.  So since I’m no longer gainfully employed, I’ve decided to finally tackle this task. 

To my joy I’ve rediscovered that “painting the house” is a lot more involved than just putting paint on walls.  A lot more!  First you move the furniture; then remove all pictures, clocks, sconces, paintings, candles, et al from the walls; then spackle up all the holes; then sand the spackle and any other rough spots on the wall; then tape up all the places you don’t want to paint; then apply the paint to the trim areas – around outlets, windows, doors, etc.; then use the roller to paint the bigger areas; then, since I was painting woodwork also, remove the tape and retape before painting the woodwork; then paint the woodwork; then remove the tape and touch up all the boo-boos you made during the previous 19 steps.  Then you put all the pictures, clocks, sconces, paintings and candles, et al back on the wall and return the furniture to their original places.  And since there is very little room in my house to move furniture, you do this three times for each room.

Pardon me while I catch my breath!

I didn’t remember it being quite this hard the last time I painted.  Of course, like I alluded to previously, that was some (many) years ago and I was…  well, quite a bit (a lot) younger.  The old muscles and the bad back that I tend to these days are handicaps that weren’t an issue back then either.  Now they are and my bed is a very, very welcome place at the end of the day.

 My previous jobs have all been computer-related office positions, so the physicality of my life has been minimal.  So now I’m paying my dues for most of a lifetime of soft office chairs and comfortable keyboards. 

But you know what?  That’s OK!  No one’s got me on a clock now and if it takes me two or three days to do a task instead of one, that’s fine too.  It’s getting done and the result is quite pleasing, at least to my eyes.  Being as this house is over a hundred years old and there isn’t a square corner or flat surface anywhere, the suitability of results can be very subjective.  So let me just say that it is pleasing to me, so if it isn’t to you…  well, so be it.

The paint I bought to accomplish this task was supposed to be low-to-no VOC’s.  VOC’s are volatile organic chemicals – substances that allow large amounts of molecules to escape from the liquid through evaporation and sublimation.  These vapors can make you ill.  Gasoline is a good example of a high-VOC substance.  Apparently my paint is a low-VOC, not a no-VOC.  I started feeling a bit icky today and have attributed it to breathing the vapors of the paint for too long at a time.  I guess I’ll need to watch my exposure to the paint in the future since I won’t be able to ventilate it to the outside like I could do in the summertime.

Too damn cold!  (see earlier paragraphs!)

The weatherman also said we’re very near the climatological center of winter – the coldest most miserable time, so the outlook for the future is warming and nicer.  Of course that’s speaking climatologically, not two days down the road, which, as you might recall, is when the snowstorm is due.  So to sum it all up, there’s a lot of winter left in this ol’ year, bucko.

People still ask me occasionally how my retirement is coming along.  Am I liking it?  Am I enjoying it?  Am I ready to go back to work?

My answers were and still are - yes, yes and no, but as time goes by, it’s like answering other rather no-brainer questions.  Do you ask a fish if he likes the water?  Do you like having two hands to do stuff with?  Do you like that the color of snow is white and grass is green?  Hmmm…  Yes?  No?  I guess?

Being retired, for me, is about as noteworthy nowadays as being employed was a few months ago.  Just pretty much the way things are.  I compare it to being married.  The first few days (or weeks or months) after being married are unique, strange and very, very different than being single.  Then it becomes status quo.  It becomes the ocean you swam in. 

I guess being retired is getting to be that for me.  Status quo.  Same-same.  Non-remarkable.

Do I miss work?  Naw.  Very little.  I do miss the folks I worked with.  At least most of them – some more than others.  But going into an office and doing the same thing over and over and over again ad infinitum?  Do I miss that?

Not a bit. 

I have found out, however, after I retired, that I needed to find a purpose for getting up each day, something to occupy my mind and my body.  It might be as simple as going to the gym and getting in a bit of a workout.  Or cooking something a bit out of the ordinary for supper one day.  Or possibly even painting my doggoned house!  Some reason for my continuing existence.  I recently read something that spoke to me on that topic and which put some focus to this need, this drive.  The entire article boiled down to a three-word question that you needed to answer every day.  The question simply is: Did Today Matter?  Can you honestly say at the end of the day that what you did that day mattered?  And if it didn’t, what will you do about it tomorrow? 

Sometimes the deepest philosophical questions can be summed up very simply.  Did today matter? 

I wrote those words down and placed them on my computer monitor.  I now end my days looking at it and answering the question as best I can.  Yes, I think so or no and I need to do better.  The mattering can be as monumental as deciding to quit smoking or to get married, to as inconsequential, but still meaningful, as always thanking your wife for her labor in making you a meal.  Or calling a friend who you know is a bit down to just chat for a while.  Or to take a pain-reliever, drink fluids and get plenty of rest when you’re ill.

All those things matter.

So another cold winter blusters and moans outside our windows, trying to make you believe that winter is all there ever is, was or will be.  But the smell of fresh paint on my old walls and the mouth-watering smell of my wife’s pot roast cooking in the kitchen lets me know that all’s well, all’s as it should be and spring surely is “just around the corner.”