Retired Life

I could start by saying that my alarm went off this morning, but it didn’t. My wife gets up at 5:45 a.m. every workday and hates the fact that I don’t have to. I don’t set an alarm.

It takes an hour and a half for her to get ready for work. I call this activity The Process. It can be very noisy: open and close doors, shower door, hairdryer, hair curler (not so noisy), walk from bathroom to closet, pull plastic shoebox off the shelf, drop lid on floor, take out hard-soled shoes, drop on floor, walk on tile like she was on the Parris Island parade grounds – heel, toe, heel, toe. You get the idea – not conducive to sleeping. There’s also some hanger rattling as she selects her wardrobe, but I don’t want to get picky.

Within five nanoseconds after waking, her brain has already retrieved all the tasks and events in her day from her memory bank. Some of them are not pleasant, and most do not help her reach self-actualization. Her Pissed Meter is already in the red.

The days I do get up with her, she usually asks me what I’m doing that day. If my response doesn’t include my assigned significant tasks, then she will suggest additional things for me to do. I’m retired. I don’t need anything to do. The things she usually mentions are on an old list that I call my Never List. As with colonoscopies, I am hoping to never do them again: painting, making something out of wood, going to Home Depot, etc. Actually, I do like going to Home Depot, but that “like” is offset by the resulting work that has to be done.

Then she leaves. I’m alone. Okay, I admit there’s a moment of loneliness and sadness, but that ends when I remember it’s time for breakfast. The foods I select are those she doesn’t know I’m eating. She is the food police. When gone, I can eat whatever I want. Ha.

Here come the eggs, toast (two pieces with jelly), and sausage. I get everything on the counter, ready to cook. Then I go to the pantry.

Crap. There it is — the high fiber cereal. It’s staring at me and wagging its finger. The guilt pours over me like Log Cabin syrup, which is banned in the house by the way.

Dammit. I put the eggs, sausage, bread, jelly, and butter away, pour a bowl of sawdust, get some blueberries and milk, and grudgingly eat what I’m supposed to. I suspect that she checks the level of the cereal box daily, so I weigh eating the stuff against the potential verbal reprimand. The cereal always wins. To get through eating it, I imagine I’m a POW and am thankful for anything to eat that is not a rodent.

With breakfast over, I move on to my first task. I usually watch one of the business channels until the stock market opens. I don’t own very much stock, but it helps me feel wealthy. I lose that feeling anytime a major appliance breaks. Once I learn the current events that will either tank the market or make it rise to new highs I move on to my next task. (Both views of the market are presented to assure that the business channel is never wrong since they told you so.)

I make my way to my computer, in my ten by ten “office.” I turn on the computer and, since it takes fifteen minutes to be usable, I practice putting on a six-foot-long chunk of fake grass – my birthday present from 2006. I would putt better, but I keep glancing at the computer to see the percentage complete of the daily update. Today it’s taking quite a while. Every day it takes quite a while, but that’s good. It’s always good to practice golf when I’m pissed because I’m usually pissed after two holes. Simulate conditions whenever possible. 

I knock three balls into the hole of the fake-grass mat, then turn around. Yay. The login screen is showing. I sit, login, then get up and putt a few more. I’m not sure what the computer does after login, but it also takes about fifteen more minutes. My stepson says it’s loading things from the internet and my internet is too slow. Since I’m also slow, I don’t care. Hey, just sank six in a row.

Now, with my cyberspace access device fully operational, I pull up my latest writing attempt. I always wanted to write stuff. It used to be so easy, the words just flowed out of me, but I joined a writing critique group. They are so picky about spelling, punctuation, and believable scenes. It’s very constraining.

I scroll the Word document. Do I edit the old or write the new? The pesky software has red-underlined about ten words and green-underlined at least five phrases. I ponder and ponder. I click the browser to check email. It’s 9:00 a.m.
My best friend has sent me a video link. I click it, YouTube pops up and another thirty-five-year-old super-model is presenting the threat of an ongoing conspiracy to overthrow the United States. I shake my head. I have told him a dozen times that he should watch the home improvement channel. He won’t change. 

I watch half of it but notice there’s a video on the right column about the F-22. I click it and watch an airplane do what is impossible. Airplanes are supposed to move forward or die. There’s another video in the column about Russia’s newest generation-five fighter. I click it and watch. The F-22 would surely kick this thing’s ass.

I lose track of time watching mind-numbing videos for two hours. I go back to email and pull up the second one. The lingering Word doc window is just barely showing behind the browser window. It haunts me. Maybe I can write something else today, something new. There ought to be some creativity left in my shriveled brain. I open a new document.

It’s so stark. There’s nothing there. Just blank white space. I ponder again, then I go to the kitchen and make a cup of coffee. When the Keurig is done spitting it out, I go to the couch and turn on a news channel.

Same old stuff. Oh, wow, it’s going to be ninety-two degrees in Atlanta today, thirty percent chance of rain. That’s different. NOT. Same daily forecast for three months now. Why couldn’t I live in Alabama – daily tornadoes with brief periods of Sahara dust? Something exciting for a change.

I put my hands together and pray: Dear God, please disregard my last thought. Just flush that thing away, like I never thought it. Ninety-two and rain are just fine. Thank you.

What an idiot I am, thinking something like that. Time for lunch.

Now in the fridge, I move the lettuce and carrots aside and get out the salami and swiss cheese. You get the idea. I was good for breakfast. Lunch is open-season on fat and carbs. I make my sandwich and go back to the fridge for mustard. None. It’s got to be hidden. Nope. No mustard. Life is nothing but torment. I eat the dry, tasteless sandwich anyway. The half bag of Fritos makes it tolerable.

I walk back to my computer and sit. There it is again – the blank white box in the window. Maybe, if I read, it will generate some ideas. I look behind me to my books. There are a few I haven’t read. I pick one and take it to the living room. Laying down on the couch I open it and start reading – “Call me Ishmael.”

The door to the garage slams and wakes me up. I glance at the clock on the wall. It’s 6:02 p.m. I remember that I was born at that time. I might die at that time. I lift the book lying on my chest. “Call me Ishmael” mocks me. She walks into the room.

She’s the most beautiful thing I ever saw. I get a rush of happiness and hug her before she can rifle through the mail she brought in. I’m so lucky to have her. She hugs back and says, “What’s for dinner?”

2 Comments

  1. Alice Jean Godbold

    You should see me smiling throughout this, thinking, “Typical Bill” and “That’s Marianne” and how much I miss y’all.
    A few laugh-out-loud moments of recognition. (Sentence fragment intended.) You write with such an ease, a deceptively relaxed tone. I love it, and you!

    • Bill

      Glad I could make you smile. Hope the world gets back to normal so we can all meet again. On the positive side, at least we don’t live in New York. Hug. Hug.

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