How to be a geezer

This morning I woke briefly, sat blinking in the warm lemon-tinted sunlight, thought “I should take medicine,” and fell back asleep. There were no consequences; I’m retired.

I awoke again and chastised myself for not taking the pills, since I could have awakened sans the myriad aches of spondylitis. The dog is also old, and moved for none of this, though I could hear him groan as his dream squirrels escaped into dream trees. Creaking upright, I took the pills, worried about addiction, and reminded myself that I had, at least, ended the use of anti-anxiety meds — so that’s a kind of progress. Well, sort of.

Breakfast consisted of yellow potatoes that I put in the microwave, coffee, and French toast pieces that arrived pre-packaged on the porch — this latter being a pleasant adjustment to the pandemic, and one I am unlikely to change. I roasted the cinnamon-smelling toast in the toaster, praying to the pill gods to stop the havoc in my spine long enough to pluck the hot squares back out. My prayer was granted.

Democracy Now washed over my consciousness as I sat next to my partner, who also has no day job — though in her case it’s more of refuge from an employer’s terror than the usual retirement. She is seeking to be economically productive, and I am pointedly not. She builds a tarot and consulting business online; I do what I want. What I wannnnnnnt. Of course, this leads to difficulties; I need exercise.

I can’t walk more than ten minutes — five some days — but I can ride a bicycle without much of a penalty, so I pushed my ancient Motobecane off the porch, brushing a spider web out of my helmet, and idly circled about my spouse as she walked to the park, or rather, most of the way to the park. (Her spine demon is sciatica.) The bicycle once held acrid memories of commuting to work, but that’s gone now, five years since I punched the clock; I spiral about as I did when I was eight, the bike reverting to toy under my grip.

I freewheeled my way around the ‘hood for a while, admiring the roses, the curly willow, the skyscraper Douglas Firs in the park, and the complacent ducks that my neighbors keep, musing on the fragrant difference between this city and just about any in Texas. I escaped Texas three decades ago. Ha.

Now I’m writing on Medium (ha, got meta there, eh) and listening to a gasoline mower’s drone; as a former Texan, that is the sound of Summer, and not the genteel click of a push-mower; they could never compete with St. Augustine grass and fire ant mounds. I can’t smell the gasoline and the grass-bruising from my upstairs chair by the window, but my memory supplies it.

I will leave you now, dear reader, that I might further plot world domination. It’s a long-term project. Better late than never.