Pooka

Prior to retirement we lived out in the country and had a cat door so our cats could come and go as they pleased.  We have co-existed with and loved many cats over the years.  Our all-time favorite was named Pooka.  We got her from a friend who had a farm where Pooka was born to be a barn cat.  She was quite young when we took her in; however, unlike all the other cats we have had before and since, she never ceased being feral.  As a result, few friends or family ever saw her.  She would quickly skedaddle outside when strangers arrived, leaving the cat door flapping in her wake.

She was a bit uncanny in the way feral animals are.  She clearly went her own way and had her own thoughts.  She was also a mighty hunter who loved roaming the wetlands near our land and often brought “presents” home to us.  This was especially true in the spring, which we came to refer to as the "Killing Season."

One spring morning during the Pooka years I got up for work and as I walked into the living room a garter snake slithered by in front of me and went under the couch.  I don't know about you, but this is not something I want to deal with at 7:15 a.m. or ever, for that matter.  Garter snakes are perfectly harmless, but there is still that wild, uncanny aspect to them; the same as mice.  Ick.  I was NEVER the kind of kid who picked up snakes by their tails and tossed them about.  Sorry, but in our house that is a job for Super T.  He was still asleep that morning and did not need to leave for work until long after I was gone.  I thought I would just go to work and then call and tell him it was there.  Right?

I reached to pull my coat off the coat rack and a chipmunk jumped out of my coat sleeve, dropped to the floor, and also ran under the couch.  I jumped back, breathing heavy.  Then I put on my coat and hightailed it out of there. 

The snake and chipmunk were never seen again.  My husband swears he never saw them.

Pooka

Alligator Days

We have a friend from NYS coming to visit this weekend and I must clean, clean, clean this dirty house.  In lieu of writing a post I will share photos from a bike ride T and I took the other morning on the east side of Lake Apopka, a large lake near us in Orange County, Florida.  

There is a bike trail along that side of the lake and it is a good place to go if you want to see alligators in the wild. There are also snakes, bobcats, and coyotes living in this protected area around the lake. T has seen bobcats a couple of times. They are afraid of humans and run away when they hear us coming. It seems odd to me that there would be a public bike trail in a place with wild animals, but there is.

The animals seem to mind their own business. My hope is they perceive large fleshy creatures on wheels as too loud, fast, and big to bother with.  Sometimes I see people walking on this trail.  I don't think I would ever want to get off my bike there. I have a good healthy fear of predators.

First, here is my old man, T, biking up the trail in front of me. He is always way out in front, pedaling much faster than me. Now we have our smartphones with us so I if he gets too far ahead I can call him and tell him to slow down, for cryin' out loud!

We were having a great time, the weather was beautiful.

We saw an alligator’s head peaking out of the water.  Spotting an alligator is always exciting.  You can see it in the middle left section of the following photograph:

Here’s a cropped close-up in case you didn’t see the alligator's head in the first one:

We came to a rustic picnic area that has an overlook into a cove. 

Are you wondering what the sign says? Here is a close-up. Believe it or not there really are people foolish enough to try and feed the alligators. We have seen people do it despite the fact that feeding alligators is illegal and can result in a hefty fine. Plus it is just stupid to get that close to one.

Later we came to a crossroad and saw an alligator sunning itself out of the water on the bank of a canal.  It is hard to make out in the photo but it looks like a long black log smack dab in the middle of the photo below:

Here is another photo I took from nearly the same spot as the one above, but I took this one with my zoom lens, and then cropped the photo:

And finally here is the same photo even more cropped.  He seems to have curled his tail up around his body or he would appear much longer:

 It looks like it was a good day to be an alligator.

On being disconnected

We gave up our landline phone recently.  We disconnected it and now we rely on our iPhones to communicate with the outside world. I have had a smartphone for almost 2 years, but I rarely turned it on before. 

I liked having a landline telephone. I do not particularly like talking on a cell phone.  The sound quality is not as good and I have this nagging fear that talking on wireless will eventually give me a brain tumor. But having the landline had become so unpleasant that we really had to get rid of it.

The people who owned this house before us went bankrupt and defaulted on their mortgage. Apparently they skipped out on a lot of other debt, too. After we moved in (a little over a year ago) and got our landline phone installed we started getting harassing and threatening phone calls from their creditors demanding to talk to those people who lived here before us. They asked for the previous owners by name, and they would not believe me when I said I was not that person nor did that person live here.

I could not figure out why the horrid bill collectors were calling OUR telephone number. We neither kept nor received the same number the previous owners used.  I guess the creditors must have used a reverse phone lookup, looking up the house number to find out what the current phone was for this address? That is the only thing I can think of.  But if those bill collectors are so clever with the Internet why couldn’t they find the telephone number for the previous owners?

For over a year we lived with the previous owners’ problems. We stopped answering the landline phone when it rang, instead relying on Caller ID to screen our calls. We continued to get creditor-related calls for the previous owners almost every day. Of course we also got the usual scam telephone calls daily simply because we are retired people who are home during the day. We were under siege.  Over time our phone situation began to drive me a little crazy.

One evening a few weeks ago I had to scramble out of the pool and run dripping wet into the house to grab the landline phone, thinking it must be a family member or a friend.  Who else would call in the evening? I did not make it in time, but the caller left a message.  My reward was a message from a nasty bill collector threatening me (actually not me, but you get the picture) with all sorts of legal actions. She left a return phone number. I usually know better than to call back – it gives them the idea that I am an easy mark. But I snapped.  Like a raving maniac I called her screaming and yelling, roaring that the people they wanted did not live here (and plenty more). I am not proud of myself.  I know it did no good, but I had a year's worth of pent up rage.  I was shaking when I hung up. It took me a long time to get to sleep that night.  Life is way too short for this kind of nonsense.  The next day I called our service provider and had the landline disconnected.

Disconnecting the landline phone did not save all that much money, so there is no windfall incentive to make me happy it is gone. I am only happy not to get the damn calls all day. I hate being forced to do something against my will. I resent not having the landline, but there you go.

I am adjusting to the iPhone. Now I charge it every night, turn it on every day (!), and keep it close by me at all times. I text now, too.  My daughter is delighted that I read and answer her texts in a more timely manner.  My tween granddaughter, who reportedly still exists but has not been seen in weeks, recently texted me from the depths of her darkened bedroom. It was thrilling. T texted me at the grocery store to pick up something he forgot to put on the list.  I messaged him some photos of our grandson riding a horse at the pumpkin farm yesterday.  And I took the *@!# picture with the phone!  If I get in an argument I can prove I am right wherever I may be as long as I can get a signal to google the question.  This is pure magic, people!  I urge oldsters everywhere to make the leap.  I have even texted a question and received an answer from my son-in-law, MV.  My grandson, N, will occasionally FaceTime me. This whole smartphone thing is much better than I thought it would be. I suppose it was past time for me to enter the modern world. Of course I entered it against my will, kicking and screaming all the way. But what else is new?

A Bald Faced Lie

The little girl in me wanted to believe in Pope Francis, but she also wants to believe in Santa Claus and the tooth fairy. I try to keep her in check because she is still a child and liable to get us in trouble. Still, I have to admit I have liked a lot of what Pope Francis has said and done since becoming Pope. I was following Francis in the media, with hope even, wondering what he would do next. Many of us ex-Catholics had been keeping an eye on him. Then he met with Kim Davis. 

For those of you from outside the States who may wonder what I am talking about, Kim Davis is an Evangelical Christian who is a minor elected official, a county clerk.  Among other things she is responsible for issuing marriage licenses in Rowan County, Kentucky.  In June, the U.S. Supreme court made the decision allowing gay people in all 50 States to get married. That has been problematic for Evangelical Christians in the so-called Bible Belt. After the ruling, Kim Davis refused to issue marriage licenses to gay couples in Rowan County because she would have to sign her name to the official document. She decided to break the law and ignore that fact that she was elected to perform a specific job because she does not want to break “God’s Law.” Hmmm, I do have an awful lot to say about religious arrogance and know-it-all-ism, but not right now.

Interestingly, because of the way the law works in Kentucky she cannot be fired for refusing to perform her duties.  She earns a lot of money for that relatively underprivileged part of the county ($80,000/year!) and refuses to just do the right thing and simply quit a job she feels she cannot perform.  Instead she wanted the U.S. District Court for the Eastern District of Kentucky to allow her to refuse to perform that portion of her job based on religious liberty.  The court refused and ultimately threw her in jail for contempt of court when she continued to deny gay couples marriage licenses.  She was released when she agreed to allow her underlings to issue licenses without her signature.  Unfortunately, she has not just gone away.  She is hanging on to the notoriety and keeps working her 15 minutes of fame. 

Perhaps most troubling is that she has allowed herself to become a poster child for the political aspirations of the extreme end of the religious right. Her lawyers belong to a firm that is officially listed as a hate group by the Southern Poverty Law Center.  

Before I go on let me just say that I am absolutely in favor of religious freedom.  I disagree with her refusal to issue marriage licenses to gay people, but I support her right to believe otherwise.  However, we live in a country that believes in the separation of church and state. She cannot choose to disobey the law of the land because of her religious beliefs. Polygamist sects would have a fit if she got do do that and they didn't.

In my humble opinion, since her job duties have lawfully changed and the job now offends her religious sensibilities she should quit the job. I think that would be the honorable and obvious thing for her to do.

Instead, Kim and her legal counsel used the recent visit of Pope Francis to the U.S.A. to manipulate the American public, to disrespect and embarrass both the Pope and the Catholic Church, and to further her cause. How did they do it? They tricked and blindsided the Grand Poobah of a major international religious institution. Wow!

Because of the liberal ideas Francis has been spewing there are many conservative elements within the Church hierarchy who dislike him.  Apparently they are also actively working against him.  A treacherous priest in charge of arranging meetings for him while he was in the USA seems to have colluded with Kim’s lawyers and got her a meeting with Francis. Then Kim and the lawyers went public with the meeting, making it appear that Pope Francis agreed with and was supportive of Kim. It is possible he did not even know who she was.

They lied and ruthlessly used the head of a world religion to further their cause.  Why would they feel comfortable doing something like that?  With all their self-righteous God talk, didn't they feel even a smidgeon of guilt about lying to millions of people?  How would they feel if a Catholic lied and used the Grand Poobah of their religion in a similar way?

In my opinion that is not their biggest transgression. Their biggest "accomplishment" was sewing seeds of doubt in the minds of untold numbers of non or ex-Catholic people about Pope Francis. Some will never fully believe in his sincerity again.  Some, like me, continue to feel foolish and gullible even after the revelation that Francis had been deceived and used. It was a bit of a wake-up call.

I will admit I was charmed by the pre-Kim Davis Pope Francis. That little girl in me really wanted to like him.  She wanted to forget that he was the head of a religion that does not allow women to become priests, sees human sexuality as a necessary evil, is adamantly against birth control, and more things I do not agree with. What was I thinking?  Well, of course I was not thinking.  I was letting the little girl inside my head take charge, which is never a good idea.  I’m thinking she might have some Daddy issues…

When the lie first hit the media, Francis-friendly liberals all over the country were howling with indignation that they had been "played" by Pope Francis.  Smug conservatives kept saying, “What did you liberals expect?  This is the Catholic Church.  Francis is the head of it.  He has not changed any Church Doctrine.”  Yeah, well, you made your point. Shut up already! I hear you!

So anyway, if Kim and her lawyers had not met with the Pope and tried to use his words to manipulate the media, the modern world might have become a little different.  Imagine!  Some people may have continued believing Pope Francis was a sincere holy man, a heroic figure.  Some might eventually have found their way back to the Church, for better or for worse.  But The Vatican would have us believe that Kim and her lawyers did lie.  If that is true, as a direct result of Team Kim lying and deceiving us the world has now changed in an altogether different way.  Standards have been lowered.  The ministry of Pope Francis has been diminished after his ambush by Kim Davis and her Merry Men.

For the fun of it, let us imagine there is life after death and we will all have to account for our actions while we were on earth.  Man, I would hate to be in their shoes and try to explain and justify THOSE particular sins to St. Peter at the pearly gates.  I am waiting for the graphic novel.  It should be epic.

 

Strip Malls

When you move someplace new you are adrift.  Nothing is familiar and everything involves taking a risk.  This is especially true with food.  It takes a long time to find the best places to eat. 

I guess you have heard there are many transplanted New Yorkers in Florida.  Central Florida is no different.  And yes, we realize native Floridians dislike and resent us.  Apparently we have a reputation for being rude.  Probably because we are hungry and we cannot find good food!  Whoops, there I go with my rude self again.  It takes so little for me to be off and running.

First of all, not every New Yorker is from New York City.  It is a big state.  Secondly, when I meet other New Yorkers the very first thing we talk about is the dearth of good, inexpensive restaurants in Central Florida.  Sometimes we whisper this to each other so that the locals do not hear us.  See, we are not really all THAT rude. 

The truth is T and I live near Disney World, the Land of Mouse, a place where French fries and chain restaurants reign supreme.  The challenge lies in hunting down the Mom and Pop owned restaurants.  They ARE here, they are simply hidden away in strip malls - a place I would never have thought to look for good restaurants before moving down here.

I have not located a bagelry. I miss fresh, crusty bagels. Perhaps if we travel to one of the Florida retirement havens on the Atlantic coast we might find a Northeast style bagelry?  We would definitely make the drive to get there if we knew FOR SURE a good bagelry existed.  I might even abandon the grandkids and move there permanently if I could buy a decent bagel.

The bagels they sell at Publix, our ubiquitous regional grocery store, are soft.  I assume they are made from a prepackaged mix Publix probably distributes to all its in-store bakeries?  Anyway, I see my granddaughter chowing down on one of those for breakfast and my heart hurts.  I feel like we have all let her down on a deep, cultural level. 

Chinese take-out can be found at virtually every strip mall, and there are plenty of strip malls.  In fact, it seems like every few blocks there is a strip mall with a Publix, a hair salon, a liquor store, and a Chinese take-out.  I am only exaggerating the teeniest little bit. 

Unfortunately, the Chinese restaurants here serve a milder version of what is served up north, and without shitake mushrooms.  I guess shitake is too weird?  Needless to say, we stopped ordering Chinese take-out early on.  I mean, who wants Hunan Chicken that has no zing and includes white button mushrooms instead of shitake?  I experience cognitive dissonance over this one. 

Pizza?  Well, we are lucky with pizza.  There is a place where the owners are from Buffalo, NY.  Although it nicely approximates NY-style pizza, the crust is not exactly the same.  The owners bemoan this fact and claim it is because of the water.  I understand.  Hey, the crust is good enough for me and I am grateful for this pizzeria.  The sauce is flavorful.  Thankfully they do not serve pizza with raw, chopped green peppers on top. Good thing, too, because my rallying cry regarding green peppers on pizza is: "Give me greasy roasted green pepper strips or give me none."

Happily, there is a lovely Thai Restaurant in town, and they are not afraid to spice things up. I have no complaints there. There are lots and lots of really good Mexican restaurants everywhere. And at a new strip mall down the road we discovered a Cajun place that makes a mean shrimp and grits. Yum.

There is a barbeque joint downtown that we like.  Part of what I like is that it is downtown instead of in a strip mall.  Of course their BBQ is not half as good you might find in South Carolina, but hey - half as good as South Carolina BBQ is pretty darn good. I hear there is another good BBQ place at one of the local strip malls, the one with the medium-sized Publix.  We need to check that out.

South Carolina style BBQ with collard greens, stewed tomatoes, coleslaw, and sweet potato

We found several interesting Cuban restaurants in the area. We frequent a Cuban place in a charming tourist town less than a half hour north of us. The picadillo is sublime.  

Picadillo with fried plantains and yellow rice

As far as the Greek experience, I live in hope. We may have to drive to Tarpon Springs on the Gulf Coast for an authentic Greek food experience. Tarpon Springs has the highest percentage of Greek Americans of any city in the US because of their sponge diving industry. I am looking forward to going there soon.

I am grateful to the Ancient Greeks for all the things they did well including democracy, philosophy, medicine, theatre, sculpture, and architecture.  But I think they reached the apex of their ancient civilization when they adapted baklava from the Ottoman Turks and made it their own.  Without the Greeks we may only be eating syrup with pancakes! Think about the perfect baklava, oozing honey syrup and melted butter with each bite.  It is so moist, almost like eating and drinking at the same time.

We stumbled upon a fabulous Greek Restaurant with our granddaughter the last time we went to St. Augustine.  She had avgolemono (egg and lemon) soup for the first time and fell in love with it. Of course the restaurant was in one of those homogenous strip malls that have no distinct sense of place, so I am not sure I can find it again.  The other two Greek restaurants we found are both about 30 minutes away in opposite directions.  Also in strip malls...  Neither of these two restaurants make their own baklava, they use the same pre-packaged variety they must purchase from their distributor.  I was disappointed, but I still ate the baklava.   

Anyway, the good, cheap restaurants we have found to date are only the tip of the iceberg.  They are out there and they are in strip malls.  The search continues.

The Grievous Angel

I get daily updates from History, a website for TV’s History channel.  A recent “This Day in History” post concerned the death of Gram Parsons, a country-rock musician who died of a drug and alcohol overdose in 1973.  Most of us die and our bodies are disposed of rapidly.  Gram’s corpse had a remarkable life after death that was also a legendary event in music history.  I was not expecting to see this reminder of his death in my In Box, it gave me pause.  

Gram Parsons was an eclectic bad boy in the late 1960’s and early 1970’s when his distinct musical genius took him on quite the ride.  He was also a serious substance abuser, partying hard with the likes of Keith Richards during the legendary making of The Rolling Stone’s Exile on Main Street.  Gram famously lived with Richards and his entourage for a while at Villa Nellcôte in the south of France until he was asked to leave.

Gram Parson’s music was not traditional country, although he revered country music.  His music is considered country rock.  He is remembered as one of the founders of what has come to be referred to as alternative country, or alt-country.  However, in true wild child style he wanted his music to be thought of as “Cosmic Americana” or “Cosmic American Music.”  Although a lot of people have never heard of him, his brief career profoundly influenced contemporary music.

He was a replacement member for the Byrds in the final days of that band's heyday. His influence was strongly felt on the one album he did with them, Sweetheart of the Rodeo, a watershed moment in the then fledgling country rock style.  He was a bit of a Young Turk in the music industry at that time.  In his early 20's and with minimal street cred, he persuaded Roger McGuinn and the Byrds to change course on that record, and he also wrote and contributed the songs, "Hickory Wind" and "One Hundred Years from Now."

Subsequent to leaving the Byrds he became an original member and creative force behind The Flying Burrito Brothers.  Gram did two albums with them: The Gilded Palace of Sin, and Burrito Deluxe before he was fired from the band.  He then put out a solo album called G.P.  Later he teamed up with the young Emmy Lou Harris, with whom he performed some stellar duets on a truly great album called Grievous Angel.  Their cover of Felice and Boudleaux Bryant’s song, “Love Hurts,” is spooky damn good.  If all you are familiar with are the versions done by The Everly Brothers in 1957, Nazareth in 1975, or Joan Jett in 1990, do yourself a favor and download Gram and Emmy Lou’s take from 1973.  Like way too many great musicians, performers, and songwriters from my generation he died young, at 26, from substance abuse. 

He died from a lethal overdose of morphine and tequila in a motel room at Joshua Tree National Park in southeastern California on September 19, 1973.  If you are my age, and of my background, you are too tired of this nonsense to even say the obvious, “What a waste.”  It went so far beyond wasteful, it was maddening.

His parents were both alcoholics.  He was born Ingram Cecil Connor III at Winter Haven, Florida in 1946, and he was raised in both Georgia and Florida. Gram’s father committed suicide when Gram was 12.  His mother remarried and Gram took his stepfather's last name, Parsons. His mother died from cirrhosis of the liver the same day he graduated from high school.  Addiction was always going to be a factor in this boy's life!

Gram had previously told his friend, an ex-tour manager and producer named Phil Kaufmann, that when he died he wanted to be cremated at Joshua Tree and have his ashes distributed there over Cap Rock.  However, when he actually died his stepfather made arrangements for his body to be sent to New Orleans for burial.  Gram was not from Louisiana and did not have a particularly good relationship with his stepfather. The story goes that his stepfather thought, because of Louisiana's Napoleonic Code, as the senior male relative he could claim the majority of Gram’s estate if he could prove Gram was a resident of Louisiana.

In true rock and roll style, Phil and a roadie named Michael Martin drove a borrowed hearse to the Los Angeles airport and managed to steal the coffin with Gram’s body in it.  They drove it to Cap Rock at Joshua Tree National Park, doused it with gasoline and lit a match. 

They split when the police arrived, but were captured later.  It turned out there was no law against stealing a body in California at that time, so they were merely fined $750 and set free.  Can you believe this stuff?  I mean who gets away with stealing a corpse?  And who has friends so committed to you that after you die they will STEAL YOUR DEAD BODY from a major airport to honor a promise!

The stepfather had the authorities pack up the 35 pounds of physical matter that survived the Joshua Tree cremation attempt and deliver said remains to him in New Orleans for burial.  If his hope to inherit Gram's money was true (and not just the stuff of legend), it didn’t work.  Gram’s money went to his daughter, wife, and sisters like it should have; which proves that sometimes the good guys do win.

Anyway, there are plenty of references to his wild young life and unfortunate death on the internet if you are interested.  A particularly nice one is on his tribute web page http://www.gramparsons.com/#/story.html written by Pamela Des Barres, the famous rock and roll groupie, former GTO, and author also known as Miss Pamela. 

This all reminded me of how crazy and transcendent the late 1960's were.  We all had one foot in heaven and one foot in hell and that's how we walked around, limping and stumbling.  Believe it or not, for a short while the nascent psychedelic drug culture was not dominated by drug dealers, substance abusers, or witless thugs.  At first young people were not taking drugs to get wasted, they really were trying to expand their minds and test the limits of reality.  True story.  Cross my heart! 

At the time it seemed like an interesting endeavor, a noble experiment.  Unbeknownst to us, it was also dangerous.  Our innocence did not last long.  Greed and/or addiction always seem to ruin everything.  Soon decadence and decay settled in and opportunistic scoundrels were everywhere.  Some of us did not survive the decline, the excess.  We all lost someone to drugs and alcohol.  And then there were the cultural heroes like Gram Parsons who checked out early.  Sheesh, there were so many of them.  It makes you wonder why all those beautiful and talented young musicians threw their lives away?

Actively creating something beautiful can be similar to a mystical experience. Tapping the creative imagination is a powerful rush.  I am sure they loved that feeling. The sad and perilous truth is that drugs and alcohol provide an easy alternate route to ecstasy. For a few moments it feels the same, but of course it is not. 

For those lucky people who have a gift, and their gifts are recognized and rewarded, it must be hard to come down to earth after a performance, a recording session, or a song writing experience.  Imagine how high you can fly when the spirit moves you.  Instead of surrendering to The Muse, artists and musicians are sometimes seduced by and then surrender to a lesser stimulus. 

Anyway, I think this is what happens to many artists, actors, and musicians especially when they are young and foolish.  Sometimes they do not live long enough to grow out of it or grasp the complexity of a life well lived. Such was the case with Gram Parsons. 

Walking the Dogs

OK, I am pulling myself together. I am going to stop flirting with confessional and/or bereavement writing! 

It was fun while it lasted, exploring my fears and anxiety (which are legion) in a public way. But that stuff takes on a dangerous life of its own. If I kept it up I would have probably jumped off a cliff, assuming I could find a cliff in Central Florida. I do have a fully realized fantasy of dealing with neurosis, anxiety and fear that I will share with you, though. 

We all have psychological baggage. Some worse than others, it is true – and always for good reason. I am not trying to be disrespectful. Deal with your issues in the way that seems best for you. They are absolutely real, and don't let anyone tell you any different.

I like to anthropomorphize my neuroses. I like to think of them as my personal demons. In my mind they are the Hounds of Hell – in this case three large and vicious canines growling deeply, dripping venomous crud from sharp and oversized teeth, and relentlessly chasing me through life, nipping at my heels. I figure I can deal with my personal demons in one of three ways.

1.  I can try to pretend that they do not exist and keep running from them until I drop dead. I think of this way as the time honored “Way Of The Neurotic.” In this scenario I attempt to keep these unresolved emotional themes bundled up inside me, letting the hounds drive me in all sorts of weird and wacky ways. This is the easiest way.

2.  Conversely, I could do battle with and seek to destroy these demons via "The Way of the Warrior.” In this scenario I battle those suckers endlessly, seeing plenty of action but never quite emerging triumphant. Instead I become battle scarred and bitter. You have to get really, really angry to go the Way of the Warrior. It involves lots of killing and plenty of blood lust. It can be dangerous to walk this path because Anger is a potent demon himself and he may actually try to usurp the rightful place and power of your other demons. You simply cannot trust Anger. Be careful if you choose the Warrior’s path.

3.  Or I could choose the last scenario, "The Way of the Dog Walker." Ha! In this scenario I stop running, turn around, and face my hounds.  Maybe they just want a little attention, you know? It's pretty scary at first, so the Dog Walker path requires as much bravery and bravado as the Way of the Warrior. But those big old hounds eventually stop growling and start to lick my hands instead. We get comfortable with each other, and I attempt to tame them so I can introduce them to polite society. When I am able to put collars on my demon hounds and hook those collars up to a leash, I take those bad boys out for a walk. I proudly parade them around in front of me. In essence I say to the world, “These are my demons, these are what drive me and make me unique. THIS is who I am.” Those dogs are always with me on this path, but I try to keep them on a short leash. The Way of the Dog Walker is the most fun because it requires an inordinate amount of humor.

Today I'm gonna walk the damn dogs.

Breaking the Sound Barrier

On Tuesday my husband had a dental appointment in Orlando.  I love that man like you would not believe; however, I am rarely in the house all by myself for an extended period of time and I was thrilled to have a few hours alone.  An unavoidable loss of privacy occurs when two people living in the same house do not work outside the home.  This has been an unexpected retirement challenge for me.

T and I have always had separate home offices in our 2 extra bedrooms.  Throughout our long marriage, we spent most of each day apart.  Our jobs were private spaces where we spent a huge part of most days.  At home on the weekends we had no problem amusing ourselves with private hobbies and interests.  We have been together for over 44 years.  We give each other a lot of space.  It works for us. 

I assumed our private lives would continue in retirement.  Theoretically, the only thing that would change is that we would now spend most of our time in the house.  In fact, we still have our separate offices.  We still spend most of the day happily pursuing our own hobbies and interests, but it seems less private now.  Why?  Well, I think in moving to Central Florida we inadvertently broke the sound barrier.

Our old house in Upstate New York had 2 stories.  His office was upstairs and mine was downstairs.  The ceiling/floor between us provided a natural sound barrier.  I used to joke that he had the upstairs and I had the downstairs and that was the secret to a long and happy marriage. 

Now we live in a small house with high ceilings, all on one floor.  The master bedroom is on one side of the house.  The dining room, living room, kitchen are in the middle.  The two extra bedrooms serving as our private spaces are on the other end.  The doors of these two rooms mercilessly face each other, separated only by a short hallway leading into the bathroom that lies between us.  I was prepared for seeing him more often when we retired, but it had simply never occurred to me that we would hear each other so much.

I now find myself reluctant to make noise because I do not want to disturb my husband.  He is usually playing his guitar, so I worry that any music I play will interfere with his concentration.  This is not something he has complained about or even mentioned, it is me overthinking.  Anticipating problems is my forte.  Big smile!

Think about it.  We cannot even talk on the phone in our rooms without hearing each other.  It seems kind of rude, but I find myself going outside the house to talk on the phone.  I am not used to being overheard as I talk to friends or family.  It is a bit disconcerting, even though logically I know T is not the kind of person who is interested in other people's conversations.  I suspect he doesn't even listen to our conversations!

So what did I do in the hours T was at the dentist and I was home alone? Well, I have 4,127 songs on my computer.  I swear I have not listened to one of them since I moved into this house, well over a year ago. I guess I have been overwhelmed by change and frozen in place.  It happens!

I clicked on iTunes and played Al Green, Amy Winehouse, and the Pogues at full blast.  I listened to Joey Ramone sing about Sheena being a punk rocker until I started to feel a little foolish listening to the Ramones...  I discovered I actually have some Taylor Swift songs.  I do not think I have ever listened to them.  I did not listen to them then, either.  I was moved, as always, by the mystical Van Morrison.  I reveled in the intensity of my girl, Carlene Carter, as she sang Stronger.  I listened to the young Sandi Shaw singing Girl Don't Come.  Moby Grape thrilled me with their glorious vocals and male angst on Bitter Wind, but I had to switch to another song before they segued into the psychedelic reverse.  Been there, done that.  I am too old to sit through that abrasive noise and pretend I like it.

I remembered that I went on a music buying frenzy in the years before I retired, buying up as many of the new generation of female British soul singers as I could find.  I need to get back to those young women, they are waiting to be heard. 

I ate Doritos and a fudge brownie even though I was not hungry.  I drank coffee until I shook.  I did NOT do any laundry.  I ran wild in an old lady kind of a way.  It was really fun.

It took some doing, because I still do not know where all my stuff is, but I searched the remaining unpacked boxes in my room until I found my iPod and ear buds.  I hate listening to music like that, but I need music in my life.  More change, yuck!  But hey, problem solved!

Another obvious solution to the privacy dilemma is to do something I have always tried to avoid, both in my personal and in my professional life.  I think I need to shut the door to my office.  Why does that seem like such a hard thing to do?

Retirement: Should you retire?

A few people have asked me in recent months if I thought they should retire.  I answered each one differently, because there is no single answer to that question.  It depends on the person and their situation.  In the process of thinking about this, 7 great universal truths emerged that I am compelled to share, somewhat irreverently, with the world:

1.  Are you sure this is what YOU want?

I retired at 62, almost two years ago.  My husband, T, knew I hated my job.  He saw the toll it took on me.  That job was stressful and truly hateful.  I was physically and emotionally burnt-out on even the best days.  He wanted me to retire for a long time before I actually did.  Many times during those last years he would send me off to the office with the retort, “Don’t forget to retire today!”  That was funny at least a couple of times. 

He was afraid I would get sick, occupational stress being a proven fertilizer for many major illnesses in this modern world.  Which brings me to the following very important disclaimer:  if you have a major and/or life threatening illness, ignore this entire post and find the best way to stop working as soon as possible so you can devote your energies to healing. 

OK, now back to the irreverent stuff.  I loved T for caring so much about me. I wanted to make him happy.  I wanted him to stop worrying about me.   I shared his concerns and I thought he was right; but when to retire had to be MY decision.  Ultimately, I waited longer than he liked because, well, retirement is a big honkin’ decision!  If I had not made the decision myself, I would have resented him on those odd days, and there are always going to be those odd days, when I get bored with retirement.  It seemed best to behave like a grown up and make my own decision so that he would be free of my childish blame game.  Yes, I play that game more often than I would like to admit.

When I finally made the decision to retire, I was absolutely, positively sure. The skies opened, angels blew their celestial horns, and lightening struck a few times.  I am not sure that will happen to everyone, though.  I wrote about this in a previous post.

I am glad I stopped working because retirement changed my life for the better. I like being retired, and so do most of my retired friends and family members.  I know a few people who deeply regret having retired and I feel bad for them.  It is a tricky situation.  A person needs to think hard before making this decision.  Changes will ensue. Best to know what to expect in advance.

2.  Are you prepared to do nothing?

“Retirement” always sounds great when you are overworked and under-appreciated.  At about 50 you start thinking of retirement as your next career goal.  You talk about it, joke about it, plan for it, and wonder how soon you will actually be able to do it.  Before I stopped working I had this mental image of the retired me as a thinner, taller, and grayer version of myself running off screaming into the night.  Kind of like the banshee in Darby O'Gill and the Little People.

But seriously, you need to understand and prepare yourself for this thing called retirement. You are not switching jobs or taking time off if you choose to “retire.” It is also not a vacation, although it will definitely seem like the best vacation EVER until napping in the afternoon and staying up past midnight starts to seem like an entitlement.  It is the vacation that never ends.  Your life will never go back to pre-retirement “normal.”  R&R becomes the new normal.  Think you can handle that?  Dig deep before you answer.

For example, today the bug guy came to spray the house and pool area.  It's a Florida thang.  He comes quarterly and he is a super nice guy.  When he sat down to write out the invoice he paused, looked at us in pure wonderment and asked how things were going.  T was lying on the couch playing around with his iPad and I was nestled into the easy chair reading a book.  Mr. Bug Guy joked a little and said he could not help but notice how peaceful our house and lives seemed, was it always like that?  I said “YES.  This is retirement.”  He laughed, clearly not knowing what to think.  I will admit at that very moment I felt a little guilty.  Not for being retired, we most certainly earned the right.  However, I try not to talk about how great retirement is to working people. It is like bragging about your wonderful husband to a friend who is married to a creep.

Keep in mind that in retirement you are ending your working-outside-the-home, achievement focused, on the way up, kicking ass, big money earning years. Suddenly life is no longer about productivity.  At all.  There is no longer anything to prove and nobody to prove it to.

When you worked you had to be ready for anything.  In retirement you must be ready for nothing.  THAT takes some getting used to...  I am not kidding.  It really does.  At first you keep thinking you should do something productive.  But eventually you come to realize that you do not have to do anything at all.  You only have to do something if you want to.  As corny and trite as it sounds, that is the absolute best part of retirement, that “only if you want to” thing. It is pure magic.

3.  Retirement requires personal initiative.

You also have to reinvent your self as a fully functioning and personally satisfied retired person on your own.  You must become self-motivated; consider the horror!  I am kind of bad at this one, so I really do not want to dwell on it...

4. Do you have enough money?

First and foremost you need to make sure you have enough money saved/invested to provide you with a comfortable income until you are about 1,000 years old.  Then you have to hope China doesn’t gut the world economy with dramatic stock market declines.  You also want to have good health insurance with prescription drug coverage, especially if you are retiring before you are old enough to qualify for Medicare.  Medicare does not pay for everything, so if you are lucky enough to retire with health insurance, for crying out loud keep it!  If you are in a position to afford long term care insurance premiums you probably want to continue that policy into retirement, too. 

5. You WILL lose your work identity.

It is not just about having enough money to retire, although that is the most critical concern.  Retirement is a total lifestyle change.  When you stop working you lose your workplace identity, giving up a role that defined you for most of your adult life.  Be clear on that. 

Chances are you were valued in the workplace.  People knew what you are capable of.  When you retire, that role, that identity is left at the workhouse door.  It does not come home with you.  Your employers do not retire your jersey, they replace you ASAP.  Afterwards, very few people will know what you are capable of, even fewer will care.  Can you stand it?  Be honest with yourself. 

6.  Can you "really" get another job if you change your mind?

If you retire in your 60's and then decide to go back to work or get a part-time job to supplement your retirement income, chances are your time will no longer be worth as much as it used to be IF you can even find someone willing to hire you. There are lots of ageist assumptions going on out there in the workplace. Young people think we are stupid and they are afraid of our mortality.  I know this because I used to be a young person.  I know how they think.

7.  Can you do less with less?

Last but not least, your discretionary income will be reduced.  One friend specifically asked me about this one, and I felt kind of bad telling him the truth.  But I did.  There are luxuries that you will have to give up or find cheaper alternatives for, even though you formerly did not think of them as luxuries.  This is different for everyone.  I stopped getting my hair cut on a regular basis.  I let my hair grow long and now just pull it up in back with a clip.  I see no reason to spend the money to keep getting it cut and styled.  I only buy new clothes if I have to go to a wedding or a funeral, and then I shop the sales.  I go to the library now instead of buying books.  I do my grocery shopping at Publix instead of Whole Foods. On New Year's Eve I buy prosecco instead of champagne.  You get the gist? Personally, I would rather have less discretionary income than have to get up every morning at 6 a.m. and get ready for work.  I am SO over that.  It is all about who you are and what you want. 

What I am trying to say is, retirement can turn your well ordered, predictable, safe and manageable world upside down.  Retirement giveth and retirement taketh away.  It involves many changes, so you really need to be sure you can live with those changes before you sign on the dotted line.  I am not just whistling Dixie. 

If you are healthy, happy and still feel passionate about your job then you probably should not retire.  However, if you are completely over the work-a-day world, feel the thrill is gone from your chosen career, know you can stomach all the losses alluded to above, are able to nap without guilt, can motivate and amuse yourself every damn day for the rest of your life, all on a restricted budget then I think you are a good candidate for retirement.  You will love it.  Cheers!

Courage, My Friends!

This morning I woke up thinking about the online accounting system at my old job. Then I read a provocative blog post on Feministe defending a certain Southern sorority’s questionable recruitment video and scolding readers for commenting so ruthlessly about it. I was reminded that courage is needed every single day in every single life, and often for rather mundane issues. However, I know in my heart of hearts that courage alone is not enough.

When I retired the new university accounting system was still new. Maddeningly complicated, the system was designed for central administration’s use. 

I worked most of my adult life as a staff member at this large research university, the “business” of which is teaching, research, and public service. A significant number of employees work in the academic units where the teaching, research, and public service actually happens.  The central administration (aka, Central) is there to make sure the tools are in place and well maintained to meet those goals.

Central is naturally concerned with the University macrocosm.  For them budgeting in aggregate is critical.  The staff in the academic “units” are concerned with the microcosm.  In academic units budgets are a means to get money into a financial entity (called an “account”) so spending can begin and teaching, research, and public service can happen.

Faculty researchers are creative individuals.  Some are the best people in the world at conducting their specific research. They think new thoughts, explore our humanity, analyze social issues, create new materials, isolate genes, cure diseases, and even take us to Mars and beyond. I am not saying they are perfect.  Some of them are not nice and a few are not even all that smart; however, when they behave themselves and do good work they are extraordinary!

Financial staff in the “units” need financial data generated quickly and easily so spending can be monitored and federally funded grants and contracts do not go into overdraft. The new system did not give us what we needed.

Anyway, Central just needed to tell the programmers to design a few different reports for the academic units.  For a ridiculously long time that did not happen.  When we complained, the central accounting people responded defensively. They accused us of being averse to change and stereotyped us as “negative.”  The result?  A solid majority of users hated the system and lost faith in the University's central accounting office.

Neither side listened to the other and no one changed their mind.  This left me scratching my head, once again wondering how you effectively challenge someone’s belief system to effect change? In a nutshell, the courage to speak up is not enough if you cannot get someone to listen.

Personally, I do not always have the good sense to fear those in power.  I know some people think I am foolish, or a glutton for punishment, but I always felt it was important as an employee to do a good job, speak the truth, and try and make things better.  I am not afraid to interrupt or talk over a man in a suit to make him listen to what I desperately hope is a well-reasoned argument.  I learned early on that you have to interrupt people in power or else you will never get a chance to talk. To do that you have to believe you are as important, as smart, and as valuable as anyone else in the room.

I also think it is important to do “the right thing.” However, unless you are comfortable being an ideologue it is hard to figure out exactly what the “right” thing is in any given situation. To figure out what is right you have to be open to the idea of being wrong.  Then you have to think critically, leaving comfortable, established belief systems behind.  This does not come naturally to human beings.  It is hard not to jump on the bandwagon or try not to succumb to group think.  Let’s face it, it is hard to be alone.

You have to suspend a natural human desire to be liked, too.  That means you cannot cry if someone gets angry with you. You just have to take it on the chin. I am sorry, but you also need to stop caring about being sexually attractive, at least for the duration of your argument. There is a time and a place for everything. 

This is a huge stumbling block for some young women. The media would have our vulnerable young girls believe sexual presentation and social approval are the most important things EVER in their whole entire lives.  Big sigh.  How do we liberate these young women from this great lie? 

Which brings me to the post I read this morning on Feministe and the murky connection between that blog post and the University’s online budget system. The post is titled: In which, God help me, I find myself defending the Alpha Phi video.  It was written by a fabulous blogger named Caperton.

As I read her defense of those seemingly frivolous young women I thought, “I don’t buy this.” The whole cutsie-cute sorority sister routine bothers me, why was this serious feminist defending them? What was her point?  In the final paragraph she laid it on me.

We are not going to change any young girl’s mind by attacking or ridiculing her. What I think Caperton was saying is this: a young sorority girl will be humiliated and angered by hurtful dogmatic criticism. Consequently, she will then be lost to the cause.  Plus, she’s still a kid and she is just trying to have fun so give her a break. We were all young and stupid once.  Some of these girls might still grow and change if they are not attacked and traumatized by raging and rabid feminists.  Ha!  You KNOW she’s right! 

I was blown away by Caperton’s courage and intellectual fervor. I enjoyed her message, but it was not as important to me as her savvy in presenting it.  Alone she stood up within the confines of a righteous but dogmatic political movement and spoke what she thought was the truth. She asked what might be a better way to effect change in those young ladies. That took courage, but it also required critical and, more importantly, strategic thinking.

I still do not like sororities. That is probably not going to change considering who I am and what I value.  That was never the point of this or the other blog post, anyway.  Still, I wish all young women cared less about how they look and more about how they think.