“YOU KNOW YOU’RE getting old when four of your doctors retire.”
That’s what a buddy of mine said to me in an email the other day.
I laughed out loud, while nodding my head. “Yeah, I s’ppose you do.”
One of the many reasons that’s funny to me is that I get it.
I’ve been there. Well, OK, not four, but I’ve certainly been through retiring doctors and retiring dentists — and a retiring handyman and a retiring blade sharpener.
Upon reflection, I’ve also been graced with the experience of a retiring hair-cutter and a retiring car salesman.
I’ve even had to fight my way through a retiring pest guy. Not that the guy was a pest, but he dealt with pests.
And people relocate or change jobs or change spouses, then relocate or change jobs or retire or some darn thing, and I’m always left in the same darn position of having to re-create my pathetic little life because these yahoos wouldn’t just stay put and keep my life simple, predictable and consistent.
Don’t they realize who I am?
It’s their job to make my life simpler by simply doing their jobs forever so I don’t have to change.
I don’t want to change. I’ve done that already.
Just stay put until I’m done with you.
And what about when I decide to retire (if I ever do …)?
Well, what about it? That’s my business, right?
Ready for change
It’ll simply mean that I’m ready for a change and I’ll wrap myself up in conveniently supplied platitudes, such as “No one is indispensable,” or “Life goes on,” or “They’ll find a way,” and charge off into change.
Let ’em eat cake.
(Well, OK, probably not that one, but you get the drift).
So, if the world operated sanely, once I get all my professionals/helpers/life-sustainers in place — not to mention the best mattress, the best dog, the perfect TV, the ultimate easy chair, the just-right coffeemaker and the dream health insurance plan — then everything would freeze.
Stop. Stay exactly the same, exactly convenient, exactly friendly, exactly predictable.
Except me. I’d be able to try those new hobbies (or resurrect the old ones) or travel to new places (well, new to me), read new books, watch new movies, try different foods, join new groups and do new-groupie things, watch the news (turn off the news, scream at the news, ignore the news), watch grandchildren grow up (and provide world-class guidance on how to do that correctly) and clean out the garage and get rid of all that old crap that I’ve been carrying around since dirt …
That stuff that I’ve been toting around for decades.
So familiar
Stuff from another time, when everything was predictable (or predictably unpredictable) that reminds me of times that weren’t this time, and it all seems so friendly, so foreign, so long ago and so familiar.
But … that was then and this is now, and I don’t need all that crap now because I have my life arranged and all the pieces in place now, so if everything and everyone will just stay put and stand pat, I can move on.
And the longer I live, the more it all changes.
Except it used to change a lot.
Because I used to change it a lot because I didn’t really “get it” or know what I wanted or needed, so I kept messing with it or changing it or screwing it up or finding new things or trying new things, but I’ve got it figured out now.
Now I’ve got all the pieces in place and the whole world needs to just stop.
Freeze everything
Freeze. Everything is just right right now.
Well, it’ll be a little better when I finally get this particular pain dealt with. And fall will be pretty.
The new carpet will be nice, and I am pretty sick of this funky old fridge.
And that old friend’s birthday is coming up just before Christmas, and the election will be over by then and I won’t have to mow again until next year and that drop-dead gorgeous granddaughter will be 6 months old in November, pretty close to Thanksgiving.
We’ll need that new carpet before that.
We’ll have to move all the furniture.
(Lord have mercy).
It might be a good time to rearrange the living room because I like to look out of that particular window.
Well, in the winter I do; in the spring and summer, I actually like that other window better because everything is blooming.
Why did I suddenly flash on Christmas?
Oh, no, I can’t face another four weeks of those incessant, same old carols.
Over and over and over.
Except, I actually do like “Little Drummer Boy,” and that other one.
Maybe we’ll go to Virginia for Christmas. I’m sure that the darn job will stagger on without me.
I mean, life goes on, right? No one is indispensable. They’ll find a way.
Then, I think we’ll just come home and settle down.
On the off chance that anyone is getting too comfortable, we all remember that “open enrollment” for Medicare Part D is looming, right?
Well, if you live on the West End and you’d like a little help figuring out the whole Part D “thing,” you could show up at the Forks Elks Lodge, 941 Merchants Road, at 6 p.m. Monday, Oct. 17, for a free workshop on how it all works and all things Medicare.
This is presented by our Statewide Health Insurance Benefits Advisors, so it’s free, people know what they’re talking about and no one will try to sell you anything.
I promise.
And if we’re really going to talk about “change” or “getting too comfortable,” how about end-of-life decisions?
(Well, OK, maybe I’m stretching here, but there does seem to a semantic correlation.)
On Wednesday, Oct. 19, from 1 p.m. to 4 p.m. at Dungeness Community Church, 45 Eberle Lane, Sequim, Assured Hospice is presenting “Choosing Quality: Caring Conversations for Planning & Implementing End-of-Life Decisions.”
It’s free.
All you have to do is show up.
And they won’t try to sell you anything either.
I promise.
________
Mark Harvey is director of Clallam/Jefferson Senior Information & Assistance, which operates through the Olympic Area Agency on Aging. He is also a member of the Community Advocates for Rural Elders partnership. He can be reached at 360-452-3221 (Port Angeles-Sequim), 360-385-2552 (Jefferson County) or 360-374-9496 (West End), or by emailing harvemb@dshs.wa.gov.
