Am I ready? I guess…
If I only knew how, I’d start some kind of countdown running. After all, the calendar changes in less than five hours. Am I ready? I guess…
The next year shouldn’t include as many changes as this one. The “big move” is behind us (although, sadly, we didn’t manage to leave much behind). We’ve had almost seven months to get used to the obvious things: a new street address, a new telephone number, satellite TV. Finding things around the house is less of a puzzle, and getting up in the middle of the night is no longer counted as “risky business”.
I’ve convinced the dog that coyotes are an intermittent diversion. The rabbits and jays are just part of his new scenery. The various life support systems in the house (running water, heat, lights, etc.) have all met with my approval. Even the waste pickup has lost much of its mystery: this morning, I made the curb run through the snow, on time.
What else? Well, with more than a year since leaving my cubicle to reflect, I have no regrets. I offer this as a hint to anyone else poised on the cliff edge of retirement: the landing is much softer than you expect.
Still not producing much new music, but I did put in a few minutes practice on the fiddle this afternoon (only the dog around, and he knows better than to criticize). The radio station can be “on the air” with only a couple of minutes notice, so that’s another check in the done column. On the whole, this was a very good year.
