What’s Happenin’

You know you are getting old when you fall asleep during the Super Bowl and your wife has to explain to you what happened in the second half; that and the fact that you remember a lot more of the names of the players on the first Super Bowl championship team than today’s Green Bay team. But what the heck I did get a good nap out of it.

I haven’t blogged much in January because I set aside the month for putting up a tile ceiling over our wavy, uneven, unsquare bedroom ceiling (one of the joys of living in an old farm house built by old farmers not carpenters). How many retirees does it take to change a light bulb? Just one but it’s going to take him all day to do it. That is why I set a whole month aside for this simple project. That and the fact that those farmers used hard oak instead of pine for all their studs and ceiling joists and every nail I drove bent beneath my hammer and expletives.

There is a country song that is popular just now about a man who hears voices in his head, the advice of his parents and grandparents which the wisdom of his own passing years has proven to be valuable and true. When I begin a project like the ceiling or even a task as simple as washing the dishes or simple house chores, I rely on the voices of old sayings, proverbs and platitudes to get past the initial inertia of an evil living room sofa calling my name for a nap and telling me to procrastinate another hour or day.

To get me started there is the old Chinese saying that “A journey of a thousand miles begins with a single step”. I ask myself what is the first simple step I need to take to begin. (No! not lie down on the couch and think about it!) Other initiating advice is “Well begun is well half done” and “On the plains of hesitation lay the bones of countless millions” and “Carpe diem”. I find the advice of Julius Caesar especially valuable as a modus operandi in accomplishing any project: “Divide and conquer.” I think he was speaking more to Gauls and Teutons but the adage works well for any unpleasant chore or “insurmountable” problem. It is the basis for my problem solving. Divide the whole problem or project into parts and then break the parts into still smaller parts and those into even smaller parts until eventually you reach a part so microscopic you automatically assert “Hey, I can do that.” Sometimes (most often actually) I can only begin the dishes with “putting the silverware away.” If all other motivators fail there is always my wife quoting from St. Paul’s epistle that “Those who don’t work, don’t eat.”

For my next project I have set aside the whole month of February for doing my taxes. No need to get in a rush; after all I am retired.