Golden

Sisyphus, I am sure, was the originator of what is currently known as golf. Being very unhappy with his retirement package, which consisted of naught but boulder-pushing and endless tedium, Sisyphus decided to shake it up a bit. He gave himself some challenges. He put scoring in place. He broadened his course and created obstacles. The gods declared he had to push the boulder up the hill - they did not say how he had to get there. The truly diabolical bit is that he turned around and sold it to the living so that we may share in his tedium. That Sisyphus is a rotter.

I must think more like Sisyphus if I am to survive retirement. Have you seen the posters touting retirement at your bank or in your financial planner's office? Happy people, walking nowhere. Happy couples, sitting on a porch, looking at nothing. It's as appealing as bed rest. It sounds good when you aren't the one doing it.

I am seventy years old, enjoying the first day of my golden years. I say this with irony. My wife, on the other hand, sees no irony. She has waited for this her whole life – or at least the last 50 years of it, she says. I think she's exaggerating because she was very busy and happy for most of those 50 years. Especially the noisy years. But yes, the last twenty or so have probably felt a bit like limbo for her. She has been waiting to live while I have been tricking a long, slow death. She refers to my retirement as heaven on earth, which is not at all the word I had in mind.

She has every surface of our home covered in travel magazines. They are opened to Alaskan cruises and Tuscan cooking classes. I would suggest the Peace Corp as a way to get out and see the world, but it is not her style. Besides, the people we went to help would probably end up having to take care of us. So not the Peace Corp, but something. Something with a purpose. Tango lessons on the lido deck with a bunch of old people, while delightful in theory, are surely on Dante's list.

I was treated to a fine retirement party by my company last night, on which no expense was spared. My wife looked astonishingly beautiful and for a moment I could imagine happiness in just being with her. This is what they want you to imagine. That you can be happy just being. It is part of the plan and is all thought up somewhere in marketing. They give you a splendid party so they can give your parking space to someone else without you making too much of a stink. They have a party in your honor and make you feel like a big deal.

They do that with sacrificial virgins, too. Oh goody. To the bonfire we go.

I would have whoever is in my parking space towed right now were it not for my lovely wife. My Persephone, my Eurydice, my Aphrodite. She deserves to live. I need to rescue her from this state of waiting, waiting, always waiting. I must remember not to look at her as we make our way toward our new life, for if I do I will succumb to the simple pleasure of knowing her and we will both be lost. People do that, you know. Wander forever, simply holding hands. You see it on those posters.

I need her to come with me because she reminds me to take my medication and she can read signs. Not signs from heaven, just regular signs. Also, neither of us can drive at night and it would be lonely if we didn't have each other.

Oh I will live this afterlife they call retirement, but I will make my own rules. I will make myself a new parking space. Perhaps I'll do it in Barcelona so my wife and I can take tango lessons on the side.

When we are ready, we will learn to play golf on the ocean's thin ice. But first, we will live.

Polite Fictions

Abstraction bloodied.

Friday, January 22, 2010

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