My column-writing colleague Bill Sniffin – great guy, trust me on this - has been asking folks lately about the happiest times in their lives.
(If it weren't for Bill Sniffin, by the way, who brought me on board Cowboy State Daily five years ago, you probably wouldn't be reading these words today. So you can either thank Bill or blame Bill, depending on how you feel. Could go either way.)
These retirement days are the happiest in my life, because my wife and I were smart enough to save our nickels and dimes, fix up old houses, and “make do” for most of our adult lives. It helped that we're both so cheap we crawl under doors to save wear and tear on the hinges.
You youngsters out there – anyone under 65 – should know how wonderful it is to wake up every day and not go to work. No boss. No deadlines. Every day is Saturday.
The downside is that at 74 – we both had birthdays recently – you're no spring chicken, pal. And while you don't have to go to work, you're no stranger in a lot of doctor's office waiting rooms around town.
In your 70s, it's one blasted thing – ailment, test, procedure, surgery – after another. You might be young at heart, but these are your high-mileage years.
Last fall I tore the Achilles tendon in my right hind leg shoving my mower out of a badger hole.
I learned that staying off your feet for eight weeks can put 15 pounds on a guy in a flash, and that tendons, unlike muscles, take a year to heal. I still walk a little like Chester Goode on “Gunsmoke.”
Back then, the burden fell on my wife, who had to pick up “all the things I do around here,” and hauling me around town because you can't drive with your right foot in a big plastic boot.
That was then. This is now.
Last Wednesday, my wife had a total knee replacement over in Laramie, and now our friends are encouraging her to – in the colorful words of one – work me “like a pack mule” to get even.
The good news - and this came as a surprise to me – was that she had the surgery at 7 a.m., and at 11 that morning we were on our way home.
It was even faster than the aortic valve job I had two years ago, when the procedure started at 8 a.m., and we were home for dinner.
These doctors today don't mess around. Wham, bam, thank you ma'am.
My wife takes the garbage tote out to the end of the driveway on Wednesday nights, a trek of about 60 yards out, then 60 yards back. So Wednesday evening, after having her left knee sawed off and a metal one put in its place that very morning, I said:
“Does this mean you won't be taking the garbage out tonight?”
It took a moment, but she laughed.
The toughest part of her recovery so far is putting tight support stockings (I don't know who “Ted Hose” is, but he belongs in prison) on the old gal to prevent blood clots. They're so tight it's almost impossible to get them on. And you can't use your pry bar, or WD-40.
A come-along might help.
I had to wear one of those stockings years ago when I tore my quadriceps watching another guy cut down a tree (it's a long story), and I looked like Little Lord Fauntleroy in tights with that thing on. You need help to get it on, and if your helper loses her grip, pushing up with all her might, you're going to get punched right where no guy wants to get punched.
Be all that as it may, I still think these retirement years are our happiest. (Grandkids. You know.) But one thing is very important, and I'll offer this bit of advice:
Forget about trophy wives or sugar daddies or landing-the-big-one when choosing a spouse.
Try to find that one person you can always trust to do two things:
Be there when the anesthesia wears off.
And drive you home.
Trust me on this. Everything else is pretty superfluous.
Dave Simpson can be reached at: DaveSimpson145@hotmail.com
