Moving Downhill
A year, any year, has always felt like it runs on a bell curve. Cool, short days start the year, long hot days fill the high middle, cool, short days end it. September was always the tipping point, the beginning of the downhill slide into December. It was time for football, hunting, and the holidays–Halloween, Thanksgiving, and Christmas. The four months of fall were action packed and sped by unbelievably fast.
But I’ve slowed my roll in recent years. I stopped hunting long ago, and I finally gave up my season ticket to Houston football this year. With the wife gone and the kids grown, two grandkids grown and two grandkids out of state, the holidays are slightly impersonal. Halloween and Thanksgiving are celebrated with friends and the neighbor children. And while I still decorated for Christmas after my wife died, I fled the state last year, and didn’t even decorate the house. I spent the holidays with my daughter and her family.
From the perspective of old age, almost everything I did in those fast fall months was about spending money, keeping the economy moving. It’s a relief to be off the treadmill. Of course, stepping back, as I have, is probably why I’m an undesirable demographic. No one advertises to parsimonious old men. Oddly enough some people might see this as a sign of depression and decline. But I still like people, and I still like doing, and the holidays are still fun. I’ve simply shrunk the numbers and built in more space in an effort to better savor this fine wine called life.