For men, one of the many joys of getting older is the challenge to grow a huge, award-winning prostate. Mine’s the size of an avocado. Florida, not California. I walk with a distinct cowboy saunter, as if I’d been riding horses all my life. Fortunately, I have my VA doctors available to certify the winning size of my flesh avocado located between the troublemaker and the waste factory.
I’m used to having to pee every few minutes, anywhere, anytime. There’s usually just enough time when I leave the bathroom to turn off the stove, and circle back again. The Publix parking lot works great too, even though I just left their men’s room. Trees interspersed on grassy islands. No problem. Five times at my AMVETS club before I leave. A quick stop at the park on the way home. Pulling into my driveway, there’s usually not enough time for me to get inside, so the hydrangeas get watered. It’s another way to give the lady who walks by with her nasty little Pomeranian just one more thing to huff about. She’s old so I’d expect a little more understanding. Actually, she walks a bit bowlegged too. That may be a pound or two of prolapse she’s carrying around.
So my VA nurse set an appointment for me to come in and test all my fluids. I told her not to wear her good shoes, you never know when a distraction may cause her to lose focus and turn back to see me splashing the floor. Saves her a paper cup anyway.
Turns out they want to plant a mini-atomic bomb right between the troublemaker and the waste processing plant. Much as that sounds like great fun, I told them to just take it all, like a woman with minor cancer in one breast who gets a double mastectomy, I’ll simply never have to worry about it again.
So I’m going to have all of my man parts removed, be like a Ken doll. But I’ve got one step more in my quest to turn lemons into lemonade.
I’ve been perusing outfits for older women on Amazon Prime. Cute and practical. I see a whole new world of possibilities on the horizon.
Carla will flourish with a female roommate. We can scrapbook in our jammies all night, maybe get facials, mani and pedi appointments side-by side before we go shop for shoes…
The grandkids can look at old pictures and point out grandma…and grandma.
hugh maverick haller
Thursday, January 30, 2025
Lemons to lemonade...
Thursday, January 9, 2025
WHAT HOUSE DID YOU GROW UP IN?
Saturday, December 14, 2024
AMVETS SALVATION
Being around
a lot of people for all of my working life, co-workers and customers, I learned
to behave as an extrovert. Got good at it. But as a card-carrying introvert, I
need more down time, more alone, recovery time, than most.
I’m the guy
who goes to a party and wonders how soon I can leave. Most people dream of
their upcoming vacations, leaving home for destinations they believe will take
them away from their daily lives, far from home. The grass is greener syndrome.
Not for me.
Home is my happy place, warm & reassuringly familiar. On vacations or
family get togethers, I love seeing everyone, but I’m always counting-down the
days, happy when it’s time to head back. Home to my lair.
In full
retirement five years ago, I mostly looked forward to not having to leave the
cave at all.
That became
unhealthy on many levels.
When Carla
was out working, I started drinking too much. If she was out of town on an assignment,
I often went several days without hearing any other voice than my own, talking to
the dogs. A little step into crazy town. Knowing it had to stop, I banished alcohol
from my own house, and decided to try a different approach. That’s when I wound
up at our local Amvets club, a veteran’s group, with a bar. One, maybe two
drinks and out. That’s been almost every day for the last four years.
But here’s
the thing I didn’t expect…it was the people there that saved me. The comradery
of a familiar group that comes from all walks of life. A Bell curve of varied lifestyles, beliefs and approaches. So
refreshing. Very quickly our differences fade into the background as our common
ground, Veterans, and community, takes the stage.
A few
drinks, some laughs, the football game, poker, bingo. The bright machines with
flashing lights that call out to people looking for a little Vegas action. Old
reruns of Wagon Train over here, Pandora country music over there. Didn’t that
guy go on to star in Gunsmoke? Checking in on how the knee operation went,
maybe a new house or dog. I’m sorry to hear about your brother.
Congratulations,
support, sympathy, friendship.
Excited that
the oyster roast Ed pays for out of his own pocket every year is coming up
soon. A Christmas dinner today. Karaoke laughs every Saturday. The bingo, the
endless dishes that the ladies group puts out for every event…all more nourishing
than just food or drink.
It's family,
and at this point in my life, on the day-to-day, it’s my fresh air and
sunshine, even though it’s inside a darkened bar that smells of smoke. Swapping
the latest stories, going for a laugh…it means everything to me.
Many, many
thanks to my AMVETS group. Humanity without division. We’re all more alike than
different.
I needed
that.
Can I buy
you a beer?
Friday, November 1, 2024
Note to Orlando
Orlando
2:51am.
Coffee, a Trulieve chocolate drop, bustling about in the kitchen, gathering ingredients
for sweet potato chili. Set the crock pot on low for eight hours or four on high. You know the drill. Alexa playing old
Moody Blues stuff. Thinking about Brooke being gone, remembering a time we all
shared so many years ago. It seems I generally entertain the same memory points,
ones I’ve revisited for 50 years, the rest of it streaked and unclear, a dirty
window to a familiar but unspecific swirl. Another cosmos far, far away.
Maybe I’ll kick it up a notch, Oye Como Va! Images of you turned to the record player, bellbottom jeans sweeping an acrylic carpet made of orange sandpaper.
There was a cigarette machine at the bottom of our stairs. It came as a surprise to me recently when I realized that I hadn't seen one in years.
Peace & Love my friend...
Wednesday, May 22, 2024
Rumspringa
A friend in his 70’s was patting himself on the back for having
completed a few days of productivity. He was proud of acting like a responsible
adult, actually getting shit done. Apparently riding a wave of “fuck off” days
as he called them, is more his norm.
A good boy, but only briefly.
That made me smile with admission of the fact that after I
fully retired four years ago, every day for me is a “fuck off” day. Never
inserting a “responsible adult” day, I’m like Snoopy lost in dance.
A permanent Rumspringa.
Sore from pinching myself about today, the only productivity
day I’ll even consider, is tomorrow.
Satchmo sings in a never-ending loop:
“I see skies of blue, and clouds of white
The bright blessed days, dark sacred nights
And I think to myself
What a wonderful world”
If I had known it was going to be this good, I would have
retired in my twenties.
Friday, January 5, 2024
“We got married in a fever, hotter than a pepper sprout.”
Tuesday, December 26, 2023
Family Ties...
I try to
please her most of the time, but it's not enough. Her need is more visceral,
deeply imbedded by shared DNA.
Best I can
do is to take her to the source of her longing, watch her drink deeply of that
linear connection, past, present, and most importantly, future.
Carla's
active mind drives her too hard, too fast. Exits and opportunities blur. But
not here, not now.
These peak
moments allow her to pause and be present, completed by a human connection as
old as our species itself, a bond that answers all questions of purpose and
path.
Peace.