As I was sitting in my office this morning, going through tons of work and trying to process the impossible complexity of trying to figure out when/if to ever retire, how/when to sign up for Medicare and how/which Part B provider to pick –should I live that long – the phone rang.
Daughter #2 (Allison).
What followed what a joyous description of a romantic evening here and he squeeze are planning. Apparently, they’re going out for Sushi, which is fine, but I bit my tongue and didn’t ask about the radiation monitor.
Then came the revelation/capper. “Then we’re going on a Zombie-Paintball-Hayride!”
Well, I’ll be damned. I’d never heard of such a thing. Apparently, people dress up like zombies, ride in a hay wagon, and shoot at things with their paintball guns, being careful to conserve ammo.
Talking with Elaine about it, a few minutes later, E wondered “What kind of Life is that training kids for…???”
And before I could hold my tongue (its kinda slippery, anyway) I blurted out my latest Truth du Jour!
“Remember dear, when we were young, it was cowboys and Indians? Well, we can’t do stuff like that anymore. Political correctness and all that. So I think the Zombies are a kind trans-national, non-racially specific (it’s OK, therefore to kill them) general-purpose social archetype!
It’s only a matter of time before the Sven and Ole and Ole & Lena jokes are retooled into zombie-names…It all makes so much sense now!”
This may not seem like a huge mental breakthrough, but I had another one earlier in the day, too: That was the realization that when my magazine subscriptions changed from Playboy, Penthouse, and Hustler, to the AARP Newsletter, Woodworker’s Journal, and Pilot Getaways, it hinted at a major change in the seasons of life.
A few minutes later, we watched from the kitchen window as our hunting season refugee deer population moseyed through the yard heading for the high brush around the creek. We don’t allow hunting here, and out neighbors do only two for the freezer, and they’re taken with a bow, so it’s real skill. So it’s a kind of 200-acre preserve amongst us.
You know it’s not a bad weekend when three odd chunks of reality come along and line up so as to make just a little more sense.
Still, the Texas white-tail deer season opens the same weekend as daylight time goes away (Nov 2/3) so not everything makes sense, but at least my list of things that don’t is getting shorter. As long as I don’t look at a New York Times, Drudge, or the WaPo….