The Tao of Paul

This morning it was 4:30. Not totally rational at that time so I made a pot o’ joe with Hendrix’ “If 6 were 9″ running through my head.
Found out the following:
Ted Kennedy passed at age 77. In the tradition of comments on the News site, first one brings up Mary Lo Kopechne. True style…

Lewiston Jazz Festival, Elmwood Festival, and rain in the forecast this weekend.

Two sites have become must – reads: Brian and Colin.

Until my daughter has the baby, I will have this thing about having fully charged phones next to me at all times.
Have a seriously good day y’all…

Positives – Garden Walk, festivities at the Broadway Market, Canalfest.

Negatives – Washer AND dryer both went down last night. The patio roof is leaking worse than ever.

Oh yeah – I have decided that today will be bowling shirt day at work again. Now a little coffee and off I go!

Enjoy!

“Remember the sabbath day, to keep it holy. Six days shalt thou labour, and do all thy work: But the seventh day is the sabbath of the Lord thy God: in it thou shalt not do any work…” (Exodus 20:8- 10).
We’ll skip the story of why the Sabbath switched to Sunday, Constantine etc, and and kick it off with Sunday…..

My parents took the Sabbath and added their own interpretation. That was family day. You didn’t go out and play with friends. If it wasn’t a trip to the relatives, it was stay at home in the backyard with the siblings. Badminton, croquet, plenty of reading. It was family time, and it was the law. At least until we started hitting the teen years and they would rather have the peace and quiet afforded when you let the kids out of the yard.
When my kids were younger, we were a little more lax. After church we would go over to the parsonage to visit my Dad, then off to do something, but the rigid “no friends” rule did not apply.
Now with the kids gone, Sunday is the downtime day. Breakfast, paper, putter around the house, whatever.

Say what you will about organized religion, this one rule makes sense. Face it, the 9 to 5, Monday – Friday work week is once again becoming a thing of the past. Overtime, extra days, staying those extra few minutes, are cutting into our personal time. Add in the responsibilities at home, and personal time hits zero. Heart attacks are becoming so common I bet you can name 3 people you know who have one before the age of 50.
You are a more or less finely tuned machine. You need downtime. You need preventive maintenance. You need to spend time with friends and loved ones.
You need to relax.
One day a week downtime. That’s all it takes. Unless you are working 7 days to barely make ends meet, you can do this. Your brain will thank you. Odds are that those close to you will appreciate it as well.

Countdown’s over. As of midnight tonight I will be officially eligible to retire.
After 36.5 years faithful service, I can ride into the sunset with a modest retirement check in hand.
If I so choose, and I don’t. This is the pot o’ gold that most look forward to. You go through all those years, praying that tomorrow you will still have a job to pay the bills, put away a bit for the kid’s future, and some for your golden years.
But once the kids are gone, the burden is a little lighter, the house is almost paid off, you start earning some for yourself, and what you want, as well as what you need. When that happens being a wage slave isn’t so bad. And when you hit that magic age, you ask yourself, “what next”?
And that, ladies and gentleman, is a pretty tough question. I know plenty of people who retired as soon as they could, and didn’t have something to fill the void. Heart attacks from the stress of trying to relax. Taking another job, which defeats the purpose. They turned into full time babysitters for their grandchildren, which is a pretty big pile of pressure.
When I wake up tomorrow, I will go to work because I want to. As much as I bitch, I have a boss who’s a straight up kind of guy. My coworkers are a pretty decent bunch. And I get to ride in every morning with my beloved. And when it becomes too much of a pain, I am secure in the knowledge that I can walk away with no regrets, and I will still have a roof over my head, food on the table, and coffee in my cup.

However, I am considering going in to work tomorrow wearing my sock monkey pajamas. I will bring a change for my 10:00 meeting, but dearly wish to see my supervisor’s face when I walk in.