retired

That is how I felt today: retired. And I say this without intending to load that word with positive or less positive overtones. The point is that when you are very busy -- whether you are gardening or taking care of grandkids or traveling or doing whatever it is that you put off until the day you stopped going in to work -- life feels like one long continuum of activities. I've heard people say that this feeling of constant engagement is actually necessary to maintain good physical and mental health in your advanced age and I guess I agree with that because I surely have kept myself busy. Kids, travel, gardens, cooking, writing, photography -- great stuff, filling my days so completely that when I finally sit down with a book to read at the end of the day, I always zonk out. My progress in my novel lately has been to go from page 101 to page 102 Thursday, 102 to 104 Friday, stay on 104 Saturday, put it down at 106 last night. And it's a pretty good book!

But today, I front loaded my garden chores (325 spent lily heads, snipped before breakfast!)...

(garden photos, comin' up! It's July!)

(in a far back corner of the Big Bed, these beauties!)

(they're tree frogs, I think, and they love my lilies! All frogs are carnivores and they eat a ton of bugs each day, keeping my garden free(er) of pests!)

(a clematis, going overboard!)

(Breakfast)

And I don't fuss much with dinner...

And I spend a good chunk of the day couch-sitting, reading and napping. With the occasional genteel stroll through the garden, as if I lived in a hoity-toity place where ruffled sun parasols are de rigueur.

Yes, I did break out of my stupor to bake blueberry muffins. I have a hankering for them and we surely have the blueberries and the recipe from Smitten Kitchen sounded so good! [Verdict: they are, in fact, perfect. None of that greasiness or heaviness you'll find in the average muffin. Light, with a whiff of lemon, not too sweet, and of course, no fruit paucity here. Plenty of blueberries!]

And Ed did convince me that we should do another round of disc golf toward evening...

(on the ride there: our fellow comrades)

 

 

 

... but all this is nothing! When I think of the day, I see clouds rolling in on gusty winds. I see the temperature rising to 91F (33C) by mid morning. I see my lilies, and my flower fields. 

 

 

 

 

 

And I see myself stretched out on the couch with a book. 

I would not do this every day, but it surely felt good to be so fully engaged in retirement on this hot hot day in early July, seven and a half years after I made my last trip down to my office.