NEW EYES (9/07)

As we inched ever closer to John’s possible retirement, I found myself studying him, wondering how he would adjust to our new life in Wimberley. So many men of our parent’s generation did not transition well from career to retirement, and now I’m beginning to see that same difficulty amongst our contemporaries.

It’s a very hard thing to predict. My father worked seven days a week from the time he was about 14 years old. He didn’t read for pleasure, he didn’t have hobbies, and he didn’t have many close friends. The only things he did for fun were spend time with family, play cards occasionally, and take an annual fishing trip to Colorado. I could never imagine him not working, but guess what? He absolutely adored retirement! Come to find out, the only reason he never read or had hobbies was that in his entire life, he had never had what you would call leisure time. Once he was finally free to do as he pleased, he became an avid gardener, joined a bowling league, played bridge with friends twice a week, and read everything he could get his hands on - even my mother’s romance novels!

John’s father was another story altogether. He was a devoted golfer and had a wonderful workshop in his garage where he built furniture and grandfather clocks. Everyone always said George would be the perfect retiree since he had so many things that he enjoyed doing. However he loved his job as well, and seemed in no hurry to leave it. We were all taken completely by surprise when he announced one day, with no warning whatsoever, that he had taken early retirement. That was nothing, however, compared to the shock we got when he proceeded to plant his rear in his lounge chair, and gave up all of his hobbies. The mystery of his strange behavior was not unraveled until he had his first major stroke a couple of years later, and doctors explained to us that he probably had been having small ones for quite some time. Perhaps confusion at work, or near accidents in his workshop, and an effort to hide them from others, had led to the decisions he made. If only he had sought help when he first noticed the symptoms, he might have avoided, or at least postponed, the major stroke that left him completely helpless for seven years, and totally destroyed his and Theda’s plans for a happy retirement.

John surprises me continually. If we had stayed in Houston, I think he might have ended up much like his father. However, buying this house in Wimberley, in order to fulfill my dreams, seems to have altered his course even more than mine. In Houston, after our son left for college, John began paying someone to do the yard, and was content to spend his weekends in a chair, either in front of the TV or at his computer. He also spent way too much time, at least in my opinion, sleeping. Once we got the Wimberley house, the tables started to turn. Suddenly I had to make him come inside during the hottest part of the day, and I was trying to convince him that it was a waste of time to be out there digging holes for shrubs until we could be here full-time to take care of them. He turned to me in frustration one day and said “You just don’t understand! I can’t sit around doing nothing while we are here. I need projects!” All I could do was stare at him, mouth agape, and think “Who are you, and what have you done with my husband?” His activity levels aren’t the only thing to have been affected, though. Wimberley also seems to have unleashed his inner artist.

When we were first married and living in Indonesia, John bought a 35mm camera and started piddling around with photography. He even had a darkroom set up for a while, but after we had kids and his career kicked into high gear, he no longer had the time or the inclination. Suddenly, after all this time, he’s pulling out the camera again. Even more surprising, he’s hopping out of bed at dawn and running down the road to catch a shot of the mist rising off the creek, or he’s tearing off in the car to go back to a place he spotted the day before, hoping that the light will be better this time. When I was driving us back to Houston last week, he was dozing in the passenger seat next to me. When he awoke, he caught a glimpse of some clouds through the window, and suddenly he grabbed his camera, rolled down the window, and became completely engrossed with snapping photos of some formation that had sparked his imagination. I just smiled, and said “You’re looking at the world with brand new eyes, Babe!”