Walked into the waiting room, looked around and figured I was the youngest man in there by at least 20 years and tried not to roll my eyes.
“Wilner, if you are in the right place, you might be middle age” and then answered my own remark.
“Yeah JW, you are getting damn close.”
Made a mental note to call Mr. Jackson, my associate from the first day of kindergarten and typically the only person who ever calls me J.W.
If you are the sort who keeps tracks of who owes a call to whom you would say that Mr. Jackson owes me a call.
Can’t tell if we spoke on his birthday or just after it has been three months and we might go another if I reach out and touch someone. I’ll text him now and ask him not to let an ongoing senior moment prevent his having the pleasure of engagement.
When we lived in the old neighborhood sometimes I’d knock on his bedroom window around 2 AM and tell him to stop being an old man and get up.
He usually did.
Anyhoo, my text will read “I am not dead and no one else is. You’re too young to be sleeping before 2 AM on a school night.”
Forty-eight years of friendship provides certain benefits that exceed the privileges bestowed by Mastercard or however that ad campaign went.
I Never Know What You Will Do
The younger Mr. Wilner is working an early morning shift which means I sometimes hear him preparing for work around 3:30 AM.
After my appointment at the old man’s doc I stopped by his place of employment to deliver a message. Someone rudely interrupted us so I gave them one of my favorite smiles and then chuckled when they took a step back.
It is a smile that Mr. Jackson is well acquainted with. He describes it as the “I never know what you will do when I see it.”
The younger Mr. Wilner says that it is the one I use to get a reaction and that once I get it I have one. “Dad, you use it to mess with people.”
I laughed and said it is usually only with people I like. I have a different look for the others. That is mostly true, if I find you to be troublesome I might bestow it upon you and see if I can send you on a different course of action other than irritating me.
It is all about people management skills.
****
Told the doc I am grateful his hands aren’t as big as mine but he didn’t laugh. Probably not the first time someone has said it to him.
Closed my eyes and started to laugh because I remember Grandpa Wilner telling me to pay attention to whether the doc used one hand or two for this particular examination.
Dad was there too and we all laughed and then grandpa shared a couple of stories about some of the army docs he encountered during WWII.
I heard myself grunt and reality brought me back to the present but I didn’t make any cracks about having had a more loving TSA agent or encounter with a police officer though I wanted to.
Call that my way of managing an uncomfortable moment. Got a clean bill of health and almost did a little jig I call the “almost middle age dance” but didn’t.
As I walked out the office I caught a guy staring at me so I pretended to walk bowlegged for a moment cuz sometimes that ridiculous juvenile humor does it for me.
****
Back the younger Mr. Wilner’s place of employment I asked if he had received a significant raise or found a bag of money. He said no so I shook my head and told him I was going back to work.
“Guess I am not retiring today.”
Writing The Night Away
Been writing the night away because the words have been flowing freely and when they come on this way only a fool ignores it.
Moments like this are made for painting upon the page without concern or regard for what comes with it. People can read or not read and interpret it however they like.
Sometimes you can be the arsonist, the artist and a half dozen other things depending on who is reading your words.
And when you get good news sometimes you do that little dance cuz it proves that you are just as vibrant and alive as ever.
Though I admit I did a double take when I realized my aunt is turning 80 in a couple of months. I remember the 80th birthday parties for my grandparents, it sounded pretty damn old.
Still sounds old, but maybe not as much as it used to.
Reminds me, I need to call my middle sister and tell her that she is pretty darn close to being old enough to move into one of those retirement villages. She loves having her older brother fulfill his brotherly duties.
She is about to become an empty nester which is pretty damn weird.
****
I have got a week of vacation I have to take and am beginning to think about what to do with it. I’ll be heading out to Austin, Houston and various other parts of this fine country for business meetings so part of me likes the idea of just hanging out.
But if I had my druthers you’d find me on a beach. I always hear the call of the ocean and could use some time there. Sometimes being landlocked gets old.
Think it is time to wrap this up and go touch up some other pieces elsewhere cuz unfiltered and running with Mr. Mischief is the mood of the moment.
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