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- Story Listed as: Fiction For Adults
- Theme: Drama / Human Interest
- Subject: General Interest
- Published: 04/25/2022
2022DayFall (Approx. 2,100 wds.)
Retirement Day Adventures
Paul Lerner opened his eyes and looked at his bedside clock. 8:15 AM, not bad. Like many, maybe all, residents of his Northern California retirement community, Paul suffered from insomnia and living under the black cloud of Covid the past two years hadn’t helped. At any rate, the sleeping pills he took had worked last night, something they didn’t always do. Every night for us senior citizens, thought Paul, was an adventure. He looked over at his wife Sally. She was still peacefully asleep; she’d be having one of her late mornings. Time for him to get up.
After doing his bathroom business Paul, in his bathrobe, went outside to retrieve the morning newspapers As always, it was at the far edge of his walkway; whoever the carrier was must have a weak arm. Their paper, the Sacramento Bee, was a daily source of irritation; first, having to get it and then the paper itself, which had gotten thinner and thinner as its price had gotten higher and higher. He also got the Wall Street Journal, a real newspaper, so that was something.
Back inside and in the kitchen Paul went through his morning routine. He set out Sally’s juice and juice glass and her cereal bowl, then did the same for himself. Then came the morning pill-taking. For his blood pressure, Paul had to take three little pills of one kind and one little pill of another and these pills had a habit of skittering along the counter top. Another daily irritation and probably not good for his blood pressure.. Next Paul set out all of the fruit he and Sally took with their cereal---strawberries, blueberries, blackberries and raspberries---that were supposed to be good for seniors. Finally, he prepared the coffee maker. By this time, Sally was up and in the kitchen. He asked how she’d slept. She said okay; she’d as usual been up during the night to go to the bathroom and then had taken a second pill and gone back to sleep.
After finishing his cereal with all that fruit Paul took his coffee and went out to their enclosed patio to do the day’s crossword puzzle, the one good thing still left in the paper. He took his time doing the puzzle, alternately filling in a couple of words and sipping the coffee. Paul considered this the best time of the day for him, sometimes the only good time. He finished the puzzle, except for a few words, and the coffee at the same time, then glanced through what passed as the paper’s sports section. It had once reported on the previous night’s games, whatever the season was, but now came out so early the report was always a day behind so that he already knew the results, still another irritation, not to mention that what there was of the reporting there was mostly terrible.
When Paul came back into the living room Sally said that their supply of berries and also their milk was getting low and they should put in a Safeway order. “Okay,” said Paul and sat down. Sally had the Safeway app on her iPad and so they always used it to order. Sally had already put in a number of items, including the milk and all the berries, and now Paul took the iPad and tried to think of items he might want. He invariably forgot something until after they’d put in the order. He ordered some of the items he always did, couldn’t think of anything else and so they went to the checkout and thought they were done.
They were wrong. The iPad told them that Safeway had a new app and they had to use that one. Sally said she thought she’d already installed the new app. There was a period of confusion while Paul tried tapping various icons until finally he must have done something the iPad approved of and their order went through. Every day for senior citizens, thought Paul, as well as every night turned out to be an adventure.
After getting dressed Paul went to his ancient computer, old just as he was, and looked at the e-mails that had accumulated overnight. Every so often there was a real e-mail but usually it was all spam and he went down the list automatically deleting. This time there was one real e-mail, from an old friend who’d moved to a senior living place. The e-mail was to tell him that one of the residents there had tested positive for Covid and so they were in lockdown. Not good news.
Paul was finishing reading the Wall Street Journal when the phone rang. It was the first robocall of the day and he hung up. Robocalls, like spam e-mails, had become a customary part of life. At least this one wasn’t a scam call, something which they got once or twice a week to keep them on their toes. The spam calls involved the IRS, social security, some alleged problem with their Amazon account or one of their credit cards and even someone alleging to be one of their grandsons. He was old enough to remember when a phone call was a real call but now these were few and far between and when the phone rang he assumed it was a robocall and was ready to hang up. By this time he was ready for lunch.
After his lunch, Paul went out to get the day’s mail and brought it inside. He counted eight pieces of mail. Seven were asking for donations; the eighth was a bill. This was as usual. Paul once hadn’t known that so many charities existed but it seemed that he was on the list or in the computer of every one in the world.
Paul then went to his computer again. He replied to his friend’s e-mail about a resident getting Covid, ending with telling him to “stay safe.” Then he looked at his e-mails, or spam mails, which had piled up since the morning.. One was a scam mail, telling him that if he didn’t do something his Yahoo account would be shut down. He’d been getting this or similar e-mails for the last month. As always, he deleted it.
Paul allowed himself to watch one television news program a day, recording it so he could skip through the commercials, which seemed mostly to be aimed at oldsters like himself, who couldn’t sleep, had aches and pains, needed more energy, perhaps needed a catheter, had some kind of skin problem or were incontinent. The news, like the robocalls, the spam mails and the scams, was all too familiar.
The Russians were still battering Ukraine and thousands of civilians were being killed. The US was sending more help but still no airplanes. Paul had always wondered why the US had waited until the Russians actually invaded before invoking sanctions or doing anything else. It was if a neighbor had told you some bad people were going to attack his house and kill everyone in it and then you said OK, let me know when that happens and I’ll do something. He supposed that, considering what had happened with Afghanistan, Ukraine was lucky to get any help at all.
The other big news item of course was Covid, although he’d noticed that of late this was getting less and less news time. He considered what the news had told people about Covid. The vaccines would protect you but no, they really wouldn’t but would keep you from getting really sick so maybe you wouldn’t have to go to the hospital or die. That was comforting, or maybe not. Then it appeared that Covid was at a low point and most, if not all, restrictions had been lifted. However, this new Omicron variant was super-transmissable and killing at least 500 people a day. In the end, what you did to protect yourself was up to you. All very helpful. No wonder people were confused and didn’t trust anybody, especially the government.
The news was over and Paul was reading a book when he heard Sally calling him. He assumed that the order from Safeway had arrived. He got up from his chair, something that was getting harder and harder to do, and went out to the living room but didn’t see Sally. Then he heard her; she was out on the enclosed patio, on the floor. He rushed over and she told him she’d gotten outside to lift up a pot that had blown over, bent down and kept going. Luckily, she’d had a soft landing and hadn’t hit her head on anything. She’d managed to get back inside but now couldn’t lift herself up.
Paul helped her crawl back into the living room and in front of a chair but she still couldn’t manage to lift herself up. She’d had a knee replacement a few years before and that knee was okay but the other one was weak. Paul got in back of her and tried to lift her into the chair but he couldn’t do it. After about twenty minutes of this he gave up. He felt embarrassed that he couldn’t do anything but it was obvious that they needed help.
Paul dialed 911, told the operator who answered that he didn’t know if it could be considered an emergency but that his wife had fallen and between them they couldn’t get her up. He added that she was 85 and he was 90. The operator, somewhat to his surprise, took down their address and said that the fire department would be over in ten minutes. Paul put the phone down and told Sally that help was on the way. At the same time the bell rang. That was really fast, Paul thought, but it wasn’t the fire department, it as the Safeway order. A dozen or so bags were outside of their door and the driver was already getting into the car.
Paul had just finished getting the many Safeway bags inside when the fire engine pull up in front of their house. He went to the door and three big firemen came into the house, all well over six feet, two burly guys and one somewhat more slender. Paul told them he was glad to see them. The two burly ones immediately went over to lift up Sally and place her into a chair while the slender one asked Paul how old she was and did she appear to be hurt. It was all over in a few minutes and, after Sally assured everyone she was okay the three firemen left, with Paul thanking them once again.
Paul told Sally to stay in the chair while he put all of the Safeway items away. Then he sat down in the other chair and said, “So you had to create some excitement?” Sally said she just started sinking down. Paul said she better not try doing anything like that again. As he’d thought earlier, a retiree’s day, like the night, was always an adventure. At least now they knew that they could rely on the fire department coming to their rescue.
The rest of the day was an anticlimax. They shared a TV dinner that had come with their Safeway order then as usual watched some TV. Sally liked to watch any hospital show and this one had the usual plots: a patient came in with a minor problem and before the show was over was in a life-or-death situation; two doctors disagreed about the diagnosis for another patient and almost came to blows but in the end the patient was saved; still another patient didn’t want to be treated for some reason and this caused a problem; a handsome doctor and an attractive nurse (Paul had never had anyone when he was in the hospital remotely looking like them) argued over something so you knew they’d shortly be ripping each other’s clothes off.
While they watched TV Paul repeatedly asked Sally if she was sure she felt okay and she assured him that she was. Falling was one of the worst things that could happen to old people and the consequences were often dire, even fatal. It appeared that they’d dodged a bullet. When Paul prepared for bed he discovered that his left shoulder was aching. His left shoulder had been doing that on and off for several years. Maybe it was trying to lift up Sally that had set it off this time.
Once in bed, Paul held Sally’s hand briefly, a nightly ritual they’d developed. They left go and Paul reviewed the events of the day. Robocalls, spam emails, a couple of scam attempts, some aches and pains, bad Ukraine and Covid news. As he’d thought to himself several times, a retiree’s day was an adventure. Now for the nightly adventure and who knows what the next day would bring.
###
Retirement Day Adventures(Martin Green)
2022DayFall (Approx. 2,100 wds.)
Retirement Day Adventures
Paul Lerner opened his eyes and looked at his bedside clock. 8:15 AM, not bad. Like many, maybe all, residents of his Northern California retirement community, Paul suffered from insomnia and living under the black cloud of Covid the past two years hadn’t helped. At any rate, the sleeping pills he took had worked last night, something they didn’t always do. Every night for us senior citizens, thought Paul, was an adventure. He looked over at his wife Sally. She was still peacefully asleep; she’d be having one of her late mornings. Time for him to get up.
After doing his bathroom business Paul, in his bathrobe, went outside to retrieve the morning newspapers As always, it was at the far edge of his walkway; whoever the carrier was must have a weak arm. Their paper, the Sacramento Bee, was a daily source of irritation; first, having to get it and then the paper itself, which had gotten thinner and thinner as its price had gotten higher and higher. He also got the Wall Street Journal, a real newspaper, so that was something.
Back inside and in the kitchen Paul went through his morning routine. He set out Sally’s juice and juice glass and her cereal bowl, then did the same for himself. Then came the morning pill-taking. For his blood pressure, Paul had to take three little pills of one kind and one little pill of another and these pills had a habit of skittering along the counter top. Another daily irritation and probably not good for his blood pressure.. Next Paul set out all of the fruit he and Sally took with their cereal---strawberries, blueberries, blackberries and raspberries---that were supposed to be good for seniors. Finally, he prepared the coffee maker. By this time, Sally was up and in the kitchen. He asked how she’d slept. She said okay; she’d as usual been up during the night to go to the bathroom and then had taken a second pill and gone back to sleep.
After finishing his cereal with all that fruit Paul took his coffee and went out to their enclosed patio to do the day’s crossword puzzle, the one good thing still left in the paper. He took his time doing the puzzle, alternately filling in a couple of words and sipping the coffee. Paul considered this the best time of the day for him, sometimes the only good time. He finished the puzzle, except for a few words, and the coffee at the same time, then glanced through what passed as the paper’s sports section. It had once reported on the previous night’s games, whatever the season was, but now came out so early the report was always a day behind so that he already knew the results, still another irritation, not to mention that what there was of the reporting there was mostly terrible.
When Paul came back into the living room Sally said that their supply of berries and also their milk was getting low and they should put in a Safeway order. “Okay,” said Paul and sat down. Sally had the Safeway app on her iPad and so they always used it to order. Sally had already put in a number of items, including the milk and all the berries, and now Paul took the iPad and tried to think of items he might want. He invariably forgot something until after they’d put in the order. He ordered some of the items he always did, couldn’t think of anything else and so they went to the checkout and thought they were done.
They were wrong. The iPad told them that Safeway had a new app and they had to use that one. Sally said she thought she’d already installed the new app. There was a period of confusion while Paul tried tapping various icons until finally he must have done something the iPad approved of and their order went through. Every day for senior citizens, thought Paul, as well as every night turned out to be an adventure.
After getting dressed Paul went to his ancient computer, old just as he was, and looked at the e-mails that had accumulated overnight. Every so often there was a real e-mail but usually it was all spam and he went down the list automatically deleting. This time there was one real e-mail, from an old friend who’d moved to a senior living place. The e-mail was to tell him that one of the residents there had tested positive for Covid and so they were in lockdown. Not good news.
Paul was finishing reading the Wall Street Journal when the phone rang. It was the first robocall of the day and he hung up. Robocalls, like spam e-mails, had become a customary part of life. At least this one wasn’t a scam call, something which they got once or twice a week to keep them on their toes. The spam calls involved the IRS, social security, some alleged problem with their Amazon account or one of their credit cards and even someone alleging to be one of their grandsons. He was old enough to remember when a phone call was a real call but now these were few and far between and when the phone rang he assumed it was a robocall and was ready to hang up. By this time he was ready for lunch.
After his lunch, Paul went out to get the day’s mail and brought it inside. He counted eight pieces of mail. Seven were asking for donations; the eighth was a bill. This was as usual. Paul once hadn’t known that so many charities existed but it seemed that he was on the list or in the computer of every one in the world.
Paul then went to his computer again. He replied to his friend’s e-mail about a resident getting Covid, ending with telling him to “stay safe.” Then he looked at his e-mails, or spam mails, which had piled up since the morning.. One was a scam mail, telling him that if he didn’t do something his Yahoo account would be shut down. He’d been getting this or similar e-mails for the last month. As always, he deleted it.
Paul allowed himself to watch one television news program a day, recording it so he could skip through the commercials, which seemed mostly to be aimed at oldsters like himself, who couldn’t sleep, had aches and pains, needed more energy, perhaps needed a catheter, had some kind of skin problem or were incontinent. The news, like the robocalls, the spam mails and the scams, was all too familiar.
The Russians were still battering Ukraine and thousands of civilians were being killed. The US was sending more help but still no airplanes. Paul had always wondered why the US had waited until the Russians actually invaded before invoking sanctions or doing anything else. It was if a neighbor had told you some bad people were going to attack his house and kill everyone in it and then you said OK, let me know when that happens and I’ll do something. He supposed that, considering what had happened with Afghanistan, Ukraine was lucky to get any help at all.
The other big news item of course was Covid, although he’d noticed that of late this was getting less and less news time. He considered what the news had told people about Covid. The vaccines would protect you but no, they really wouldn’t but would keep you from getting really sick so maybe you wouldn’t have to go to the hospital or die. That was comforting, or maybe not. Then it appeared that Covid was at a low point and most, if not all, restrictions had been lifted. However, this new Omicron variant was super-transmissable and killing at least 500 people a day. In the end, what you did to protect yourself was up to you. All very helpful. No wonder people were confused and didn’t trust anybody, especially the government.
The news was over and Paul was reading a book when he heard Sally calling him. He assumed that the order from Safeway had arrived. He got up from his chair, something that was getting harder and harder to do, and went out to the living room but didn’t see Sally. Then he heard her; she was out on the enclosed patio, on the floor. He rushed over and she told him she’d gotten outside to lift up a pot that had blown over, bent down and kept going. Luckily, she’d had a soft landing and hadn’t hit her head on anything. She’d managed to get back inside but now couldn’t lift herself up.
Paul helped her crawl back into the living room and in front of a chair but she still couldn’t manage to lift herself up. She’d had a knee replacement a few years before and that knee was okay but the other one was weak. Paul got in back of her and tried to lift her into the chair but he couldn’t do it. After about twenty minutes of this he gave up. He felt embarrassed that he couldn’t do anything but it was obvious that they needed help.
Paul dialed 911, told the operator who answered that he didn’t know if it could be considered an emergency but that his wife had fallen and between them they couldn’t get her up. He added that she was 85 and he was 90. The operator, somewhat to his surprise, took down their address and said that the fire department would be over in ten minutes. Paul put the phone down and told Sally that help was on the way. At the same time the bell rang. That was really fast, Paul thought, but it wasn’t the fire department, it as the Safeway order. A dozen or so bags were outside of their door and the driver was already getting into the car.
Paul had just finished getting the many Safeway bags inside when the fire engine pull up in front of their house. He went to the door and three big firemen came into the house, all well over six feet, two burly guys and one somewhat more slender. Paul told them he was glad to see them. The two burly ones immediately went over to lift up Sally and place her into a chair while the slender one asked Paul how old she was and did she appear to be hurt. It was all over in a few minutes and, after Sally assured everyone she was okay the three firemen left, with Paul thanking them once again.
Paul told Sally to stay in the chair while he put all of the Safeway items away. Then he sat down in the other chair and said, “So you had to create some excitement?” Sally said she just started sinking down. Paul said she better not try doing anything like that again. As he’d thought earlier, a retiree’s day, like the night, was always an adventure. At least now they knew that they could rely on the fire department coming to their rescue.
The rest of the day was an anticlimax. They shared a TV dinner that had come with their Safeway order then as usual watched some TV. Sally liked to watch any hospital show and this one had the usual plots: a patient came in with a minor problem and before the show was over was in a life-or-death situation; two doctors disagreed about the diagnosis for another patient and almost came to blows but in the end the patient was saved; still another patient didn’t want to be treated for some reason and this caused a problem; a handsome doctor and an attractive nurse (Paul had never had anyone when he was in the hospital remotely looking like them) argued over something so you knew they’d shortly be ripping each other’s clothes off.
While they watched TV Paul repeatedly asked Sally if she was sure she felt okay and she assured him that she was. Falling was one of the worst things that could happen to old people and the consequences were often dire, even fatal. It appeared that they’d dodged a bullet. When Paul prepared for bed he discovered that his left shoulder was aching. His left shoulder had been doing that on and off for several years. Maybe it was trying to lift up Sally that had set it off this time.
Once in bed, Paul held Sally’s hand briefly, a nightly ritual they’d developed. They left go and Paul reviewed the events of the day. Robocalls, spam emails, a couple of scam attempts, some aches and pains, bad Ukraine and Covid news. As he’d thought to himself several times, a retiree’s day was an adventure. Now for the nightly adventure and who knows what the next day would bring.
###
Shelly Garrod
04/29/2022Loved your story. Yes Martin, being retired is an adventure all its own! Well done.
Shelly
Help Us Understand What's Happening
Martin Green
04/30/2022Thanks for your comment, Shelly. A better word might be misadventure but we hv to carry on. Martin
Help Us Understand What's Happening
Kevin Hughes
04/26/2022Another wonderful job Martyn,
I have been retired for 10 years – funnily enough my translation came through as "Road tired". That made me laugh as we used to call being out doing gigs: "road work." Comedians are just truckers with a nighttime show at the end.
I have to use the translation speech thing because when my arthritis flares up I can't type! Oh and just like you sometimes I miss the fact that it wrote something twice. Sometimes something I never even said. Lol
Have a great day smiles Kevin
Help Us Understand What's Happening
Gerald R Gioglio
04/25/2022Loved the story, Martin. A day in a life. But, my friend, you may want to get Admin to delete the extra copies that somehow appear over and over in the piece. Senior minute? I, for one, got a million+ of 'em. Peace, man. Jerry
ReplyHelp Us Understand What's Happening
Martin Green
04/25/2022Thanks for your comment, Jerry. What happened was that my computer didn't show that the piece was pasted but it was, more than once. Next time I'll check to see if it's there. Martin
COMMENTS (3)