A Birthday for the Ages
I have been saying I am 68 years old for the better part of the year. I am not sure why I do that, but I always declare my age as the next birthday I am expecting. I have never been afraid of aging, though I probably should be. There isn’t a day that goes by that I don’t feel a full share of aches and pains, even though I do not seem to have any particularly lethal or debilitating maladies. I walk slower, but I still trudge forward up and down the back hillside. Today, I went out there after screwing around again with the life insurance companies for a few hours (that may be the worst thing I’ve experienced about aging so far and it is due to my old accountant, who was the trustee of my life insurance trust, dropping dead while he was mowing the lawn at his vacation house), and I was out there without stopping or having anything to eat or drink until I came in at 4pm.
I have no idea why I do that once in a while. Obviously I am not feeling hungry or thirsty enough to bother stopping. I do tire enough to sit and contemplate my next moves or to do some task while seated if possible, but I am, once again, a dog with a bone that simply must get buried before I can bother to think about anything else. Today, that bone was all the new Volt low-voltage lighting I ran to the Hobbit House and installed prior to putting on the sheathing (which I plan to do tomorrow). Putting up framed wooden walls that are sturdily sitting atop the railroad tie foundation I crafted and secured in place with rebar stakes certainly made me feel like a home builder. But drilling the frame and running wiring sufficient to light both the interior and exterior of my newest hillside creation has made me feel like a real construction guy. There is something about seeing the wiring threaded through the 2×6’s and terminating where I intend to install the brass fixtures, just feels very professional to me. It requires enough foresight to run enough wire into the right wall cavities to feed all the lights you think you might want or need.
This Hobbit House project seems to have intrigued Winston since he has wandered over almost daily with some excuse or other. On Saturday he heard my screwing together my wall form on the driveway, so he wandered over to see if I needed help. I actually asked if he wanted to help on Sunday, but Winston tends to keep the Sabbath holy. On Monday I did not call him and on Tuesday he admitted to wondering why I hadn’t. Yesterday, Winston brought over some grapefruits for Kim and then went down to check out my construction progress. Today, he was bringing over limes for Kim and he just looked too eager not to ask him down to give me some lighting advice. I’m glad I did, because he made at least two worthwhile suggestions that should make my project all the better. My guess is that I would have come to the same ideas sooner or later, but probably on my second try. Getting it right the first time around is particularly worthwhile when you are as lazy as I am, so I very much appreciated his input. Winston is ten years my senior, so I see that in addition to staying trim and fit, he has also lasted this long by not exerting himself with crazy projects like I do.
They say that age is a matter of mind over matter and that you are as old as you feel. Well, I haven’t figured myself out around this issue yet because I feel old and creaky when I get up, but then as I warm up, I start to feel more energetic. But regardless of how I feel in my bones and connective tissues, I trudge forward relentlessly, wanting desperately to accomplish my mission for the day. On this project I have no time pressures because I am way out ahead of my schedule. That’s what happens when you lose yourself in a task. Until those front tree trunk pillars arrive, I only have to sheath the house (that should be done tomorrow), wrap it in Tyvek, and put on the stucco wire. That and cutting and placing the beams (perhaps on Saturday) and I will have earned a rest on Sunday myself, less to head to church and more to celebrate my actual 68th birthday. This should publish on the morning of my birthday, so I will be anxious to see how much of what I predict I can get done I can actually get done. If I do all that, I will only have the 1×8” 16’ roof boards left in the garage. I can’t put them on the beams until those front pillars are up since they will likely curl up if not nailed down back to front for their full length. I’ve come too far to let that happen.
Besides, I have almost seven weeks until we head off to Italy and that should be more than enough time to finish up and make this Hobbit House very special. I got the lighting hooked up and working today, so I can already see the house in its skeletal form through the darkness. That 800 lumen LED spotlight was a good investment and missing lunch today to bury all the wires and hook everything up was worth the effort for the inspiration of good lighting. One of Winston’s suggestion was to add an interior spotlight for the new Boca Della Verita boulder on the southern wall. I haven’t hooked that up yet, but will do so tomorrow to further inspire me to finish the sheathing.
I don’t know why this last year has felt so long, but it has. I suppose I could say it was COVID, but I don’t recall feeling this way in 2020. Then again, in 2020 we were all adjusting daily and with our move and settling in, there was always a full roster of things that needed doing. 2021 was a less busy year in some ways and a busier one in others. My teaching ratcheted up considerably and I was still busy on the expert witness trail, but my project work was less about directing Handy Brad and more about doing things for myself. I feel as though my summer stay in Ithaca combined with my struggles with the University over my Homeward Bound home took a lot out of me. My plan is to repeat the summer stay and to take my trailer cross-country with one of my motorcycles in it. We will load the trailer with important Ithaca memorabilia to take back home and to genericize my Ithaca home of 26 years. I refuse to get sentimental about the house since the University has always ultimately owned it and it was never really mine. Property is never really ours anyway and we are all only temporary residents of any place we call home. Home is a much bigger concept than any house. I think I have, at age 68, become more philosophical about just about everything. I can’t stop others from being emotional about things or places, but on this birthday I feel confident in saying that I have learned that the real pleasures in my life are the peace I find with Kim every day, the pleasure I get in watching my children move forward in their lives, the sheer joy of watching my grandchildren grow, the good times we get to enjoy with our friends and extended family, and the ability to endure and feel every ache and pain that I get from working my hillside. Money, power, pride and possessions mean nothing. Many before me have come to this awareness before me, but on this birthday for the ages, I think I may have finally caught up.