Category: Learning

A good way to cope with bad politics?

When I started studying Stoicism just a few weeks ago, I was hoping it would help me with lot of negative emotions, and one of the big ones was how I cope with politics. Watching democracy rot from within has been horrible, but there I go already, bemoaning the state of the world when it is well outside my control.  

I’m still very new to Stoicism, so believe me, I am no expert. And I am woefully imperfect, but there is a lot to this philosophy that makes it easier to process what is happening in our country and in the world.

The most important Stoic concept for me is the distinction between what is within my control and what is not. I do not control elections, politicians, headlines or what other people think. I do not control what laws are proposed or passed, what people post online or what happens tomorrow.

What I can control is me. My actions. I control whether I pay attention or tune out. Whether I speak up or stay silent. Whether I vote. Whether I support a candidate I value or give aid to someone in need. Whether I act with integrity. Whether I let anger consume me.

Everybody thinks Stoicism is about not caring, but that’s not true. We just need to spend less energy on outcomes and more energy on our character. Honorable effort. Good choices. How we behave.

As I intepret it, we can believe what’s happening is harmful and do our part to affect it, but we can’t expect to bend the universe to our will. Lately it does seem as though it’s going in the complete opposite direction of what I want, but I take some time during the day to contemplate the pillars of Stoicism – wisdom, courage, discipline and justice. How can I use the resources of being human to stay steady and preserve my tranquility? To not let the bad stuff diminish the joy that comes from being alive?

At first that felt like surrender, but now I see it as accepting reality. And I am much calmer.

I’ve been thinking about small things. Making a call. Donating. Being kind to people. Reaching out to my neighbors. Focusing on what I can control. Do one thing and then the next necessary thing. Do what I can today and leave the rest to time.

Media consumption is another issue. I spend a lot of time reading the gloom and doom on Substack, so I deleted the app to make it harder for me to access it. I didn’t delete my account because I value some of the independent journalism on Substack, but I don’t need to immerse myself in it.

Same for the New York Times. I also made a vow not to use my phone to pass the time when I’m waiting somewhere. Instead, I pack my Kindle and read a little from my Stoic library.

It’s not a perfect solution, but it helps me.

Here are a few quotes from notable Stoics:

Marcus Aurelius

You have power over your mind—not outside events. Realize this, and you will find strength.

Waste no more time arguing what a good person should be. Be one.

Epictetus

Some things are up to us and some are not up to us.

Make the best use of what is in your power, and take the rest as it happens.

Seneca

We suffer more often in imagination than in reality.

Begin at once to live, and count each separate day as a separate life.

Philosophy 101 revisited

It has been a rough few months at our house. Dale fractured his pelvis in December, I broke my arm in January and just as both of us were recovering, Dale seems to have torn his meniscus. The medical system sucks in case you didn’t know, so a week ago he was told to rest and ice and not put any weight on it and wait for the MRI – which isn’t until next week.

The whole thing has been one big stress bomb, so I decided to shop around for a better way to cope with the challenges life throws at us. I’m 70, Dale turns 77 this month, and I don’t suppose this will get any easier. I keep wishing we could go back, that somehow this didn’t happen and certainly won’t happen again.

It turns out we can’t bend the universe to our will. I’ve spent a lot of time brooding about that. I wanted to explore a different perspective, but self-help books mostly annoy me. The chat bot recommended The Antidote: Happiness For People Who Can’t Stand Positive Thinking by Oliver Burkeman.

It’s a pretty good book, scholarly but humorous, although I still haven’t finished it. The chapter on the Stoics spoke to me as nothing previously had. Burkeman says Stoicism was invented in ancient Greece but perfected in Rome. I am a complete novice, so before you read any further, please accept my apologies if I got it all wrong.

Up until now, I didn’t have a guiding philosophy, Greek, Roman or otherwise. I took Philosophy 101 in college, and it appears that didn’t stick. If I had to guess, I’d say if anything, I was an Enlightened Hedonist … someone who pursues pleasure but is guided by reason, foresight and self-awareness.

There’s some overlap between Enlightened Hedonism and Stoicism, so it’s not like I have to ditch one for the other. But as I see it, the Hedonists are not really there for you when the chips are down. Stoicism helps you develop calmness in the face of trying circumstances.

The big wake up call for me was that being a Stoic doesn’t mean we have to be the miserable grin-and-bear-it type. Ideally, a practicing Stoic is joyful. Tranquil. We can pursue pleasure. We can have nice things. We just can’t define ourselves by those things or get too attached.

Tranquility is the ultimate goal. Not fiery electrocutions of happiness. Stoics believe tranquility is achieved by using the human power of reason to develop a calm indifference to whatever happens in life. It’s not about outcomes or whether something is good or bad.

The Burkeman book cites this example :

“A relative’s illness is bad only in the view of your belief that it’s a good thing for your relatives not to be ill. Millions of people after all get ill every day and we have no beliefs whatsoever about most of them and consequently don’t feel distressed … if you didn’t judge a relative’s illness to be bad, would be you distressed by it? The judgment is within our control.”

Whew – this stuff gets deep, and I’m just scratching the surface. To start, I memorized the four pillars of Stoicism and think about them throughout the day. Wisdom, courage, discipline and justice. The original Stoics used the word temperance for what we now call discipline or moderation.

I might reflect and ask myself, what is bothering me?  What was I expecting to happen? Were those expectations within my control? How can I use the pillars to shape a better response and stay tranquil?

The original Stoics such as Marcus Aurelius, Seneca and Epictetus are profound, and it will take years for me to read and fully appreciate their works. I’m reading bits of their stuff already, but I wanted beginner’s introduction, so I’m reading A Guide to the Good Life: The Ancient Art of Stoic Joy by William B. Irvine.  

The Daily Stoic by Ryan Holiday is another book that is often recommended. I’m on the waiting list at the library.

Yes, life is messy. I’m learning that the Stoic response is not about pretending everything is OK. It about trying to separate facts from the self-induced suffering caused by any number of emotions, including anger, selfishness or fear. The question becomes, “What part of my suffering comes from demanding that reality be different from what it currently is?”

Stoicism doesn’t ask you to like it, it just wants you to accept, adjust and do the next necessary thing.  

A Stoic’s guide to chow mein

This sounds defeatist, but things rarely turn out the way I like. There’s this nagging disappointment that follows me along like a lovesick puppy, but I always bounce back. It’s not exactly the power of positive thinking, but I remember things could be worse, and I get by OK.

But as always, I never leave much of anything alone. It was probably the chow mein noodles that sent me down the path to learn more about Stoicism, an ancient Greek philosophy that teaches us to focus on what is within our control and accepting that bad things in life is just the way shit goes down (my words).  

True learning will take some time, which I may or may not have if you believe the Stoics. They claim you should be ready for death at any moment. I admit, I’m not quite ready, and other than admitting I actually prefer to live, I don’t have much progress to report except I started reading Meditations by Marcus Arelius.

Eventually, if you want, I can put together a reading list. There are some interesting titles like How to Stubbornly Refuse to Make Yourself Miserable About Anything – yes, Anything! and Happiness for People Who Can’t Stand Positive Thinking.

But all this came after the chow mein noodles.

I’ve long been interested in cooking Asian noodles, but I didn’t know much about them. We live near a great Asian supermarket with all manner of fresh noodles, so I wanted to take advantage of a local resource. Appreciating nature – that’s another Stoic trait.

I found a couple of recipes for Chicken Lo Mein, which is what I might describe as a stir-fry with noodles, chicken, baby bok choy and a selection of aromatics. What could go wrong?

Since there’s really no such thing as lo mein noodles, you buy chow mein noodles. Sure, why not? Accepting reality is another goal here on the Stoic journey, so I quit bitching and purchased a bag of fresh chow mein noodles along with everything else I would need to make a spectacular dish.

One recipe called for cooking the noodles first. One recipe did not and the bag said to rinse them off first with hot water and then cold water. Something like that. I really really wanted to do what the bag said, but something told me not to. I went with straight out of the bag and into the wok.

Even though the noodles were “steamed” and sealed in the bag, they were quite dry and fluffy. The recipe called for 750 grams of noodles, and I will tell you now that is a shit ton of dry noodles. I stuffed as many of them as I could into the wok at the appropriate time and proceeded with the recipe.

The chicken and the other stuff was tasty, but so many noodles! And thick and gloppy. Not good. We ate what we could, and I put the rest of it along with the unused noodles down the garbage disposal. I had a hard time getting them to go down, but down they went.

The next day the garbage disposal was clogged. I went to get the plunger, but Dale said he’d do it, what with my broken arm and all. He cleared the path, and all was well. But the thing about reality, it that you never know when it will bite.

As it happens, Dale has had a minor setback on his road to recovery. Elvis the fractured pelvis is doing just fine, but Dale twisted his knee at physical therapy and now has a torn meniscus. I’ve had a torn meniscus, but you know, it doesn’t count because I’m not a man.

Anyway.

He’s having a hard time with the steps and decided to take a shower in the tiny little bathroom downstairs that we used when he first came home from the Skilled Nursing Facility. I retrieved the shower chair from the garage and went to set up everything for him, and there was this gross pile of foul-smelling crap all over the bottom of the shower floor.

What fresh hell is this? I got on my hands and knees to get a good look and all of the sudden it hit me. It was the chow mein noodles! What a disgusting mess, but I cleaned it up, with my good arm, and just prayed the drain wasn’t clogged completely.

Prayer is probably not a Stoic standard. I’m too new at this to be sure. But it seems to have worked. He has since taken several showers, and no more noodles, but my journey toward all things Stoic is coming in handy just the same.  

I mean, bad dinner and a plumbing incident. Who needed that? There’s Dale’s knee. My arm, which I broke, in case anybody forgot. Dale said at this point, how could anyone forget, a comment that at first made me mad, but then I remembered to accept good and bad with equal indifference.

Perhaps it is all as it was meant to be. See, I’m getting the hang of it. I’m once again in charge of dinner until Dale can get around a little better, but this time around I will be way smarter about everything. Slow, mindful. No more injuries for this little whiner.

And to celebrate, I’m making Lo Mein Noodles with pork and baby bok choy. This time around, I bought dried chow mein noodles at the regular grocery store, and I’m just going to do what the bag says.

Many small things

Today I bought a sewing machine. Nothing fancy. Just sewing machine, one each. I purchased it online from Costco. Price was $160. Free delivery. It’s coming tomorrow.

You might ask what I am going to do with said sewing machine, and my answer is, huh? I don’t know, but I’ve been wanting to try something new for ages. I actually do have some sewing experience, but it has been many, many moons since I messed with needles and thread.

But rusty skills was not the primary issue for me. I resisted because I thought, oh, that’s the last thing I need. One more toy. The garage is full. Why throw money at something that might not stick?

But that’s the thing with me and why I enjoy retirement so much. Very little sticks. While I envy those who find a singular purpose and excel at it, I have always been someone who tries many small things. Few of them are permanent.

It’s not that I lack focus, per se, but my focus is sequential or rotating. And it felt like time to throw something new into the rotation. Don’t worry — I’m not giving up art or cooking — just adding one small thing to the mix.

So, I told myself, start cheap. You do not need the sewing machine of the future. The Sewmaster 5000. It’s not a lifelong identity. I will not necessarily be good at this.

It’s an exploration. A hunt for creativity and fun. For provisions, my sister suggested Costco, and boom! I hunted it down and killed it with a credit card like the bloodthirsty predator that I am. She sent me another list of accessories I will need, and it doesn’t look like it will cost me an arm and a leg. Good scissors, thread, a few other niche tools.

I feel better now that I’ve decided I will never find that ONE BIG THING that drives some people to success. That quest was mostly driving me nuts. The key for me is many small things, which I guess could be put under the umbrella of keep moving, continue to learn and stay curious.

And then, of course, write about it.

Oh, well, but …

I intended to make cookies this weekend, but it proved a bridge too far. Rolling out the dough was tough on my broken arm, and then messing around with the royal icing made everything throb. Two nights of bad sleep was enough for me. Some were frosted, some weren’t. I froze them all and quit.

For me to even say that in my outside voice is shocking. I never quit anything until my knuckles are bleeding. But I am not the same person I was then. Maybe this is a good thing?

It’s not that I’m less capable because I’m older, I told myself. I’m less capable right now because I have an injury. Oh, sure, I felt better for a minute, but the reality is I’m less capable. Probably not forever, but here I am, stuck in the present again.

I used to get all spun up about plans gone awry, but aging has softened the blow of disappointment. There’s a cornucopia of sentiments the Stoics among us have shared to help frame the harsh turns life takes.

  • It is what it is
  • Shit happens
  • C’est la vie
  • Que sera sera
  • It was meant to be   

Those all seem so final to me. Like nothing good is left. My personal mantra is, “Oh, well, but…”  For me, oh, well, but … captures the fatalism of things gone wrong or things you can’t control but also leaves an opportunity for something better on the horizon. To elaborate:

Oh, well, it hurt to make cookies so I had to stop, but now I have a bunch in the freezer.

Oh, well, my arm hurts, but my legs are strong and I can walk to the freezer and get a cookie.  

Oh, well, I didn’t finish making the cookies, but I can certainly finish them off.

Recalibrating! Recalibrating!

Today marks 12 weeks since I fell and fractured my proximal humerus. That’s up there near the shoulder, so some may call it a broken arm, and some may call it a broken shoulder. I call it absolute misery.

But it’s weird that today is my accidentversary, because the pain is now minimal, I’m sleeping better and I woke up today feeling, I don’t know, brighter? On this exact day. I have not been in a good place emotionally, but something lifted. Maybe it just takes 12 weeks to feel human again after a fall like that.

Prior to my accident, and prior to my husband’s accident, which preceded mine, I seemed to be breezing through retirement. Although I like to read and cook and create art, the bulk of my time is typically spent walking, swimming and playing golf. And all those have been pretty much off the table for three months.

Although I can walk just fine, I learned the hard way the shoulder goes through some serious movement when you walk and let your arms swing naturally. For an injury like mine, that means you can’t just walk and burn off all your frustration on the footpaths.

One of my shorter routes is about two miles. I wear my sling when I start and then take it off at various junctures. I’m now doing about half of it without the sling and improving fast. I expect to walk the full two miles slingless within a couple of weeks. And this might be a pipe dream, but I’m thinking once I can do the two miles regularly without pain, I can increase my mileage and maybe even hike.

I tell you this not because it’s all about me. Think of it as a public service announcement. Nothing is permanent. Change is inevitable. Do your best to stay safe, but be prepared for hard times. We just have to keep evolving. I’m not saying I’ve been good at it, but knowing what I know now, I’ll be better at it next time. And no, I’m not planning to fall again, but there’s always a next time when it comes to bad shit raining down.

Honestly, I still feel a little lost. I’m giving a lot of thought to how I spend my time. Who I spend it with. How I present myself to the world. I’m still happy to be retired, but I feel like I need to recalibrate. You know, when you’re in the car, and you’re using the map but you take a different route, and that woman’s voice says, “Recalibrating! Recalibrating!” That’s what I’m hearing.

In one baby step forward, I FINALLY donated the last of my professional wardrobe. I had some gorgeous suits and skirts that have been sitting there for eight years.

One day I just did it, and it was liberating. Skirts be gone.

As far as how I present myself to the world, I’ve never been one to seek the male gaze, but now that I’m over 70 and invisible, it’s easier than ever to avoid that whole scene. And yes, I realize rapists and serial killers will go after anyone, but the routine sexual harassment that comes from just being young and female – well, those days are over, and I couldn’t be happier.

Throughout my life, I’ve made an effort to look the part, to fit in. Well, for the most part anyway. But with all the mysogynist rhetoric coming from the right, and so many women falling in line to look younger and sexier, I feel zero interest in living up to anyone’s ideals of what I should look like. Or how I should behave.

Fun times ahead.

Dale and I were talking the other day, and I said, you know, I feel lucky I was never sexually assaulted. There were a few times when that was a real possibility. Isn’t that something? That we have to be grateful we weren’t raped? I realize that politically speaking, women are just as vicious, and certainly some of them are sexual predators, but what is up with all these men?????

On the lighter side, I thoroughly enjoyed The Fourth Consort by Edward Ashton. It’s a fun science fiction novel, not the Dystopian drama that these days seems too real to be read as entertainment. Ashton also wrote Mickey7, which I have not read but plan to. There’s a relatively recent movie based on the book called Mickey17.

I almost went to the theater to see Project Hail Mary, another science fiction story that isn’t so bleak, but I said almost. I loved the book and look forward to seeing the movie when it starts streaming.  

While I still can’t play golf, there’s a tournament next week in my women’s club, so I thought I’d go out and help. They will need cookies, so I’m going to get started on those this weekend. I like to make the decorated kind with royal icing, and those can take days to fully dry. But they’re fun to make and so cute and delicious.

I might go through the cookie cutters today and see what piques my interest. I have insects. Ladybug, dragonfly, etc. That sounds like spring does it not?

The boulevard of broken bones

Today marks five weeks since I tripped over a power cord and broke my arm. It was non-surgical, and I’ve been wearing the sling 24/7, except for showers, etc. In another 10 days I see the ortho for an assessment. If all goes well, he will say the bone is healing properly, I don’t need surgery and I can begin physical therapy.

I will not bore you with my boring itinerary here at the boulevard of broken bones, but just so you know. It’s boring. I can’t quite get into a book even though I have several in the queue. I’ve watched a little TV. I ate a box of See’s candy. I was losing weight, but I fixed that.

I’ve been able to walk a little every day. It’s awkward but manageable. I think about Lindsey Vonn and wonder how she passes the time. She’s probably good at this, too.

Dale, who fell off a ladder right before Christmas and broke his pelvis, is defying the odds. The PT is getting him stronger and stronger, and he hasn’t used the walker in a week. He’s up and down the stairs like an old pro, and I can only detect a slight limp at the end of the day when he’s tired.

It’s too early to even speculate on what we’ve learned throughout this ordeal. There will be takeaways for sure, but right now we’re just trying to get through it. I have calmed down a bunch and no longer feel like everything is an accident waiting to happen. I even opened the door to the room where I am sleeping, as I’ve sort of moved on from that existential fear of things that go bump in the night.

My goal is to move back into the master bedroom with Dale. He’s lost weight, too, so maybe he won’t snore as much. The main reason I’m not in there now is because I have a hard time finding a comfortable position, and I guess I’d rather not have an audience.

Oh, that’s right. Dale needs to sleep. That was my real reason – always thinking of others.

Everyone assumes the biggest thing I want is to get back to golf. And that’s true to some extent, but I just want to be able to do stuff around the house like I used to. I am amazed at what I can accomplish with one arm. Still, it’s not enough to chop vegetables or maintain the household.

We hired someone to come and help with stuff, but we got rid of her after one day. She drove both of us crazy. Dale agreed to step up, and it’s working well enough. Way better than having someone else in our space. If I squint, it looks OK.

Thankfully, he can cook. We’re back to pizza on Fridays. Last week’s was sausage and anchovies. I don’t know what’s on the docket for tomorrow. Yesterday we had spaghetti carbonara with a salad. Tonight is schnitzel with marinated cucumbers and home fries. I might need help cutting mine. That was the great thing about the See’s. Just pop them in, and they’re gone.

Aside from the candy, I have been eating well. Lots of protein. I actually like cottage cheese, which is high in protein, but I got tired of it pretty quickly. I prefer Greek yogurt, which is also an excellent source of protein. Tuna, sardines – both great. I cooked up a chicken breast just to make chicken salad.

I’ve squandered many an hour on the Epstein files. I want to see Trump held accountable for something in his miserable life of crime, and I thought it might be this, but who knows? The whole thing is bigger than my brain can absorb.

Although I said I don’t have any lessons to share just yet, I will say our accidents have given me an even greater appreciation for the simple things in life. And reading about all that awfulness with Epstein and his billionaire buddies only amplifies my desire to live simply, stay healthy, eat well and enjoy the time that has been given to us.

Facts aren’t what they used to be

So, here we are on the dark side of the information age, where you read something, you find yourself nodding in agreement and then you find out it’s AI. Lying and fakery has become the norm. Truth is almost always disguised. Facts aren’t what they used to be.

What’s real? What’s not?

While I feel good about challenging lies when I’m on solid ground, most of the time it feels like everything I know is built on a foundation of quicksand.

The good news is I’ve become much more comfortable saying I don’t know. And perhaps I will be among the first to tell you this is good relationship advice. You don’t always have to be correct. My husband and I seem to do better when we just accept we’re both clueless.

Before I realized I know nothing, he would say something obviously delusional. I would correct him, and then we’d start arguing until I went upstairs to get on the Internet and prove I’m right. Then he would start questioning my sources, like Wikipedia doesn’t count, and I would find myself defending some troll who saw Elvis last night.

Then it’s all about the art of surrendering. Backing out of a firm stance. Agreeing we were both wrong. It was a misunderstanding. None of it matters, anyway. That seems to be working.

Social situations are more challenging. What with my filter broken, I can’t stay silent when people spew absolute nonsense. I might not know all the facts, but in terms of a moral compass, I know right from wrong, so let’s start there.

These are trying times, and it can be hard to know when to be quiet or when to speak up, but I think most of us figure it out eventually. One thing I’ve learned for sure is friends and acquaintances can still enjoy fulfilling lives without hearing what I think about everything.

I suppose it’s about moderation and self-awareness. Speak up when it counts, muzzle yourself when it doesn’t. My group does a pretty good job managing all that. We eat a little, drink a little, talk about what we’re going to eat next, share pictures of our animals and coo.

It’s not bad. Not bad at all.

And on that note, I leave you with Number 48.

The opposite of bored

You know the age old question for retirees. What do you do all day? If you find the idea of being bored in retirement preposterous, this post might be for you.

My thinking on this subject has morphed since I started watching Astrid on PBS Masterpiece. The show features a brilliant autistic woman named Astrid who works in criminal records and is recruited by a detective to help solve crimes. It’s French with subtitles, which I hardly notice.

Her autism bugged me at first, but I grew more comfortable with it as the series and the characters evolved. Wouldn’t it be great if it worked that way in real life? You spend some time with a person, get to know them and maybe they don’t seem so damn odd after all. One can hope.

A common characteristic of people with autism is the special interest, which is an intense hyper-focus area that brings joy and helps them stay centered. To some, a special interest may come across as obsessive, but a few of us out here might be envious.

I’m talking about we, the people, who have too many interests and sometimes have difficulty focusing. As for me, I’ve spent a lot of time and dropped a fair chunk of change on things that interested me … for a while.

Retirement changes the game. The good news is we have time and hopefully enough money to dabble, and sometimes we’re like kids in a candy store. It’s exciting to think, what do I want to try next? But then you realize time doesn’t last forever, and it’s a fixed income, anyway, so you can’t get stupid with it.

I already have plenty of interests, but every now and then I’m tempted by some new shiny object. Sewing is one. I used to jump for it, but now that I’m older and wiser, I start thinking about the start-up costs, learning curve, space requirements, time commitment – and I get stuck.

Like Astrid, do I need something to stay centered? She inspired me to think about my current hobbies as special interests. Plural. These are the activities that have stood the test of time. Instead of spreading myself too thin, I want to make the most of what I know is sustainable.

My approach to these interests is haphazard at best. I grow cannabis, for example, but sometimes my yields are unsatisfactory, and I’ve done nothing to dig deeper and find out why. Cooking is a big one, but there’s no organization or the slightest bit of discipline to my approach. The house looks like a recipe bomb exploded, and no one came to clean up the debris.

One of the joys of retirement is that you can throw rigid schedules out the window, and I relish my laid back lifestyle. That said, it’s time to focus on my special interests in a more mindful way. Pay more attention to the details.

For starters, I bought a book about growing cannabis, and it has given me good ideas for how to improve my yield. I spend an inordinate amount of time on puzzles, so I might cap that at an hour a day. Swimming is 30 minutes of freestyle, but I could easily introduce some variations to my workout.

While I suppose there’s a certain charm to being the eccentric Bohemian who dabbles in what amuses her, retirement by shiny object can be stressful. I waste a lot of time doing not much of anything because I’m overwhelmed by choices. On the other hand, I don’t want a hardcore regimen about what I do when.

If this dilemma sounds familiar, I can offer a few suggestions that will perhaps help us maximize the pleasures and outcomes of things we already do.

Does this interest make you happy? How much time are you committing? Think weekly not daily – overall, is there balance? Do you feel calm? Would you enjoy improving your skill level or technique? Can you throw some money at it? Will a schedule or some sort of organizational structure bring clarity, improve your performance or just create unwanted stress?

There will come a day when I ignore all reason and go for it, but right now I’m saying no to sewing and other shiny objects so I can properly tend to my current garden of interests.

A bridge lesson

I was invited by one of the women in my golf group to participate in a series of beginner bridge lessons in her home, and I thought why not? They say this complex card game is especially good for the aging brain. It seems to me anything that might help us dodge dementia is a good thing. I’m retired. I’ve got the time.

Today was my first lesson, and that’s an hour and a half I’ll never get back.

Perhaps I should have known. When I told Dale, he reminded me math was involved. While it’s true I picked journalism as a major because it was about the only degree that didn’t require even the most rudimentary of math skills, I thought, well, it’s a card game. How hard can it be?

Many of you probably know this already, but it’s damned hard. I won’t even go into the complexities I tried to absorb during this first lesson, but it reminded me of high school geometry, when the teacher spent an entire semester saying, “Blah, blah, blah, blah, blah.”

Because that’s what it sounded like to me.

The bridge instructor scheduled an indefinite number of lessons every Thursday at 9:30 a.m. Not bad, but not good for the retirement practice I subscribe to called, “The Slow Start.” But you know, staving off dementia, I guess I could move out faster for a good cause. Also, Thursdays at 10 is my preferred time for massages, and one must have priorities.

On the plus side, I wore jeans and my old Lucchese cowboy boots, which I haven’t done in a couple of years. At least I looked cute, and that takes a few brain cells, doesn’t it?

Bridge is interesting, and I can totally see the attraction. I generally like games. I really liked this group of women. If they had a Yahtzee league, I’m all in. I used to play Hearts back in the day, and that didn’t kill me. Backgammon. Scrabble.

But bridge, wow. I’m 67, reasonably intelligent and in excellent health. However, I don’t think I have enough time left to understand this game.

Even without the card counting and all that, there are all kinds of weird things including where you sit and what cards you play – north, south, east and west. What’s so wrong about left and right?

Sometimes your partner will show all their cards, and you play those, too. Like one hand wasn’t enough. And all these little codes to signal your partner how you want to bid. If everyone subscribes to the same convention, why not just say it in plain English? I have five spades!

I didn’t want to disappoint my friends, but I also didn’t want to pretend I’d come back when I knew it was a lost cause. While I acknowledge some stress is good for you, this is the kind of stress that makes me miserable. Rather than drag it out, I just laid it out for them. They were gracious, but now they have to find a replacement, which sucks for them.

When I got home, I told Dale he was right. Numbers gone wild! Crazy stuff! And all my Thursdays eaten up just to learn the basics? I’m pretty sure I would start dreading Thursdays, finding excuses to stay in bed, when in fact it’s a rather pleasant day of the week that has done me no previous harm.

He said, “So, you’re saying it was a bridge too far?”

The man’s still got it. 

All this is good news for those of you who enjoy reading my blog. I haven’t posted in a couple of weeks, and I had been thinking, maybe I’ll just quit writing. But that’s looking like a bad strategy now that I know bridge isn’t going to save me.   

I promised the bridge gods I would work harder at writing if they would just leave me alone.