My water heater, my phone, and my car broke down on consecutive days. My otherwise quiet February suddenly filled with small tasks in need of my attention. Over the past week, the water heater’s been replaced, my phone’s been repaired, and I am still waiting to hear from Pete, my mechanic, about the car.
With my car in the shop, I rode my bicycle to the volunteer job I have at the nature center. It might be the first time I’ve ever ridden a bike in the winter. The roads were free of snow and ice, but the sidewalks were spotty. It wasn’t until I came upon a poorly cleared stretch along Losey Boulevard that I realized I was wearing a balaclava and a hood, but no helmet.
My days of small annoyances have me thinking about whether life is easier or more difficult with age. Until my mid-forties, simultaneous leaks to the water heater in my house and the radiator in my car would have left me wondering where the money was coming from. Now in my seventies, I have the money, but barely the energy to deal with disruptions to my routine. My conclusion is that retirement has as many rough patches as a wintry sidewalk. For every pension check that magically shows up in my bank account, there is an aching back from shoveling snow. For every day without obligations, there is the realization that even the most carefree day will not include red wine, hot sauce, or any efforts to stand up quickly. The cost of a car repair does not worry me, but I was bothered when I got home after dropping off my car and realizing that I’d left my house key on the key chain with my ignition key. I have a spare house key hidden away, but I shouldn’t have made such a basic mistake.
There are two ways to look at all of this. One comes from my friend Shu, who is an expert on the Chinese zodiac. She said, “This is just a taste of things to come. You are a horse in the Year of the Horse, so be ready for a rough twelve months. It’s also a Fire Year, and fire intensifies everything. Horse and fire come together only once every sixty years, and this is the year.” The other way is from Pete, my mechanic. He told me, “You might be the luckiest guy in the world. Your radiator should have blown when you were in the middle of nowhere on your vacation up north. Instead it held together until you got home.”
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