Road Apples by Tim Sanders
Dec. 19, 2011
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Why seniors downsize Christmas My wife and I are Senior Citizens. We have met the legal definition set forth in Vol. 7, Subsection 46, Page 981, Paragraph 13, Item 12 of the Official Federal Bureau of Old People’s Handbook, which states, “SENIOR CITIZEN: An individual who has attained or exceeds the age of 55, and has therefore become eligible for a 20% Senior Discount at McDonald’s, with all the rights and privileges appertaining thereto, with the exception of Happy Meals, birthday parties, and bulk orders.” We are proud of our accomplishments, having moved successfully up through the ranks of Freshman, Sophomore, and Junior Citizenship. But now that we are Seniors, we’re in no hurry to graduate. Things seem to get smaller when you are a senior citizen. That is partially because your perspective broadens with age, and also because your eyesight gets worse. The 12 font print on my computer is much smaller than it was five years ago. I can hardly read it. Sometimes things get smaller because you prefer it that way. Take pets, for example. Old people like smaller pets because they require less maintenance. In November of 2009 we reported the true story of an 89-year-old lady named Selma Wilcox of Foley, Alabama. Mrs. Wilcox, for the last few months of her life, carried with her a shoe box with holes punched in the top for ventilation. She said the box contained her teacup Chihuahua, Hal, whom she kept in the box because the light hurt his eyes and people frightened him. No, wait, there’s a point to this story. In October of 2009, Mrs. Wilcox suffered a stroke and was hospitalized. When a neighbor lady went to Selma’s house to pick up a nightgown and some personal items, she heard scratching coming from Hal’s shoe box. She opened the box, but it contained no Chihuahua at all, only some pieces of dog biscuit and a very large palmetto bug, which immediately flew onto the lady’s blouse. Thinking it was a rabid flying Chihuahua, the neighbor lady screamed, threw Hal to the floor and stomped him into tiny roach pieces. I believe that when I first wrote about Hal Roach and Mrs. Wilcox my point had something or other to do with the care and feeding of exotic pets. But now what is my point, you ask? It is ... uh ... that senior citizens keep telling the same story over and over again. NO, WAIT! That’s not it. My point is that old Mrs. Wilcox probably once had a teacup Chihuahua, but decided to replace him with a smaller, even more maintenance-free pet which only resembled a Chihuahua. So she went to her local pet store, purchased a top-of-the-line, pedigreed, teacup palmetto bug and named him Hal. Where was I? Oh yeah, senior citizens and things that get smaller. Around this time of year the need for seniors to downsize becomes very apparent. My wife does most of the Christmas decorating, and gift wrapping. I learned long ago that my decorating capability was non-existent. “That’s not how you hang tinsel!” Marilyn would shout when I carefully laid several strands across my palm and then tossed them at the tree, in a very natural, fluid motion. “Just go somewhere and let me do it!” When it came to gift wrapping, my skills were even worse. The main problem was always one of dimensions. All of the gifts seemed to come in different sized boxes, and once I’d finally worked my way through three rolls of wrapping paper figuring out how to wrap that little square box, there was another one–this one much larger, and more or less oblong, with very sharp corners. Long ago she said she appreciated my efforts, but given the cost of wrapping paper and duct tape, we couldn’t afford for me to wrap any more presents. So she has persevered, decorating and buying and wrapping. And of course baking cookies. She always bakes Christmas cookies. But the decorations have become fewer, as have the cookies. And our Christmas tree is not one of the live variety. (When I was a kid, my dad would never cut down a live tree. He’d dig it up by the roots and put it in a large galvanized tub full of dirt. Mom didn’t appreciate the tub in the living room, but Dad hated to waste a perfectly good pine tree when he could transplant it after Christmas. But that’s another story altogether. In their later years, my parents simply put a plastic, two-foot tree on a table top and that was that.) And we’ve followed suit. Gradually, over the years, our tree shrunk to one of those artificial trees with removable limbs. and from there to a three-footer that sits on top of a table in front of the living room window, but looks like a regulation-sized tree from the street. I’ve gotta go now. Marilyn’s fixing some egg nog tonight. If I’m a good boy and take our palmetto bug, Biff, outside to do his business, I’ll get a whole thimble full. Of egg nog, that is. (NOTE: We are responsible pet owners. After the holidays, we’re taking Biff to the vet’s to have him neutered.) |