Occupation

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Many people are shopping for swimsuits or mowing their lawns for the second or third time while I find myself dwelling on the notion that it will not be long before the daylight hours begin to grow shorter, barely perceptibly at first, and once Independence Day has passed all but a sliver of hope has been dashed. Time accelerates and there is a blurry remembrance of pleasant activities taking place on wonderfully sunny days. In the blink of an eye garden hoses and tiki torches are whisked from the shelves and replaced with witch costumes and apple cider. By the middle of August, the time of year called the dog days by the blindly optimistic, I have long since said goodbye to summer and taken to brooding over the long shadows of the low sun. Some may still go fishing or boating or laying about in the sun, but I am found sulking in the dimness of my garage taking in the heady commingled tang of lawn fertilizer and charcoal starter that all too soon will be quelled by the stench of smoldering leaves.

Perplexingly, there are many who seem pleased to have summer over with. You see them, slaves to marketing and the pressure of peers, sporting the latest fall fashion on the last 90 degree day of the year. Clammy in stylish jackets and oblivious to their own folly, they are the ones who stealthily snicker at my rational ritual of wearing short pants well beyond the first subfreezing day of the year. If the world were a fair and just place where reality could be easily rendered from pretense and fantasy I would gladly wager the righteousness of my shivering against the vanity of their perspiration.

After the leaves have curled and blown to the ground below, the first flakes of snow are not far off. They foreshadow dreary days ahead and woe for me. Snow is for towing companies and orthopedic surgeons, and though I have to date personally remained unscathed and intact, the icy specter of winters empire is always hovering to threaten dealings with an arch-browed insurance agent or the probability of hobbling on crutches. I have no use for snow and do not find any amusement in it or see it as a source of entertainment. The prettiness of it lasts until trucks drop salt and children stomp across the lawns. It is in general at least as vicious and bothersome as it is peaceful and benevolent. And there are those who hope to see snow on the ground when Christmas arrives. I have no shame in saying that I have as much use for Christmas as I do snow. If this sounds harsh, hear me out.

It is not religion or conspicuous consumption, neither of which I comprehend, that puts me off. It is the hellish pace of the thing that turns me away. A two month frenzy of promotion, demanding, hinting, anticipation, guilt, hurried indecision and veiled disappointment comes to a point and then implodes into a mass of crumpled paper and junk soon to be relegated to the backs of closets or bottoms of toy boxes. Don’t be shocked though when I tell you that I participate in the celebration. This is partially out of a sense of tradition; but mostly because I am surrounded by children who are not yet of an age to have formed their own honest opinions. I am not so cold hearted that I would deny them the joys of their peers and those in the family who revel in the “spirit” of the season. For this I consider myself to be selfless and in return for my gracious act those around me who know of or sense my true thought do me the good turn of not holding me out as an object of scorn. It’s a challenge and an art but I generally manage in keeping myself tolerable to most people.

I even grudgingly take my wobbly ladder from the garage to reluctantly hang Christmas lights. I do the best my heart allows me to do, but they are never as straight or well placed as those of my neighbors. There always seems to be several strands that will blink when they aren’t supposed to or do not blink when they are. The children notice this and make innocent remarks that unknown to them are hurtful and make me question my manhood. By now I have established a record of twinkly ineptitude and fear the final act of my life will see me sliding from my rooftop clutching a stubborn string of lights. Of course I will be buried on a snowy and bitterly cold day with a hastily found preacher telling the few assembled to see me off that my last words were “… but then, I was the one who never broke a bone.” Along with his own kind words, “He wasn’t as he bad as he put on ... and will be remembered for his yearly display of Christmas lights.”