Growing Old, Fairly Disgracefully!

Several months have drifted by since the other Grumpy Old Sod stopped full time employment, and now that we are home together every day, we are slipping into a retirement routine which is developing its own rhythms and pinch points. One of them is the Denial of Responsibility conversation, which runs on similar lines every time it is had, and could easily have been scripted by Samuel Beckett:

GOS1: Did you remember to bring the newspaper voucher/shopping list/bag?
GOS2: No, I thought you were bringing it.
GOS1: I thought you were.
GOS1: I brought it last time.
GOS2: So you haven't got it?
GOS1: You didn't remind me.
GOS2: I can't remind you of everything.
GOS1: You could have brought it.
GOS2: I was relying on you.
GOS1: Well I haven't got it. I thought you were bringing it.
GOS2: I thought you were   .....   (and so on.)


Then there is the I put it down there a minute ago and now it's gone observation. This can apply to a biscuit, reading glasses, a mobile, a pile of clean socks, or the sports section of the newspaper. Nobody knows, or will admit to knowing, where the item has vanished to, so in the absence of any firm and tangible evidence to the contrary, the cat usually gets blamed.

It is hard work not working. It is even harder work trying to justify it. Much time is spent looking busy, whether it be 'paperwork' (GOS2) or 'writing my novel' (GOS1). It is vital to appear to be preoccupied by something, or busy doing anything, which justifies not actually being engaged in official paid employment. Guilt? Don't tell us about it ~ we are working flat out on it here.

There are, however, plenty of up-sides: I couldn't look after Little G and Small on my own ~ I don't have eyes in the back of my head, and I'm not nearly fast enough to be in two places at the same time. And it is good to have someone to sound off to about the mindlessly stupid and endlessly frustrating complexities of everyday life. Even if, between us, we are responsible for most of them.