I Don't Wanna'!

I'm an old hand at being retired, though - have been practicing for 25 years.

- Alan Liere

It's raining out there this morning. I'm supposed to meet Mike at his house to go bird hunting, but I really don't want to. It's a funny thing about rain; in the spring, I enjoy it, admiring how overnight even a brief thunderstorm will green things up and jump-start my garden. I love to hike in a spring or summer rain, but come fall, a cold rain just makes me long for a grilled cheese sandwich, a bowl of hot tomato soup and a nap. It's cold out there today, and the two inches of early snow that made tracking a pheasant fun a week ago has melted, and crossing plowed fields adds an extra five pounds of mud to each boot.

If I really needed to be as miserable as today promises, I'd forgo the long drive and go hiking barefoot in my friend's walk-in freezer. No, I don't want to go hunting at all today. I'll call Mike and tell him so.

I wonder if Mike, and another friend, Jerry, have ever considered just not going hunting when the weather is rainy. Probably not. Mike and Jerry have not been retired as long as I have. They're still making up for all those wasted years of employment. They're trying to do all the things now they could once do only every other weekend. I'm an old hand at being retired, though ― have been practicing for 25 years and have become very good at it.