Thursday, February 6, 2014

Saving Lives

I was reading "Hitch 22" and choked on the phrase "Dickensian old age" that Hitchens used to describe poverty stricken, back breaking elder years.

Many of Dickens' characters struggled with poverty, hunger, and cold; their lives were daily battles to survive.

This is the fear that gnaws at my diseased brain as I and the wife approach 70.

We have no retirement and social security buys  a loaf of bread and a cup of tainted water.

If our circumstance does not change, we will be working until the day we die.

Which I refuse to do, by the way.

I also refuse to become the diaper wearing dad whose kids get to soil their hands on their father's feces.

Presents a bit of a pickle.

I have to make something happen if we are to enjoy even 30 seconds of retirement before we become fertilizer.

That's a load, baby; a lot of pressure.

Especially at the age of 60.

Ain't nobody looking to hire a 60 year old. You walk into an interview and the receptionist starts chuckling behind the hand that she quickly raised to her mouth to pretend she was coughing. She lies and tells you that Mr. Bronstein is not in then, when you leave, she walks into Bronstein's office and laughingly says "I did not know the guy was a goddamn dinosaur."

It all comes down to independence. Independence in reality is the only way to enjoy a fulfilling life. As long as you work for someone else you will be manipulated, lied to and abused and eventually kicked to the curb.

You will be forced to grovel for benefits and then have your access to them narrowed over and over again by changes to the Godly policy and procedures manual.

So independence is the key. A lesson hopefully learned early in life.

It is a bit daunting to realize at the age of 60 that your only hope of survival, a comfortable survival, is independence.

Life has a nasty way of catching up to you. The one thing I will say about those pretentious financial planner ads that stress planning for retirement - they are dead on right. Because life blows by and when you get to a certain age nobody is going to help you. Society would prefer that you just die and decrease the surplus population.

But the times they are a changing. There are opportunities out there to achieve independence, more so than ever before. With diligent research, determination, a little luck and a little talent, you can probably find a way to at least bring in additional income to supplement social security and whatever else you got going on.

With a lot of luck maybe you can find a way to become independent.

There is an AARP commercial that depicts successful elders and sells the whole thing with the slogan "Not everybody peaks in their twenties."

I dig that. I have to dig that. My back is to the wall and I need to grab on to whatever presents itself as hope.

The next 10 years of my life and Carol's life are critical. In reality, the next couple of years are crucial. We need to get the ball rolling ASAP to even have a chance at a few good years.

No pressure.

I am hopeful.

This is no time to give up. Breaking away from society's stifling rules and regs, even at our advanced age, would be sweet icing on the cake of life.

I'd love to sit and chat but you will have to excuse me.

I have to save a couple of lives.

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