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Senior Citizens, Things That Suck and Uppity Friends

   Written by on April 13, 2017 at 10:01 am
The stories in this column are true. Averett lives a dull life in rural Southside Virginia with his wife Management, two children and a rotating assortment of goats, dogs, cats, snakes and other local fauna.

The stories in this column are true. Averett lives a dull life in rural Southside Virginia with his wife Management, two children and a rotating assortment of goats, dogs, cats, snakes and other local fauna.

I have been adjusting to the fact that this July I will achieve a chronological milestone. I will officially be a senior citizen. I am looking forward to the free coffee and the other senior discounts but I am unhappy with being officially a senior. On the other hand, I still feel (and sometimes act) like a kid.  Besides I never expected to live past my 21st birthday, much less this long. I should have taken better care of myself.

My Bride Management and I decided to take the weekend off and go to the daffodil festival in Gloucester.  We are pretty easy to please.  All we wanted was a quiet weekend together.  We were going to wander around the festival, smell a few flowers, have a romantic dinner, spend the night in a cozy out-of-the-way motel and come home.

It didn’t really matter where we were; I always say wherever Management is, is Eden.  We got up Saturday morning and it was raining. Now keep in mind when I was younger I would leave home in a hurricane if I wanted to go somewhere.  I looked at Management and Management looked at me. Without saying a word we postponed the trip and went back to sleep. We spent the weekend wandering around the house and yard, smelled a few flowers, read some books, had a romantic dinner and spent the night in our cozy out-of-the-way home.  About the time we would have returned home had we gone on a trip. we turned our phones back on and unlocked the gate. It was a glorious vacation.

Once we were officially back from vacation I did a few chores around the house.  When we were building the house I installed a central vacuum system. When I was running the vacuum lines I cut the pipe, made the connections and then went back and glued them.  Everything worked great, even the free vacuum unit I saved from the trash. The only problem was even though it sucked it didn’t suck with enough enthusiasm.

Apparently I neglected to glue all of the connections and it was sucking in places it shouldn’t have been and not sucking in places it should have.  I spent the afternoon reversing this issue.  Management is delighted. She said, “This really sucks!” and spent the rest of the evening sucking up stuff.

Then a friend of ours called. He said someone had called him uppity followed by a description of his ethnic heritage.  My first inclination was to find that person and “read to him from the book.”   They should not be calling my friend names. If anyone is going to call him names it should be me.  Actually, his wife should have first rights in calling him names.  Then it would be my job to disagree with her when she isn’t around, that’s what friends are for.

The only time I couldn’t do that was when a friend of mine in North Carolina was fussing at her husband.  She explained what he had done wrong and ended it with an intense, “Sometimes you act just like a, a, a Man.”  So, what could I say to that?  I just continued to drink my coffee.  My position (until now) was that even though we were all sitting at the same table I wasn’t there.

But back to my friend on the phone, it doesn’t do any good to get upset, I just needed to locate the offending party and explain to them their error.  “Who called you uppity and why?” I asked.

He responded, “My Mother.”  Well, that certainly changes things. Who am I to even think about attempting to correct his mother?  Besides she certainly knows more about him and his heritage than I.

As I should have said, “Last week an uppity friend of ours called…”

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