Archives for July 2019

Back at the Ranch

July 30, 2019 By admin

The more things change, the more they stay the same. At least that might be true when it comes to the housing of choice. Baby boomers are turning to ranch homes for the convenience and compactness. It’s a manageable size for retirement and that means they can keep their freedom and independence.

That’s just a bit ironic since the ranch home traces its roots to the old west, when early homesteads were made of adobe and then later inspired by the Spanish-style homes popularized in California circa 1920. Easterners grew fond of the unpretentious look and the affordability was very appealing. Around 1950, nine out of every ten homes in the United States were ranch homes.

So early settlers to the frontier and beyond were looking for freedom and simplicity and more than 100 years later, baby boomers are attracted to ranch homes for the same reasons. Living on one level often required larger lots back in the day but that’s not necessarily true now. The sprawling ranch homes of the 50s have become more compact and efficient, but the outdoor lifestyle in still key. Most new ranch homes have multiple egress to the outside for outdoor kitchens, dining and recreation. Swimming pools and hot tubs are also popular with baby boomers. The U- and L-shape configurations are still desirable because they offer more privacy for the outdoor space, especially important now that ranch homes are cropping up on smaller lots.

For further irony, even millennials are attracted to this home style and are competing with boomers in the real estate market. For a millennial, the moderate cost is a big factor but so is the nostalgia, as many of them grew up in this type of home.

Maybe it’s time for you to saddle up. Put some horseshoes on the wall. Get one of those cowboy silouettes…you know, the kind where the cowpoke has his boot up leaning against the wall and his hat pulled down low in front. A longhorn steer skull hanging on the wall could also work. Sure won’t look like assisted living.

Jay Harrison is a graphic designer and writer whose work can be seen at DesignConcept . His mystery novel, Head Above Water, is available on Amazon and Kindle. You can also visit his author page here .

Day at the Beach

July 30, 2019 By admin

Is a drive to the beach for a dip in the ocean the ultimate road trip? Yes, when it’s 5,000-miles.

Yes, when the last 400 miles are a pot-holed dirt and gravel road.

Yes, when it’s the Arctic Ocean.

Mike Lizonitz, 67, and his wife Patricia, 66, made the trip from Pennsylvania in their Kia Sedona, modified for car camping with a memory foam mattress under a homemade shelf for gear storage.

It was, Mike said, “Our last great road trip. We’ve driven to 48 states. We cruised to Alaska from Vancouver, but we’d never driven there.”
Mike said they didn’t feel their trip really began until they reached Mile Zero of the Alaskan Highway, 2,700 miles from home.

The Alaskan Highway is a 1,387-mile, two-lane blacktop, from Dawson Creek, British Columbia to Delta Junction, Alaska, near Fairbanks. Mike and Patricia car camped for $8 a night, stopped to visit Santa at the town of North Pole and left their mark at Watson Lake Signpost Forest in the Yukon.

At Fairbanks, they rented a 2017 Ford Escape specially equipped with full extra spare and donut, tool box, CB radio and medical kit for life on the Dawson Highway, the last leg. Dalton highway is a 414-mile dirt and gravel industrial road, riddled with potholes and without cell service. Facilities are spartan and spare, there are no gas stations or basic services on the last 240-mile stretch. The terminus is Deadhorse, an oil camp, at Prudhoe Bay.

Taking a day and one-half each way, Mike and Patricia spent the night, though never fully dark, at a self-serve campground sleeping in the rented Escape. The Dalton follows the Alaska Pipeline. Three quarters of the distance is forested, until the “Last Spruce. “Ahead was a vast grassland of the tundra.
Most of the traffic was semi trucks which kick up gravel, dinging windshields. They saw only two private vehicles in 400 miles. At Deadhorse they took a shuttle bus to the Arctic Ocean. Mike waded into the Arctic to his calves, while Patricia dipped her toes in.

It was a trip only 10 of 10,000 visitors who reach Fairbanks complete.

They gassed up at Deadhorse at an automated pump station, paying $5.49 a gallon. They spent $2,000 on gas for the entire trip.

They got back to Pennsylvania after traveling 9,997 miles in three weeks.

Jack Smiles is a feature correspondent for Times Shamrock Communications in Pennsylvania. He was born in 1947.

Going It Alone

July 30, 2019 By admin

My dad used to tell me about growing up in the 1930’s when you could invite a passing stranger into your home for a meal and a night’s sleep without any concerns for your family’s safety. This same dad tried to dissuade me from going to Ecuador, warning me that there are plenty of people in the world who might be looking to hurt or kill an American woman of a certain age traveling alone.

The fact is I’ve always been a bit of a loner. I could blame that on my nomadic early life as an army brat, always the new girl in school, never really sure of where I came from or where I belonged and forever the outsider. Or perhaps it’s the selfish streak that won’t allow me to waste precious time accommodating others or compromising my agenda. It could be that it was just the practical thing to do: I wanted to go to Ecuador, so I did it.

As a new retiree, I had done a lot of reading and learned that I would get a lot of geographical and cultural bang for my buck in Ecuador as there was an amazing amount of diversity in a limited area. Several distinct indigenous peoples, the influence of Spanish colonialism, the volcanic mountains, the jungle, the beaches, Quito’s urban sprawl, and perhaps the last “undiscovered” places on earth. And the wildlife. Holy Capybara, the wildlife!

Most compelling of all was the strange cultural duality of the place. It was at once rich and poor. Straightforward and complex. Rigid and freewheeling. From the very first day, I knew I had placed myself directly in the path of some unnamed yearning that had existed for me all my life.

I’m still not sure why I wanted to go to Ecuador but what I found there was a genuine welcome by a proud people eager to show me their country and their cultures. I found insight and enlightenment. Above all, I found personal freedom and the amazing sense of peace that comes from being “off the grid” if only for a couple of weeks.

Linda Caradine is a Portland, Oregon based writer, traveler and animal lover.

Bon Fire

July 15, 2019 By admin

Nobody wants our stuff. Face it. Maybe you’re looking at them right now — the nicknacks and tchotchkes that are collecting dust on the mantle, piano or bookcase.

No one wants it. Not the dishes, not the furniture, not even the antique rocking chair, and especially not the figurines.

Millennials and GenXers just aren’t that sentimental about our “valuables” and even if they wanted some of it, they don’t have the space. Besides, their collectibles come in a digital format and they can store it all on a flash drive.

Thrift stores and estate sales are loaded with boomer cast-offs but they are just collecting dust. Still. They were collecting dust when we owned them and they are doomed to continue collecting dust. Go to any yard or estate sale in an older established neighborhood and you can see for yourself that our stuff is going begging. Lladro porcelain? Big deal. Even the people who know what it’s worth don’t want any more of it. A vintage Ridgeway grandfather clock? Where would anyone put it? An Apple watch does so much more. Beautiful sets of dishes, and when I say set, I mean service for 12? No one is feeding 12 people anymore and if they had 12 people over, it would be for finger food.

Look up some of these things on eBay and you’ll see acres of listings posted by desperate boomers. Their best customers may be other boomers who just can’t give up the hunt for more treasures.

I don’t care what Marie Kondo says. Holding on to what sparks joy isn’t really generating much joy and the next generations are getting absolutely no joy from baby boomer possessions.

At the risk of sounding like I’m encouraging arson, certainly one option is to put it all in a big bonfire. Or you could take it to the landfill, where the bonus is that you get to meet the most interesting people there. These options make more sense than waiting for millennials to come around and decide that these treasures are worth keeping. Won’t happen in our lifetime.

Back then to a bon fire.

Score

July 15, 2019 By admin

Retirement reduced my exposure to annoying situations, but it’s hard to avoid them completely. I recently played golf with a woman who announced she was extremely sensitive to sounds. She had rabbit ears and could hear even the tiniest whisper, requiring absolute silence when it was her turn to play. Even the rustling of a potato chip bag was terribly disturbing to her.

I got paired with her again a few weeks later, and she got into a snit about scoring. Rules for the women’s golf club events are rather persnickety. We all keep each other’s score, and you have to capture that information at the end of each hole played.

Around the fourth hole, she got a little huffy about our process for swapping scores and announced her demands for how it would be done going forward.

Good thing I spent my career learning “advanced” communication skills to get through challenging scenarios without injury or lawsuits. Please select the best response:

A) Thank you for sharing that. Let’s collaborate when we get to the next hole and get some consensus on a win-win solution.
B) I appreciate your perspective – and to build on that – I recommend we circle the wagons on the next hole and get input from the rest of the team.
C) Great idea! Let’s pulse the team and see if everyone’s on board.
D) Who died and left you in charge?

I chose D, haunted by the voice from the ethics videos we used to watch, “That is not your best choice.” Still, shit like this goes on in my head all the time, but I’ve learned to suppress it. Even on the golf course, I allow myself to be bossed around because it’s easier than conflict.

When we got to the next hole, she said, “Did you just ask me who died and left me in charge?” I said, yes, I did. She never spoke another word to me.

I hope I wasn’t too much of a jerk, and I hope I’m not put to the test again any time soon. However, it’s kind of interesting how it turned out. I shot my best score ever. What’s up with that?

Donna Pekar is an aging badass (for real) who lives in California and writes Retirement Confidential.

It’s Smokey

July 15, 2019 By admin

In the early 80’s, I was playing with the Bernie Pearl Band and one night we opened for Smokey Wilson at The Music Machine out on Pico on Los Angeles’ Westside. Smokey was a real showman; he fronted a 7 piece band with a horn section and sported a powder blue 3-piece suit with a cowboy hat to match. He’d hit the stage after his band warmed up the audience with two or three tunes.

In those days, Smokey traveled in a trailer. At some point during Bernie’s set, my girlfriend Lynda took him out there for a little taste. I don’t know how much of our set he actually heard but when we came off, he told me he liked my playing and invited me to sit in for his set. We had a drink at the bar and he said, “once the band gets going you come up with me”. We had a couple more shots and I asked him what key the band would be in when we hit the stage. He put his hand on my shoulder and said, “Son, I play so many keys”.

As we walked toward the stage, I still didn’t know. We passed the horn section on the way to my spot and, in desperation, I asked them for the key. The trumpet man said “F#”. F#! A lot of harp players don’t carry a “B” harp which is what is needed for cross position in F#. Smokey strapped on his guitar, grabbed the mike, looked at me and said, “take one”. We’re in F# and he puts the spotlight on me right out of the gate. But the trumpet man saved my ass. If no trumpet man, I’m punked in front of a full house. I tore up that solo and Smokey ignored me until his final song. It was ok with me because fitting in with a solid horn section is one of my favorite things.

Smokey’s gone now, but he taught valuable lessons for harp players that night: be prepared for the flats and sharps, beware of a guitar slinger in a powder blue suit and always make nice with the horn section.

For the record, according to L.A. bass player Ron Battle, that trumpet player was, most likely, Joe Campbell. This many years later, thank you Joe. Smokey will never know.

Rick Smith is a musician and harp player (that’s a harmonica folks) from Helendale, California.