Tired and Retired

I feel so tired. My eyes are almost always heavy. I know much of that weariness is my allergies, but taking medication to combat the allergies also makes me sleepy. Which is worse? If I don’t take the meds, I feel tired with a runny nose. If I take the medication, I feel tired with a full feeling in my head.

I just finished a busy week. Our church had revival meetings in the evening with the speaker Jeremiah Clark. His down-to-earth messages challenged the heart and the understanding of Christianity. The meetings were a small part of the business. For ten hours on Friday I fried sausages for the annual Sausage and Buckwheat Festival. It’s the main fund raising event for the Ohiopyle Volunteer Fire Department. On Saturday I fried for seven hours. This year, there were more volunteers and I didn’t have to lean over the hot grills all of that time. Leaning is hard on the lower back.

I’ve helped at the festival for nearly forty-five years, starting when I first started to date my wife Cindy. Her dad ‘Bud Morrison coerced me to help in 1975 and I’ve have helped since then. Saturday evening my son Andrew hung my new bedroom ceiling fan. I’d been sleeping with the box on one side of my bed for several weeks. I’m mechanically dyslexic and had slowly removed the old one with the broken fan switch.

Sunday was a little less stressful with only church services in the morning and evening. Monday I needed to make up for lost time. I did three loads of laundry. The loads of my jeans and dark clothing as well as a load of towels I hung outside on the clothesline to dry. I dried my whites and lights inside. While they were tumbling, I put fresh sheets on my bed. By the day’s end, I set a new record. I managed to wash, dry, fold, and put away the laundry in less than fourteen hours, but the saddest thing about this time of year is that the sheets were flannel. This is the season when tomatoes start to taste like cardboard and sheets become flannel.

Tuesday I rode with a friend to the West Virginia Medical Center for a yearly follow-up of her knee replacement surgery. I knew I was in West Virginia when I saw a sign posted above the urinal that read, “Please do not spit tobacco snuff in the urinal.” The doctor was delayed and I was un able to attend the monthly luncheon with several of my friends who graduated in 1967 from Connellsville Area Senior High School. Sorry guys, next month I will be there.