THE WEIRS TIMES & THE COCHECO TIMES, Thursday, March 29, 2012 Formerly & Everywhere! RFD# to the gulf stream waters 3 to the New York Island by Lorrie Baird jim-lorrie@earthlink.net


FEELING OLD? THERE’S NOTHING LIKE A NEW SET OF WHEELS


by Lorrie Baird Both of us celebrated


milestone birthdays in March. Better put, I cel- ebrated. Jim spent his en- tire day pouting. Let’s just say that I now qualify for Medicare; and Jim, he’s… well…five years older be- cause he still can’t bring himself to say the “S” num- ber out loud. Jim started off his birth-


day with a celebratory song from our granddaughter Bryce which brought big smiles to his face that failed to make an encore appearance for the rest of the day. I just happened to men-


tion to a neighbor that it was Jim’s birthday and you would have thought that I yanked a long buried skeleton out of the family closet and was waltzing down the street with it. “Do me a favor? He snort-


ed. “Don’t tell anybody else it’s my bbb….birthday?” finding even that small reality hard to get out and I could tell right away this wasn’t going to be one of those touchy feely good- time birthdays. Last year I threw a sur-


prise birthday party for Jim. This year he threat- ened retaliation if I even thought about it. When asked what he wanted to do on his special day he answered glumly, “I need comfort food. German com- fort food. And I don’t want to go with anybody except you so nobody will mention the ‘B’ word.” So we went to a German


restaurant where the food was good and the ambi- ence straight out of the 1950s which further dis- turbed Jim because he felt at home there right away. There’s nothing like drown- ing your birthday blues in a platter of homemade wie- ner schnitzel. We ate. We


came home. We watched a movie of Jim’s choosing which is why I don’t re- member what it was. I can


“Jim, when can I take a


look at this cart?” “When it’s delivered to the house in about five min-


Last year I threw a surprise birthday party for Jim. This year he threatened retaliation if I even thought about it.


hardly wait for the next decade. To cheer Jim up I sent


him golf cart shopping the next day. Now that the house is finally remodeled we could consider a golf cart. The operative word here being “consider.” Two hours later an exuberant Jim called back announc- ing, “I found one! It’s a re- tired cart from the Villages and it’s so cool. You’ll love it!”


“How ‘retired’ is it?” “It’s a 1999 but it doesn’t


look it. It has brand new batteries, two glove boxes, even a ceiling cooling fan. It has a burled walnut dash panel…okay, it’s plastic… but it looks great. And it even has a speedometer. It’s a high speed model, and Lorrie and let me tell you, this thing goes. Almost thirty miles an hour!” as if that was going to impress me: a golf cart with giddy- up when everyone else in the neighbor is flooring it at 15 mph. “What color is it?” I asked. “It’s…well…it’s orange.


But it’s a real pretty or- ange.” “Jim, you know that I


HATE orange, it’s my least favorite color!” “But it has real cool pin-


striping all around and…” “And I hate orange.” “You’ll love it Lorrie, it’s


so cute…just like you,” he said and that’s when I knew he was hiding some- thing.


utes?” And sure enough as I was hanging up a truck pulled into the driveway with the cutest little red- orange golf cart (one of the times I am grateful Jim is slightly colorblind.) It did look brand new and is a Club Car, the top of the line. It has wire wheels, brand new tires and was decked out in new full en- closure canvas. And Jim was right, it was a bargain because it came with a full back seat and we both


knew it would be snapped up quickly. On the windshield hung a


“Happy Birthday” sign but I knew Jim put it there only because he figured if he did I just couldn’t get mad at him for breaking a cardinal rule of our marriage that all major purchases are to be discussed between us. It’s supposed to be “our”


golf cart, but Jim’s been tooling around the com-


munity every day like a golf cart is to him what a sporty new convertible is to a guy going through a mid- life crises. After all, there’s nothing like a new set of wheels to make a guy feel young again. Besides, it could be


worse. If we were living in New Hampshire it would have been a tricked out John Deere.


23


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