Lucky

You may not know this about me, but I’ve been married three times. Once when I was 18, then at 20, then at 30. Third time’s the charm; we’ve been married 35 years. Retirement agrees with Al as you can see by the twinkle in his eyes. He was actually telling me not to take his picture but I had to, because it tells so much about him.

He does dishes. He makes coffee every morning. He cooks, he cleans, and he golfs. Golf may be the most important thing he does for me, as when he leaves the house with his clubs, I write. Working the second novel in my new series “Jane in St Pete Mysteries” and I’m loving it. So happy Al and I have naturally evolved into spending time together but also time apart. We are both of the same mind about that.

Yesterday he cleaned the basement, which is full of stuff, including furniture we thought we wanted from our old house, but then realized didn’t fit here.. He was down there for hours. Now I can gather up my smaller stuff, mostly for donation (books, knick knacks, old clothes, old decor). Our original plan was to get a booth at the Armada Flea Market but the virus has made that not such a good plan. This is better.

We’ve been home from Florida for five weeks and I kept wanting him to vacuum the spider webs and make space, but I didn’t say anything. I knew how busy he was cleaning the deck, bringing up the patio furniture, fixing his car, fixing the ice machine in the fridge, fixing the AC, installing a new humidifier, and a million other little things.

We came home to a fire alarm beeping, even though he changed all the batteries before we left. So there was that. Every day he didn’t golf, he was playing catch up with this house. But yesterday was the day! Never has the sound of a shop vac sounded more dear to my heart.

Oh and did I say he grocery shops? And reads the sale papers. And finds all the deals. When I was a single mom, before I met Al, I had to watch every penny. I kept a running tab in my head and scrutinized prices. It was painful but my boys were young so PBJ, hot dogs and mac and cheese all sounded great to them. After Al and I were married, I vowed to never look at a price in the grocery store again. And I haven’t. I just buy what I want.

The best thing about Al’s retirement is not that he helps me with chores (Although he cleans the bathrooms and polishes the wood floors and will pitch in on anything else I need help with.) or that he keeps the cars running and the appliances too. It’s his financial sense. He’s like my own personal financial consultant. I feel safe.

Also, he’s fun. And funny. Even during a pandemic.