Life on the pre-retirement lane

Like the now infamous gremlins, I am back. It’s a long story. I probably owe the readers who have missed this column – all five of them – some kind of explanation. Somewhere in the lore of mental health is the fact that moving homes causes major discombobulation because this is a life-altering event that carries major stress. This refers only to moving homes. Imagine what it might be for building your own home in the country and turning the way you live completely upside down. Then you would move from majorly discombobulated to totally bonkers for a while. That’s what happened to me.

Not only did I build a home in the country, I also underwent a major lif-threatening operation and some more major life changes that according to the book How to Stop ________ and Stay Stopped, I shouldn’t talk about. So take my word for it, I return as a totally different person. Sometimes I don’t recognize myself, mainly because my operation left my face slightly frozen (no, it was not a face lift) and therefore slightly twisted. They tell me it’s hardly noticeable, but I know. I feel the twist. It’s like wearing my warp on my face and it makes me feel exposed. But that’s another story.

The upside of this thing (in my long absence I learned there was an upside to everything, sometimes you just need a long stiff neck to find it) is that maybe, just maybe I have new stuff to explore. I don’t know if this will have anything to do with business or the title of my column. Maybe I should find another title that covers that period of life when one is physically too young to retire but is psychologically dying to do something totally new preferably very laid back. That’s the psychographic lifestyle segment in which I reside these days.

Let’s not talk about the commute because I haven’t mastered that though I have learned much about it. Originally I thought that I could do as I did 20 years (has it been that long? Time flies) ago – wake up at 5 a.m. and be on the road in an hour. I can still do that but I don’t drive and my driver has fallen in love and is on his honeymoon. I have only the highest respect (and envy) for people on their honeymoon, so we leave when he can make it. He makes it to my front door at 9 a.m.

If we leave at nine, I am generally at the office by 10, give or take a few minutes. If I leave at eight or thereabouts, which I can do on Mondays when I borrow the car (not off-the-road as my car is) and driver (not on a honeymoon) of my daughter, I am generally at the office by 10, give or take a few minutes. The lesson I should learn is there is no difference in my office arrival time whether or not my driver is on his honeymoon. I would probably be wiser letting the honeymooners dictate the schedule. But it makes me feel better to leave earlier. I think I am getting to work earlier.

In the afternoons, if I leave Makati at four, I am home in 45 to 55 minutes. If I leave half-an-hour later, I increase travel time by 30 percent and if I leave an hour later by 100 percent. The neat thing is I can actually observe and compute all these things. In reality, there’s very little I can do about them except go with the flow. One never gains mastery over the Philippines’ anarchic flow. You just do what the environment allows you to do at the pace it mandates.

One morning I woke up at 5 (no reason to stay up late so early to bed and early to rise) and decided to go for a walk. As I was winding down almost an hour later, suddenly at an intersection a snake crossed my path. She – I don’t know why I’m so sure she was a she – just darted out of the grass about a meter away from me. I walked backward quickly to see if she would run after me but snakes have trouble with pavement. She just went on, a grown-up snake, much longer than the road was wide. Later I had visions of her lying down with an ice bag on her head, trying to get over almost running into me, this human who was walking just as she decided to cross the pavement.

Another morning we had to stop at the little wooden bridge to wait for two goats to get across. And yesterday, my maid Judith, showed me the two bloated and stiff frogs floating in our pond with their arms around each other, like they had taken a lover’s pact. "What do you suppose happened to them?" I asked curiously.

"They drowned," Judith said with much authority.

"Do frogs drown? I don’t think they drown," I said, searching in my mind for my frog lore learned mostly from the National Geographic and Discovery channels.

"They can if they go underwater while mating," Judith said, again with authority. Maybe she watched them mate. I’m not sure this is scientific but what do I know? All I know is I have before me Tristan and Isolde Frog. I think frogs find my home romantic. This from the number of tadpoles and eggs I discover. These frogs must be doing it all the time! Maybe they die of exhaustion.

My home, almost finished, at last. My life, almost settled, at last. My work, almost done, always. My financial security, almost entirely surrendered to this home that has surpassed my wildest dreams. But I love it, love this life among the snakes, frogs and goats. In the afternoons chickens come to peck in my garden. I don’t know who scares them away, but suddenly they run and in a flutter of wings, doves descend to peck in my garden. On warm dry summer evenings, fireflies flicker in the lanes and trees. They’re not extinct here. One got into my bedroom and stayed many nights. It was so beautiful, made me feel so blessed. Every time I look out my bedroom window there’s Mount Makiling, smothered, embraced kissed by clouds.

This is my life today. I can get used to it. Wonder how my work will adjust.