Days of Reckoning

By Gary White

One morning in the early 1990s I awoke from a bad dream. Unlike most bad dreams, this one seemed to persist and follow me around like the little dark cloud that hung over the head of Joe Btfsplk in the Lil’ Abner comic strip of our youth. There was simply no reason for the funk I was in. After all, my life was nearly perfect. I was at, or just past, the peak of my career. I had a good reputation as a composer and, in recent years, I had become known as a successful textbook author. The university had rewarded my long service in teaching, administration, and creative work with the highest rank they could bestow, distinguished professor. This got me a few hundred dollars additional salary and a parking spot right outside the music building. It also got me the honor of serving on the committee that chose a new university president and other prestigious committees such as promotion and tenure committee and the like. My wife and I had raised two wonderful children and had seen them through their university education and out on their own. The future was all smooth sailing.

Of course, I did average one migraine headache per week, but a combination of prescription drugs and regular massage kept that in check. The periodic diverticulitis could be handled with a round of antibiotics every month or so. My asthma was totally controlled with an inhaler and my chronic acid reflux was nearly under control with the new drugs that were coming on the market. The enlarged prostate could be kept in check by herbs alone, so it was no problem. I was working an average of sixteen hours per day, seven days a week, and having fun doing it. There was simply no reason that the dream that I was standing in front of my own, already dug, grave persisted.

Well, something was seriously wrong and I had to get to the bottom of it. I began to wonder why I was working all the time I wasn’t sleeping. I couldn’t remember when I had last done something frivolous, like going to a movie. Fairly soon I came to the conclusion that the reason for all the work was that I couldn’t stand my home life. Our marriage had never been a close one, but we had done a good job with our children and there weren’t any major wars going on between us. My wife was a respected attorney in town with her own very busy career. We enjoyed the good reputation that two successful people earn and we didn’t lack for friends and acquaintances.

In a sudden act that shocked everyone around, I moved out of the house. The next few months are just a blur to me. A friend had a room in her basement, behind her furnace. There was a full bathroom down there so I moved in. My bed was an old futon that was brick hard. My closet was nails driven into the walls around the room. I had one table and a chair. I was totally lost and Ivy was my port in the storm. I was still teaching full time, but I hardly remembered what I had taught ten minutes after the class. Twenty eight years of university teaching gives one a certain backlog and you can continue without much thought. I had bragged that someone could fire a starting pistol and I could deliver a 50-minute lecture without any preparation or even looking at my watch. I had some creative projects that were unfinished, but I could do them in the same way. I would undertake no new projects however, and gradually my days began to open up.

I started a men’s group where a group of guys could air their difficulties and challenges. Two of these guys were young people with small children. I began to hang around their houses and play with the kids. I joked that Indigo, the three-year-old daughter of one of the guys was the best therapist I had. She loved to bonk noses and I could bonk noses with Indigo for a few minutes and be totally relaxed. Most of the guys in the men’s group were not university types and I came in contact with a different part of society where the driven lifestyle of the university professors I knew wasn’t the norm. These people had time to be with their kids and time to read a novel or even go to a movie if I would babysit for them. And I did a lot of free baby-sitting during those months and my friends and their wives provided a lot of free home cooked meals.

Gradually the fog began to clear and I moved into a small duplex apartment. At least I was above ground level and I enjoyed visiting with my new friends and the neighbors around me. The university had an early retirement program that provided very attractive options for professors starting at age fifty-seven. I would be fifty-seven in 1994 and I began to make plans for early retirement. After about a year of fruitless marriage counseling, I filed for divorce. I was not prepared for getting a divorce from one of the top divorce attorneys in town. The divorce was fairly quickly granted, but the financial settlement took several years and ended up being argued before the state supreme court. Naturally, my ex-wife served as her own attorney with a colleague fronting for her to keep things looking on the up and up.

During the months of limbo I had wanted to keep my evenings busy. Going home to a dark basement room was just too depressing. The local Unitarian Fellowship had a very good program of adult education and I began to fill several evenings each week with classes. I liked the people I met there and one person in particular became a good friend. Elyn was in charge of adult education classes for the fellowship and had plans to go to seminary the following year. Her son was just the same age as my son and was in the process of completing his college education. We had a lot in common, not the least of which, that her parents had been colleagues of mine at the university. Her father was also a distinguished professor and Elyn had a PhD in cultural anthropology. She was in a lot of the classes I was attending and I asked her if she would like to car pool to some of the classes. Well, you can probably guess the rest of that story. In a few months we were an “item” and when she went off to seminary the following year I began to visit her in Denver as many weekends as I could.

By that time I was in my final year at the university, having declared myself in transition to early retirement. We were married the following summer. I can truly say that my life has begun anew in the years that Elyn and I have been married. We have traveled, enjoyed our home life, and taken time to do fun things. Just tonight we attended a concert and, on the way home, enjoyed looking at the full moon. In my previous life I would scarcely have noticed. I have noticed that the recent freeze has begun to turn our plantings into their fall beauty and I will enjoy that transition. Life is good!

Since I have retired I have come to grips with a lifetime of addiction to work. Work addiction is unlike any other addiction. Instead of landing you in jail it is rewarded. Society loves a work addict. The more you can accomplish the better you are rewarded and I had followed that carrot almost into the grave. I can’t say that I have beaten this addiction. I am up at 1 AM tonight writing this and I still put out a pretty full day of work most days. But, at least I know the dimensions of the problem and make every effort to take my time, have some fun, and just spend time doing nothing. Doing nothing is not wasting time, it is taking the time to enjoy the small things and the small things can be sweet. Like sharing this blog with you for example.