{"id":13399,"date":"2025-01-01T11:07:23","date_gmt":"2025-01-01T16:07:23","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/brucegarrett.com\/brucelog\/?p=13399"},"modified":"2025-01-01T11:36:19","modified_gmt":"2025-01-01T16:36:19","slug":"2024","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/brucegarrett.com\/brucelog\/13399","title":{"rendered":"2024"},"content":{"rendered":"

So now I’m two and a half decades past the year 2000. You should have seen what the future looked like when I was a 1960s teenage boy.<\/p>\n

I began the year 2024 two years fully retired, vagueing out on life and unable to be creative about anything.That first year of retirement was pretty good. But I began to spiral inward after that. 2024 began to resemble a bad period of my life back in my twenties when I just sat all night in my bedroom listening to music and zoning out. I couldn’t draw, my photographic eye would not open. The difference between then and now is I’m in my 70s and a heart patient, and I’ve given up finally on ever having a boyfriend, let alone a spouse. It never happened and never will now. So once again I was just coasting along spiraling inward.<\/p>\n

But then I ended the year back at Space Telescope working part time. That’s perked me up somewhat, but the initial thrill of being back among people and places I knew for decades is wearing off, and while I still love this job and the workplace I’m still that lost empty soul when I’m back on my own time. I took a train ride to Oceano (I love train rides), bought a small sketchbook here to try and do something, anything, to get that creative spark going again, even if it’s just practicing drawing hands, but it’s excruciatingly hard. I brought the Leica M3 along (it’s good for travelling light) and I think I managed to get a few good shots while I was here, so my photographic eye has opened up a tad. I have the office laptop with me and work to do that I enjoy because I don’t yet have enough leave time banked I can just take the holiday weeks off completely.<\/p>\n

I’m 71. How did I make it this far without someone to love and be loved by. I feel like I died years ago and I just never noticed it so I’m still going through the motions of a life. I’m in reasonably good health. I just got a good review from my cardiologist, who would probably disapprove of the Cuban cigar I smoked tonight, let alone my intake at Old Juan’s. I should count my blessings, but I feel so empty. And given the situation here in the United (sic) States I am not looking forward to 2025. I can’t bring myself to wish anyone a happy new year considering, though I’ve wished it back whenever someone passing by has wished it me. Sorry. It just seems unreasonably optimistic.<\/p>\n

Soon I’ll be back in my little Baltimore rowhouse, my solitary life, and a job I love for as long as the Republicans will let NASA have a budget for space telescopes, or they get Executive Order 10540 restored<\/a>, and someone comes to my desk and tells me I can no longer legally work for a NASA contractor. Drifting along through the rest of my life is probably for the best. Paying attention to the world around me is only going to make me unhappy, which I really don’t need.<\/p>\n

Happy As Best You Can Manage New Year!<\/em><\/p>\n

 <\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

So now I’m two and a half decades past the year 2000. You should have seen what the future looked like when I was a 1960s teenage boy. I began the year 2024 two years fully retired, vagueing out on life and unable to be creative about anything.That first year of retirement was pretty good. […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":3,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[7],"tags":[130,157],"class_list":["post-13399","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-life","tag-lonelyache","tag-the-old-man-chronicles"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/brucegarrett.com\/brucelog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/13399","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/brucegarrett.com\/brucelog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/brucegarrett.com\/brucelog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/brucegarrett.com\/brucelog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/3"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/brucegarrett.com\/brucelog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=13399"}],"version-history":[{"count":4,"href":"https:\/\/brucegarrett.com\/brucelog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/13399\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":13403,"href":"https:\/\/brucegarrett.com\/brucelog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/13399\/revisions\/13403"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/brucegarrett.com\/brucelog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=13399"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/brucegarrett.com\/brucelog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=13399"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/brucegarrett.com\/brucelog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=13399"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}