THE RETIREE

There's an actual spittoon next to his rocking chair.

He hocks up a big loogie and sends it zipping into the jar before he speaks.

Nothin' changed for me. No sir.

Okay, I don't have to leave my house to get dinner. But that ain't new. My daughters used to bring me dinner four nights a week. And my grandson had taught me how to use one of them food delivery apps for the other three nights.

Now the app don't work. Nobody driving for 'em anymore.

So that's different.

But how different is it, really? Instead of hittin' a couple of buttons on my phone to put food on my table, I hit a couple of buttons on a rep. It takes 30 seconds instead of 30 minutes.

Okay! That's an improvement. But that's called a difference in degree, not a difference in kind. And now my daughters only come over twice a week.

Hmm.

Other than the food thing, there ain't a damn thing different about my life.

I wake up at dawn.

I watch a bunch of trash on the TV.

I piddle around the house.

Then I go to sleep and do it all over again.

I remember even back before we'd heard about reps, people were sayin' it was gonna be a disaster when automation took away all the jobs.

"What will people do all day!"

They really said that.

If they really wanted to know, they shoulda just asked a retired person.