I Can't Do It In 10 Minutes, Irene

This was written in response to the hurricane.  It just took me a long time to post.

    I can’t do it in 10 minutes. Well, I guess if I leave my shoes on. It’s this weather. You wear so many inconvenient clothes when it’s wet. Gawd, it takes me 10 minutes to unbend my umbrella. When I was young I could do it in 10 minutes. When you’re young you can fire reload, fire reload, fire reload—you can even grit your teeth then fire and reload one more time. But at my age its fire—and I’ll let you know when I’ll reload again. But, the advantage with age is that you’ll hit the bull’s eye more often. When you’re young you’re all over the place. You’re hitting there—over there. Gosh, the gun could go off in your hand. You don’t care just as long as you’re firing. You’re so selfish when you’re young. But, as you become more experienced the reloading process can take a long time. You want the whole experience to last as long as possible—eventually you’ll get your stance, wet your sights like Gary Cooper in Sergeant York—and ever so slowly place your finger on the trigger, feeling the smooth warm surface, then squeeze. Now that takes much longer than 10 minutes.