ON BECOMING A CURMUDGEON

              

I don’t think I’m quite there yet, not quite ready to fill Andy Rooney’s shoes, but as I get older I feel more and more curmudgeonly. Some of the topics flying around SCCL lately just bring out the curmudgeon in me.

Wrong and Right

Have you ever heard this one: “Dogs are like string: every yo-yo wants one”?  We’ve got a few yo-yo’s around here, that’s for sure.  Most folks will say “oh, you don’t like dogs” or “you don’t understand”.  

Wrong: I like dogs. I’ve got four wonderful grand-dogs. I know something about the canine family, and I especially admire large, working dogs. (I do sometimes wonder at the sight of tall, hefty men out walking their miniature dogs. I want to yell “get a real dog” at them, but I suppose a little dog, however yappy they are, can be loved as much and mean as much as a large one.)   

We had several dogs when I was growing up. One memorable dog was a juvenile Great Dane that my uncle brought to us when we first moved to the countrified wilds of Nassau County, Long Island, from the civilized, citified sanity of Queens, New York. He thought we needed a dog for protection. After a week or two, my Mother decided she’d risk life and limb and the security of the family, rather than to have to feed that dog. I learned about the economic impact of dogs, and pets in general, at an early age. I love dogs - just for other people. I do not want to have to spend retirement funds to feed them, vet them, kennel them when we travel, or walk them on a schedule that’s theirs, not mine, much less scoop their poop. Other people are welcome to do it, just not me. But I do like dogs. 

Right: I don’t understand. Here’s where the ‘yo-yo’ comes in: I don’t understand some of the dog owners here at Sun City Carolina Lakes who have so little respect for their fellow homeowners that they don’t curb their dogs and/or don’t clean up after them. They’d have a fit if another dog walker left a load on their property.

I could not believe it when we were told of folks who dump their doo-bags (to be distinguished from doo-rags) down the drainage grates in our streets. For Pete’s sake, the drainage grates are not sewers. The water ends up in our own little Carolina Lakes.

And another thing: I don’t understand the people who think the SCCL HOA is there to provide their personal supply of doo-bags. (I also don’t understand why the HOA pays for these bags in the first place. A nice little addition among many other deletions?) The HOA puts the bags out and they disappear before you can say scoopy-doo. How cheap can these folks get? I realize that some people are just built this way, but I wish they weren’t. Well – I could go on, but…

This is just one of the things that regularly strike me as being fodder for a good grump session. I find that with age I haven’t gained more wisdom: I’m just viewing things with a more cynical eye, with a little more skepticism, and with a lot more disbelief. I read or see something that strikes an off-key note, and it all sets me grumbling and complaining. I hope to be writing more about such things. It will take a while more for me to become a full blown curmudgeon, but I’m working on it - it’s such fun.