Thursday, 17 August 2006

"There's a guy outside our house!"
At work today, the Major General Music had an experience that officially marks the period where he may first be called "old."

The Major General Music and his boss, the Anything Fixer, spent the day chinking cabins #4 and #1 at the resort today right before the rains came. While the Anything Fixer finished prepping inside the store, the Major General Music loaded Garf the Golf Cart, readied the last part of cabin #4, and began working.

To the Major General Music's amusement, there were three young girls flitting about the cabin, recently returned from their adventures at the resort playground picking leaves, dandelions, and whatever else caught their fancy. They quickly noticed the Major General Music, who is neither girl nor young, and payed close attention to his movements outside the cabin. Unable to figure out that he was preparing to chink the cabin (and who could blame for such ignorance?), one loudly whispered to the others, "There's a guy outside our house!"

"What's he doing?"

"I don't know. He has two huge buckets, a ladder, this big tube, and a screwdriver!"

The Major General Music sighed to himself as he dug at the rotted pieces of wood with the screwdriver whilst standing on the ladder. One bucket held chinking material, the big tube laid across it was the chinking gun, and the second bucket held soapy water and rags for smoothing the chink. Who is the Major General Music to people? Apparently, he's "a guy." He's not "some kid" or "a student." To these young guests, he's some "guy." Therefore, he is becoming old. However, the Major General Music was immature enough to let them continue guessing and not loudly proclaim that he was chinking their cabin so it wouldn't get rotten.

The Major General Music: growing old, but never up.