IS JIMBORED FINALLY FINISHED – 2025

Perhaps some of you have noticed that Ol’ JimboRed has been somewhat silent of late. I must admit that the late winter and early spring were trying times. It seems that even with nothing to worry about, I could still come up with a ton of things to fret over. One issue, in particular, had me in deep periods of reflection, self doubt and perhaps moments of self pity. Bubbaloo said I was sulking, mean, teary (at times), and for the most part, not my usual cheerful and caring self. To that I say, “can’t a man get a break around here”? Couldn’t she feel my hurt? Even now it is hard to open up, and spill my guts about what happened. The words will hardly come out of my mouth. Aaaarrrghhh!

I quit, retired, tapped out and otherwise abandoned my golf career. There, “are you happy now, that I’ve said it”? After years of imagining that I could play golf, I finally had to admit, that as I got older, one thing became apparent. My abilities, and my expectations were on divergent paths. The more I wanted to master this game, the less my natural talents and physical abilities allowed me to do so. I had felt unfulfilled for the last year or perhaps two. I worried quite a bit about not getting better. In reality I found myself “forging on” basically for the beer and old men’s talk at the end of each round. In the later months of this winter, I started to develop the same feeling about going golfing, as I had in my previous life, about going to work.

Once I arrived at that point, the end was surely in sight. It was then, only a matter of fighting off my own feelings of failure and inadequacy. “What the hell”, I would think. “Others, of my age, still played.” Some of them even quite well. Some said I was just far too hard on myself. They offered advice like “no one cares how you play”, or “take it easy just enjoy yourself”. That was where I had the real problem. I never, ever, had enjoyed something that I did poorly. Not, even once, as far back as I can remember, did I enjoy doing something badly. Proof of this, in my early years, might be found in an early exit, from things such as dancing, playing musical instruments, or getting into physical confrontations. All because I was not even mediocre at any of them.

With golf I suffered through the self imposed torture of never really being any good. I mean, for 20 years, I told myself, “just keep at it and you will get better”. At times I even convinced myself that I was better. Oh, what a fool I was. There were times where I even had a break from golf. Times like during Covid, where they didn’t allow anyone out on the course. During such times, I found that I did not miss golf that much. However, as soon as restrictions were lifted, I was right back at it. Each time with renewed enthusiasm and expectations. Each time, it took me a long while to return to, post timeout, form. And even when I did, that form was bad. Oh what an embarrassment I was.

So, one day, faced with paying a new membership for another year, and continuing to further torture myself. I TAPPED OUT. Let me tell you, my golf partners were in total amazement and disbelief. No longer would they have JimboRed, to beat on. No more, making themselves feel worthy, by crapping on my game, or pointing out my opportunities for improvement. You cannot even imagine the thousands of times I wanted to use the “f” word during one of their “lessons”. Once it sunk in that I would no longer be booking their tee times, keeping the scores, finding substitutes (when one of them got the sniffles) and otherwise making sure they were all happy. Then, the sarcasm started. things like “bet you won’t make it a week before you are back”. Or, “whatcha gonna do now, go shopping with Deysi?” Those and all sorts of other hurtful comments.

I just smiled and bit down on my tongue. I’ll show those bastards, I thought. In some ways, I was hoping for one of them to say, “we’ll miss you big guy”, or “thanks for all the work over the years, keeping us together”. All I received, however, was, “call us when you are ready to come back, and we will see if there is a spot for you, hahahahaha”. So, retire, resign, or quit, I did. I took my golf equipment and threw it in the back of the garage. And there it remains to this day. I soon found that not playing was somewhat of a relief. I did not suffer withdrawal. Just the opposite. Once I no longer had to stress over “not embarrassing myself”, it was like a huge weight lifted from my shoulders. I must admit, though, that I did miss the beer after each round.

So, what to replace it with? I still had gardening with Ron and Deysi. Or more accurately, labouring in the garden, under the oppressive scrutiny of Deysi and Ron. That was kind of fun. I will never cease to be amazed at how one, seemingly dried, and dead seed, can transform itself into a huge magnificent plant in no time. My god, when the first green shoot pops thru, and you think, “nah can’t be”. And then, in a few short weeks, it grows to a point where the plant is taller than you and bearing all kinds of lush fruit. I will never cease to be amazed? So gardening now filled in the great holes in my time, that had been previously occupied by golf. The major difference was there was no smoking and beer drinking after gardening. Other than that, they were similar.

Apparently, I had lots of time on my hands, so one day, Deysi decides that we need to sell our house, downsize, move on and otherwise change our life. “Great”, I thought. I will humour her and let her live her dream. She enlisted her trusty realtor, and together they determined what needed to be done to get the house in shape for selling. I was not immediately worried, after all, we had been down this path a few times before. And we still found ourselves in our house. It seems like a house of this size, was not extremely popular in our market. A lot of people were moving to the area for retirement and leisure. Not many of these people were in the market for a 5000 sq. ft house. More, the “serious money” seemed to pour into “new build” bungalows on the golf course.

The consensus of everyone involved was that this huge house needed a major decluttering. We had 45 years of treasures and memories packed into our place. There was enough furniture to fill “three” full, good size, homes. What didn’t fit in the house, was neatly stored in 30+ large plastic totes inside our garage. These contained treasures that Deysi could not live without all these years. Most of them were unopened since the day she last viewed them 20 years previously. They were stacked floor to ceiling on both walls of the garage. When I looked at them sitting there, I realized just what an overwhelming task lay ahead.

Oh well, there will be lots of time to sort thru this stuff, if and when this house ever sells. Our house sale starts as others before it had started. At the outset, and while the listing was new, we had a lot of people looking at the house. And as always, we never quite had the right house for anyone. It was too big, too high, too old, not quite right, wrong color, wrong shape, too many trees, not enough trees and anything else you can think of. We were used to that, as we had been in this rodeo before. It was as “water off a duck’s back”, we paid no heed to all the naysayers. Deysi kept my spirits up by often telling me. “Don’t worry Jimbo, it will sell, they all sell”. In my mind I see, 6 months of people coming thru our home, telling us why it is not “right” for them. And then life as normal.

Ol’ JimboRed spent his mornings digging, scratching, cutting and pulling at weeds. Then in the afternoon digging, scratching and helping veggies to grow on the Finca. I was quite happy, although Deysi says, no matter where I was, I was still bitching. My mornings were spent cursing weeds in our lawn, and afternoons were spent nurturing veggies in Ron and JMW’s garden (the Finca). My life was a routine, I bothered no one. The spring came and went. Summer fast approached. I hacked away, cursing and complaining all the time. Life was idyllic. The weather was hot, with endless sun. Sometimes I wished I did not have such a big yard to look after.

Careful what you wish for, RIGHT? One day a 40’ish couple visit. We think nothing of it, just another routine showing of our gem. And as had happened a couple of times previously, they made an offer on our house, too see if we would “gift” it to them. And as also had happened previously, we declined their offer and continued with our life. Not to be put off, these people were back the next week with another offer, somewhat better than their opening gambit. We were now mildly curious. Once again we declined and felt sure that we had seen the last of this group. We did, however, throw out a number to them, too test their interest. Again, we were still only paying about half attention to this activity. AMAZINGLY AND COMPLETELY OUT OF NOWHERE THEY ACCEPTED OUR PROPOSAL.

When the realtor informed us that these people had agreed to our counter-offer, I was stunned. Immediately I said, “hold on a minute, we were not serious, were we?” Realization set in, our home was just sold. I had to shake my head to let the truth sink in. Deysi was uncharacteristically quiet. She was not exactly jumping up and down and beating ol’ JimboRed on the back. Rather, she looked stunned. Then the realtor says, “the buyers want to know if you can be out in two months?” We are still in shock. “Hell”, I think to myself, “I’m not sure we can be out of the garage in two months”. “My big mouth comes open and I blurt out, “hell ya, we will be out in 2 months!” Deysi, just looks at me and shakes her head. I’m sure she’s thinking, “oh what a fool I married.”

Our life is now turned upside-down. We sign our names to a contract and the clock starts ticking. Our first piece of advice came from Ron and JMW. It went like, “throw it all away, give it away, sell it! YOU DO NOT NEED ANYTHING WHEN YOU MOVE!” When asked what things they wanted, you could almost hear them laugh. “Ha,ha,ha,He,he,he”, you could hear them giggle all the way from the Finca. “Are they kidding?” “We don’t want any of that stuff”. When we considered it, disposing of it all, sounded like a great solution. At least, we would be able to get out in two months. However, those of you that know Deysi, know that 100% she is not throwing her lifelong treasures away. Now she might agree, to throw my stuff away, but I knew there was a line we weren’t going to cross when it came to her stuff.

Right at the outset it became obvious that we had two different approaches to the task at hand. My approach was to rip and tear, “go grizzly bear” at it and finish in 2 weeks. Then rest for 6 weeks. Deysi’s was much the opposite. She wanted to walk around it, sniffing and feeling the move. She wanted to plan it out for the first 6 weeks, then go hard at it for two weeks. Obviously two different approaches were not going to work. Hell, we would have killed each other, well inside of 2 months. So we decided that I would take on the basement and garage. She would be left alone to plan the hell out of the rest. Her idea was to put everything, we no longer wanted or needed, up for sale. She would then pack, whatever was left. Even the division of labor, had it’s problems. Although I could sort things into piles of “keep” or “discard”, I would still require permission to throw “anything” away.

I must say though, Deysi “bought in” to the disposal of our goods, very well. She agonized a bit over some of her things, but in reality was pretty committed to down-sizing. One day while sitting in the garage agonizing over what to keep or throw, D2 arrived to help. We are talking and I am telling him that everything has to go, I’m throwing it all. etc. I add that I am expecting a hard time, throwing all of Deysi’s stuff away. He looks at me and makes a profound statement. It went like, “Geezus Dad you guys are not dying!” “You still need your things to live with.” “Let Deysi keep her stuff, don’t be so harsh”. That stopped me in my tracks. You know, he was right. We still had to live, after the sale. It was at that point, where I realized that downsizing had limits, it didn’t mean everything reduced to zero.

I then took a lot more sympathetic approach to culling our treasures. It was still a monumental task. Even if you try, you cannot possibly imagine just how much stuff we had. For example, we had 3 full floors of furniture. Enough to furnish 3 – medium sized houses. We are talking 3 couches, 2 recliners, 2 love seats, three tables, 22 chairs, a couple of fully stocked bars, assorted coffee and end tables. At least a half dozen beds, probably that many tv sets and monitors. Enough dishes and flatware for 3 families, 2500 movies, 500 hardcover books and clothes to dress an army. It was mind boggling. And then big plastic totes full of treasures. Perhaps 40 of them. Not all ours mind you. It seems Ange had also been using our home to store her things. My god she also had 10 totes full of her “collectibles”.

I was on the edge of breakdown, trying to get it all handled at once, inside the first 7 days. I was like a dervish, ripping and tearing, piling things up, and moving the piles. Meanwhile, Deysi sat in the kitchen, calmly taking out one piece, inspecting it, sighing, and cuddling it. She would then extract one sheet of packing paper, and very carefully wrap her treasure and place it in a box. Geezus, I could not watch. I just wanted to scream and have a fit. Ange is encouraging her to keep her stuff, Ron is encouraging us to throw it all away, and start over at ground zero. JMW sides with Ron, while D2 has the “Geezus, you are not dying” stance, too the moderate culling of the goods.

Ol’ JimboRed was caught in the middle. With the weight of the world on his shoulders. The clock, in my brain, is ticking. Each day passes as a deadline. I’m frothing at the mouth. Deysi is lalalalala, the world is at peace, and “what, me worry?” Perhaps the best decision we ever made was to NOT BUY our next place, in the middle of the chaos that was our move! We decided that once the “smoke” cleared and the trauma had passed then we would decide on our next place. In the period in-between, we decided to take some vacation and live for a time, stress and worry free. That one decision, I believe, kept us both sane. We did not have the added pressure of viewing new homes, fighting off sales pressure, and doubling our stress, knowing that there was a new place awaiting us.

And amazingly, little by little things started to come together. Firstly, temporary housing became available, thank to Ron/JMW, Ange and a backup offer from D2 and A. The pressure of being homeless was lifted from our shoulders. Ron and JMW offered a storage solution for the goods that we needed to keep. This was a great weight off us! It allowed us to move pieces to storage as they were identified. JMW came in with his trailer, on the weekends, and him and D2 loaded loads for storage. In typical JimboRed fashion I had managed to damage my hip during the first week, rendering myself useless when it came to lifting. Now, 2 and a half month’s later, that same hip is still hard to put weight on.

Ange and her beau Cdy, also came to help. As they were sorting thru her stuff, they identified some major furniture items that they wanted. One weekend about halfway thru the move, they appear with a U-Haul truck. Between them, A, JMW and D2, they take 50% of the furniture remaining in the house. My God what a load that was. Between Deysi and I, each day we took a load to charity, garbage or recycle. By the end we had been to garbage 10 times, with full loads, recycle, probably 15 times and charity drop-offs, maybe, 20 times. Additionally, Deysi was selling stuff over the Internet, daily. Amazing as it sounds, there are people who actually want things that we did not. She sold tons.

One month in, it appeared that we might stand a chance of everything gone within the 2 month timeframe. One day D2 was with us trying to help. He had (mostly) resisted the urge during his visits to haul stuff from our storage to his own storage. This time however, he noticed the major pile of movies that we had to dispose of. They were worth nothing for resale, few places needed 1500+ movies (left after we went thru them to extract our favourites). So, in a weak moment, he says “I’ll take them for you and dispose of them.” “Hell, I know a couple of places that will take them.” Well, we loaded them into bags, boxes, and any other type of container we could find. It filled D2’s SUV from front to back and completely solid. Poor ol’ D2, finally came to the realization that, although people would happily take 5, 10 or even 15 movies, there were few places that needed 1500.

And A, of course, thought he was insane. D2, himself, blamed it on the H..ld mouth. For a couple weeks he drove around with a full car of movies. Another big, big issue solved. Incredibly, the house was slowly emptying. Ol’ JimboRed was near crazy with the job. Deysi marched to her own drummer. Luckily, we did not kill each other in the process. And lo and behold, on the day that our sale was finalized, we took the last loads to charity and the dump. We cleaned our last floor, on the way out, locked the doors and became HOMELESS. It had been a summer for the books. After 20 years of, what we called retirement, we were now finally RETIRED. WE HAVE NO HOME, NO GOLF, NO WEEDS AND NO WORRIES. NOW TO SEE WHAT THE REST OF OUR TIME LOOKS LIKE. WE TRULY, FINALLY FEEL STRESS FREE!

One last thing I might say. Each day throughout this process, I awoke early, identified a task, and went crazy over it. In the process, I also found time to comment on Deysi’s “lack” of progress. “Couldn’t she see, what it took to get this job finished?” I ripped, snorted, cursed and swore. I forced this move to happen in my timeframe. And you know what? The work finished in exactly the time that Desyi planned it to finish! Not one minute before! On the last day, at the last minute, Deysi allowed me to finish the last task. Then she pronounced the job DONE. She made no concession to my plan or schedule. She finished exactly when she planned on finishing. I don’t think she ever paid any attention to my ranting and raving. I feel no guilt, at once again, being beaten to submission by a 5 foot Peruvian.