Butch Lawson

After more than 80 years of nearly constant practice and exhaustive training, I am embarrassed to admit that my tongue still can't stay out of the way of my teeth. Just as disappointing is my starboard cheek, which gets slammed nearly as often as my tongue.

I spent my career in a world where numbers defined success or failure, profit or loss, win or lose. It could be at once rewarding and heartbreaking. I made some lifelong friends — men to ride the river with, as they say in Texas — and I encountered a few black-hearted snakes destined, I hope, for a long swim in the Lake of Fire.

As ol' Al Tennyson said, "In the Spring a young man's fancy lightly turns to thoughts of love." First, that's a young man's problem, and, as I remember, there was nothing "light" about that particular fancy. But, more to the point, while young men have their own challenges, the rest of us also have stuff to be happy about in the spring.

This month we're talking about my 40th birthday. There was no party, no plane ride, but it was memorable for a different reason. At that time I had a wife, a couple of kids, a mortgage, two car payments, a crappy day job in a factory, and a tight, four-piece country band. I had everything I needed for a head-on collision with reality, and it did not disappoint.

When the nurse came into the examining room, she came in hurriedly, a fresh smile on her face and hand extended in what she must have felt was a normal workday greeting situation. I was sitting there on the parchment paper-covered table in a too-small hospital gown that was missing one of the two strings used to tie it closed in the back.

The calendar says it's still autumn, but I know winter when I see it. As I write this, there is snow on the ground, it's 30 degrees, and the weather station says there's a 30-mph westerly wind gusting to over 40. There are whitecap rollers in the bay and I'm loving Maine being Maine. But, for some reason, today's weather makes me think of a time long ago when Maine weather taught me a life lesson that I'll share with you.

Long ago and not far away there was a land of Sufficient. "Plenty" had not yet come, but in the land of Sufficient we had what we needed. Oh, there were signs of Plenty here and there during the summers, but mostly we had just what we needed. For us, that was Plenty.

Like most of us, I can be caught out among other humans sporting a less-than-elegant appearance, but most of the time I'm at least presentable. I'm aware, though, that my desire to be squared away when out and about puts me into a shrinking minority of out-and-abouters.

While I wasn't paying attention, autumn happened. I'm not sure exactly when, but the telltale signs are there, the most noticeable of which is that the towels and washcloths in the bathrooms have changed color. This is via some wife-decorator sorcery that happens twice a year. One summer morning the towels are light blue and then, without warning, they are red. They'll stay red until someday next spring, when they will again be light blue.

It doesn't matter whether it's stamps, street rods, guns, fishing rods, guitars, tools, widgets or whatever. If a man collects something he loves and appreciates, it's likely that, at several points in his collector journey, he'll be challenged by his loving and concerned spouse.