Debts come due
Just a bit of deferred maintenance. (Image by Emslichter)
How do you transport an unregistered car to a new state in order to get it registered?
As it happens, there’s a plan for that. For instance, the state of Maine offers a ten-day transit permit that functions as a temporary registration.
And that would have been great for me, but the flimsy transit plate blew clean off the car somewhere in South Carolina only a few hours into my trip from Atlanta to Maine. So I got out the screwdriver and put on my old Georgia tag and hoped for the best.
A few hundred miles later, when I went over the George Washington Bridge, I wondered where the invoice for the automated toll would go. After all, my Georgia registration was associated with an address where I no longer lived. Strangely, creepily, the bill came directly to my home in Maine six weeks later.
I’d rather not dwell on how much information strangers and government agencies have about me. However, this saga got me thinking about debts, literal and metaphorical. Sooner or later, they come due, and you can’t always predict when they will arrive and how much you’ll be asked for. In fact, some of our choices lead to consequences we can’t have foreseen, yet we’re on the hook for them anyway.
As the threat of the coronavirus recedes in most of the United States, I’ve done a bit of traveling and visiting. My immune system, now unaccustomed to being around other humans, was not able to withstand a redeye flight, a subsequent bus trip, and jet lag. I caught a cold (lots of sneezing; there’s no sneezing with Covid). Of course I did. Did I think I could dance around the globe without paying the price?
Meanwhile, days of visiting with family took their toll on my work. I found myself scrambling to catch up, working long hours just to get back to zero. But then I realized that I wasn’t just recovering from a couple of weeks of fun. There’s an extensive backlog from days and weeks and months of listlessness and lethargy during the pandemic. I wasn’t in a constant state of decreased productivity, but I definitely cycled through periods of lower output. Just when I’d like to be out having fun, I’ve got a lot of stuff to do. It looks like I’ll be catching up for awhile.
Meanwhile, meanwhile, I spent my adult life not having children, not saving money, consuming sugar, not doing crunches and not learning a foreign language. It should be no surprise to find that my home life, bank account, dental health, and core strength are what they are. And no surprise that I can’t do much more than order a taco in Spanish.
The bills come due. I am grateful that I don’t have arthritis (yet) or impaired hearing (yet). I am mobile and able and still have almost all of the choices I had in my twenties. But the bills come due eventually. They’ll find me wherever I am, and I have to be ready to pay.
I have invested wisely in some areas, and I hope it’s not too late in others. I have, as a result of age and the pandemic, a renewed appreciation for some of the basic joys and privileges of life. I don’t take my health, my family, or my career for granted. I appreciate being able to wake up early in the morning in a peaceful home, and then I equally appreciate being able to leave it and go virtually anywhere I want. My freedom is priceless.
Someday, inshallah, I will be old. Maybe, as a result of my choices over the preceding decades, I’ll have stooped shoulders and a job bagging groceries at Hannaford. Maybe I’ll live independently, or perhaps I’ll have dementia like my grandmother did. Will I still be able to play the piano or go for a walk? I don’t know. I do know that what I have, I may not have forever. I ought to make the most of it while I can.
