The Boomer Chronicles

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Dan the Early Retired Man: My Last Winter Ever Posted: 22 Feb 2011 07:52 AM PST My cousin Dan, who retired in 2009 from the U.S. Postal Service at age 53, is moving to Arizona, leaving behind frigid Minnesota: My realtor called just after 2:00 pm. "You have a signed contract." The tears started to flow. When I called my wife, all I could get out was "We're moving to Arizona!" Minnesota has a lot of good qualities, chief among them is spring. Yes, there is clean air, good schools, and 10,000 lakes, too, but spring in Minnesota is magical. (Before Jesse Ventura and Michele Bachmann, Minnesota even had good politicians.) But this winter has been brutal, the worst in our 17 years. When my snowblower broke down during the December blizzard, I lost it ("Lost it" is being kind). But last week was the final straw. We were flying back from our yearly pilgrimage to warmth. It was late afternoon and the sun was exiting fast. When we broke through the overcast, all I could see was gray. The farms were gray, the streets were gray and the salt-covered cars on the ground were gray. Winter in Minnesota is the definition of gray. We spent last week gazing at the blue of Lake Havasu, the purple of Monument Valley, and the brown of Canyon de Chelly. In just three hours all that color had been drained away as if Mother Nature herself was on vacation. To make it worse, the temperature had dropped 80 degrees — 80 degrees in less than three hours! It all happened very fast. The current owners of the house we liked in Arizona lowered the price, which triggered an automated email to my wife. My wife forwarded the email to me and then I forwarded it to my friend Sandy who lives in Arizona. Sandy and my realtor called me from the house the next day. "The kitchen appliances are old," Sandy said. "Perfect," I replied. The deal I have with my wife is simple. If we move, she gets a new kitchen with a double oven, and I get to be warm. "There is no island in the kitchen," she reported. Perfect again, we hate those kitchen islands. "How about that stupid media wall," I asked. In early 2000, the builders in the area started building these walls full of square holes for TVs and speakers. Except now, TVs are rectangular. Sandy confirmed, "No media wall." An automatic email announced the new price. We took a virtual tour of the house on a web site and checked out the neighborhood via Google Earth. We viewed the backyard using Bing's Bird's Eye and even walked down the street by means of Google's Street View. The contracts were emailed, printed, scanned and returned in hours.

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