Staying Put

Same place, city, street, neighborhood.  For many years -- you know the postal worker, what time the paper will arrive, who leaves at what time for work, the people two doors down who retire early in the evening.  Familiarity, sameness.  The local grocery store is four blocks away . . . your long time dentist's office is less than one mile.  You have worked at the same job for more than 15 years and expect to retire from there.  The house will need a new roof in a year or so, and recently there was major plumbing repair which had to be done.  Your Christmas present from your husband this year, you hope, will be a new living room suite, and you have already chosen what you want.  Occasionally you purchase a new table or picture for your home, and you are struggling to keep the children happy when they want the newest games and electronic gadgets.  You bowl on Friday nights and play Bunco pretty regularly with some friends.

You have now acquired the three M's . . . mortgage, maintenance, and moldering.  Home ownership, settling, putting down roots, the American dream.  You're there -- and that's pretty much it.  Once per year, everyone coordinates a week and makes a trip somewhere . . . blowing the budget and exhausting everyone.  Then it's back to 'reality' - but whose would that be?

This kind of life is, well, admirable.  Or not.  Those who live it will not really notice one way or another.  Acceptable, expected, and definitely headed for extinction.