Lord of the flies

A couple months ago we had a family get-together to celebrate the Farm Manager's 60th. A photographer was on hand, and the other day the kids gifted us a framed picture taken on the occassion. I'm the grey-beard seated in the middle, with the gang arranged around me, and for the first time in my life, I felt like a patriarch! I savoured that special feeling. I didn't savour it long, though, because nobody in that picture, including the dog, is particularly interested in anything I have to say. An authentic patriarch would be telling them what to do. Everybody in that picture, including the dog, tells me what to do. I'm a complete fraud and a failure as a patriarch. But I have learned how to compensate. I have become the Lord of the Flies. As regular readers will know, now that I'm retired, I don't actually "do" much of anything other than relax on the stoop, watching the world go by... yes, a very empty life, I know, but I think I'm getting the hang of it. Now that we have some summer heat going on, flies are out. House flies, Horse flies, Black flies, and Fruit flies, you name it, they all want to interfere with my stoop mindfulness zen experience. That's when the shit-hammer of death, ie the fly-swatter, sends them to the proverbial better place. I am the Lord of the Flies.