I’ve only been gone about three weeks, but things can change quickly. As many of you already know, Jean has decided to sell the house in town and we’re buying a condo near Hastings Country Club. It’s the house that Jean grew up in and I didn’t expect her to ever want to move, but things change.

We ran today from Jon and Laura’s house. Everyone is kind of “in between” events, so we’re all just running to stay fit and not running all that long (if you call running 6 miles “short”). After the run we were standing out in front (it was a beautiful day for running) and I noticed Martin was missing most of a couple of his teeth. I asked him if he was getting ready to move to West Virginia, but he didn’t really see the humor in that.

Apparently he was pulling on a wrench really hard and it slipped, hitting him in the mouth and breaking off a couple of his front teeth. That’s the story he’s telling, but he may have told Jane he was going to do another Ironman next year and she took exception to his plan.

At coffee yesterday morning “Never Again Diane” said she would be interested in doing Ironman North America at Lake Placid in 2008 if others of us did also. I can still see her at The Great Floridian, her first Ironman race, coming across the finish line saying never again! I was sleeping quite a bit after Ironman Wisconsin in 2003, but people tell me she said several times after she finished, never again! Apparently “never again” has arrived.

I’ve said that I wouldn’t ever spend another winter in Michigan when I could be riding my bike and running in warm weather in Florida. I’ll be leaving to go back on December 5th and arriving there on the 6th. Jean will fly down on the 21st to spend the winter. But I’m guessing we’ll be back sometime in January to close on the condo. And, if the house on Green Street sells, we’ll have to come back to move. That coupled with the time I’ll need to be available to assist in interviewing and hiring a new CEO at Pennock, and I can see myself spending more time up North than I had planned. Things change.

But as I looked around the table at coffee yesterday morning and at the run this morning, things haven’t changed all that much after all. Life goes on and we’re all along for the ride. So if everything stayed exactly the same, life would be really dull. I guess the changes are normal and I just notice them more, either because I’ve been away and am seeing them for the first time, or because I’m about to hit the big six-oh and I’m trying to take my mind off being officially “elderly”.

Just (Still In My Fifties But Time Is Running Out) Jack