Stagnation Breeds Boredom

Posted on Sun 11th Apr, 2021 @ 5:43am by Chief Petty Officer Larry Kersenboom (Ret.)

909 words; about a 5 minute read

Mission: Business Not At All As Usual
Location: Larry Kersenboom's apartment, Deck 1548
Timeline: MD-8, 1300 hours

"You have to evolve; stagnation breeds boredom." --Anonymous

0700 hours

Larry Kersenboom read his morning email and groaned with disappointment.

Hey, all--I threw out my back--can't even get out of bed without screaming--so there will be no gaming until my back recovers. If it's true to form, it shouldn't take more than a week. Figure out what mischief you guys would like to get into at the Court of Tareya, and PM me about it. I can still use a PADD, at least. I'll see you next Wednesday night. --Karen

Larry immediately wrote back. Sorry to hear the news about your back. Is there anything you need me to bring you while you're under the weather?

He waited a few minutes for a reply but suspected that Karen was by now taking pain meds or muscle relaxers and wasn't in a fit state to be typing much on her PADD. He sighed. Just when they were about to start the adventure, this had to happen. Karen had injured her back as a young woman. It had never fully recovered, and she had had to be medically discharged from Starfleet because of it.

Three days of gaming weren't going to happen now. Larry rolled his eyes at his disappointment, knowing that he was being rather self-centered. Ah, well, I can watch some holo-vids, get caught up on my reading, loaf around my quarters naked...whatever. Maybe I'll go for a walk. There's Charlie's fish & chips stand in Tivoli Gardens. Good stuff. I'll go there for lunch.

"Computer, run the Taltos vid series," he said aloud and settled down in his easy chair to watch the adventures of Vlad Taltos.

It was 1300 hours before Larry blinked and realized that he'd dozed off in the middle of Jhereg, which was the first installment in the series. "Well, frizzlesnort," he grumbled. "Now I'll have to watch it again." He sighed and put on some clothes, including one of his favorite Hawaiian shirts, hoping he could still grab some fish & chips before Charlie sold out. He rode the turbolift down six decks and got out.

"Hey, Charlie," he said and waved, perking up as he arrived at the stand. There was a short line, but it looked like Charlie still had plenty of fish to fry.

So what am I gonna do after lunch? Larry wondered. He had nowhere to be, nothing to do, no one to answer to for his time. He was completely, utterly, free and couldn't think of a thing to do. Sure, he could wander around the Promenade, but what was the point in that? Clean his quarters? They already were clean. Much as he liked to yammer on about not having to keep his quarters tidy, he'd been in Starfleet long enough that keeping clean quarters was ingrained into him. So was getting up at the crack of 'dawn.'

I could learn to skateboard, he thought as a teenager whizzed past on one, hopped it up onto a park bench, rolled along the bench, and then hopped back down to the sidewalk. Larry shuddered and hastily discarded the idea. I'm not 20 anymore. I would break my fool neck.

It was hell when you could feel that you weren't 20 anymore.

Maybe he could tinker with some appliance or other? But nothing in his quarters needed repairing; everything in his quarters worked perfectly. Larry mused that he should have planned for this. He'd planned financially of course, but he hadn't planned mentally. He hadn't planned for how to occupy his days, outside of work. How annoying. Usually, I'm more organized than this. Usually, I have a plan. I just didn't expect to retire so soon.

He got to the front of the line, ordered a couple of fish filets, chips, and a soft drink from Charlie, and sat down on one of the river-facing park benches to eat his lunch. Normally, this would be the life, sitting on a park bench watching ducks, barges, and steamboats toodle down a river. Young children chased each other along the riverbank as their parents called out to them to be careful.

I don't have to decide this in the next five minutes Larry told himself. But that was half the problem. He didn't have to decide anything in the next five minutes, except perhaps for whether to bite into his fish now or swallow his drink.

An aroma of fried fish wafted past his nose, and he glanced at Charlie's stand, smiling. And then a thought occurred to him. Charlie did not look like a young spring chicken. In fact, Charlie might be older than he himself was. Charlie was working.

You know, there's nothing says I can't look for work on this starbase, to have something to do between gaming sessions, Larry thought. Just because I retired from my job on Mars doesn't mean I can't work another day in my life. How's about I look for something here? 'Cause I will go stir-crazy if I don't work at something. Doesn't have to be full-time, and it's better if it's not.

Larry nodded to himself. Yeah, let's do this.

 

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