Is not this the carpenter?

Whatever expectations I had of retirement, I was wrong.

I left the city heady with dreams of rocking-chairs and pre-lunch beers. After a week, I was bored. After a month, I was worryingly close to brain death. Mrs Dragonfly had had enough. ‘You’ve moved from between my legs to under my feet,’ she said.

She’s all for honesty, that one.

I suspect my next step was what all men everywhere would do: I went to the pub. After some post-dinner whiskies, I discovered the comforting truth that, in a valley full of retired people, my inertia was familiar.

The old geezers blinked, mumbled encouragingly, and nodded in agreement. They’d all been goaded into new and hitherto undreamt-of hobbies. It didn’t really matter what, as long as they were out of the house, but carpentry seemed the way to go. Every one of them and his dog was an expert. Peak View Sawmills had seen them all – what stories the Grays could tell!

Besides, I thought, if it was good enough for Jesus’ dad (Joseph, not the other one), then who was I to argue? Apart from making really useful stuff, I could add a veneer of virtue to my reasons for buying all those wonderful tools.

The other great thing about woodwork was that I could start small (bird tables, shelves, walking-sticks), the failures could become objets d’art for the wife’s amusement (or, failing that, firewood), and I could work my way up (a double-storey house, for instance).

I’m not there yet, but, after three years, I’m no longer the worst carpenter in the valley. I have a chicken coop, two decks, and a ton of failures in the hearth to my name. I’m not at the level of Clive Parker, Graham Barry, or Roy Strydom, but nor am I plumbing the depths of the local league table. (I’m mentioning no names; even noms de plume are decipherable.)

If I were ever asked to talk about the afterlife, I could find a lesson in this.

My advice: when you arrive at the pearly gates and St Peter, Mohammed, or whoever asks you, get your hobby request in early, because it’s for sure that your wife will have no truck with clouds and harps. Take up something that will keep you occupied, and from under your wife’s feet, for ever.

Whatever expectations you have of heaven, you’re probably wrong.