I am having a real time problem. Retirement was supposed to hand me buckets of free time. Instead I’ve traded one calendar for four, plus a grocery list that never ends.

On the bright side, I’m collecting misadventures faster than ever. Documenting them is where I keep losing. So here’s the current lineup of things eating my hours, in the order they occurred to me.

The hockey boys are back, appetites fully intact. They eat well, generally. What we’ve learned is that “eating well” comes with fine print.

For years we blamed their parents for this. A childhood of fast food runs between practices will shape a palate. This year’s contribution to the family vocabulary is the classic “I don’t eat tomatoes” and “I don’t eat cheese,” which after some gentle interrogation turns out to mean no whole tomatoes and no cheese specifically on tacos or hamburgers. Somehow that’s more specific while creating more questions.

We’re navigating it. What we haven’t solved is quantity, since we’re still cooking for our local kids too, and it’s only the start of the second week of practice. Once the warm-up leftovers start surviving in the fridge instead of getting fought over as second dinner after nine o’clock, that’s our signal it’s safe to go back to boring.

Then there’s the billet coordinator, who giveth and taketh. Really, it’s the coach making every call. The coordinator is just one of the minions relaying it with a cheerful “yes, sir.”

All of our boys made it through the first cut and played in the intrasquad scrimmage. One didn’t show well and was on a plane to “Plan B” the next day. The bed sat empty exactly one night before a non-tendered, non-drafted player got invited to move out of his hotel and into ours. I got a little scrappy making that happen, and I regret nothing.

We don’t do this for the money. It doesn’t hurt that there is some, and in exchange we feed these kids well and let them load up the wifi with all of their devices. And, if feeling extremely generous, we even let them control their own thermostat at night.

In three weeks I’m scheduled to acquire two more granddaughters. My daughter is finishing her last week of Zoom consulting, and everyone has quietly agreed it’s better to have grandpa on standby than to have her explain to a client that she needs a minute for baby maintenance.

So my calendar now includes clementine distribution and teaching a toddler exciting new ways to play with toys she already owns, mostly because grandpa needs the entertainment. This is genuinely on my top ten list of things I want to be doing with my life. It has been fulfilling, but grandpa needs a little variety there, too.

The last item is the one I complain about the least: getting to know these hockey kids while I still have them under my roof. Dinners run long. Plans get pushed to make room for them.

Any of them could be gone tomorrow or here through the end of the season, and I’d rather spend the time now than look back in April wishing I had. The billet fees cover food, laundry access, and the basics of keeping a teenager alive. I haven’t run the actual math, but I’d bet money we don’t turn a profit on any of it.

Somewhere between retirement, travel, and grandkids we apparently can’t say no to, the hockey hosting is going to get squeezed out eventually. Whenever that day comes, I want to have done it well and left these boys wanting more, not counting down the days until we stop showing up.

Nobody handed me a vote on how this fall’s schedule filled up, and I wouldn’t trade a single piece of it. I’ll find the time somewhere. Probably by writing shorter posts about it, which defeats the purpose, but here we are.