alexpgp | Found while... um... procrastinating

Bob Johnson is a colleague of mine in the American Translators Association. I met him a few years ago at the annual ATA conference (in Nashville, if memory serves). The latest issue of SlavFile, the publication of the ATA's Slavic Languages Division, features an interview with Bob, on the occasion of his being the first active division member to actually retire, as opposed to going into another line of work.

The following item was published in that interview, and I plan to keep it close to my work place:

Epitaph of a Procrastinator
He died too young
as do we all
Not a hero, not a martyr, not a saint,
but he, too, died before his work was done.

He planned to clean the garage this weekend
and sort out fifteen years of photographs,
paste them into albums with neat labels,
go on a diet, lose twenty pounds,
stop smoking, write letters to old friends,
tell his children he loves them,
read two years' worth of National Geographic,
and listen to the Saint Matthew Passion.

He leaves behind a cluttered garage,
ten shoe boxes full of photographs,
thirty years worth of good intentions,
and several people who would love him
as far as he allowed.
-- Bob Johnson

Cheers...