The one very wonderful thing about being retired is that on Sunday nights I can watch television and not worry about that horrible next day called Monday. I remember in the bad old, good old days when I would be enjoying the dour Ed Sullivan Show and pangs of anxiety would creep into my stomach.

What was waiting and lurking in the office that I would have to confront? Emergencies are a part of life and had to be dealt with. However, you never knew from what direction and at what intensity they would attack you. As the acrobats tumbled my insides rumbled as Mr. Sullivan fumbled with his halting diction as emcee.

On vacations I would also get a mild form of this anxiety. Being away from the office for a week or 10 days opened up a Pandora's Box of possibilities. Would the person covering for me make the right decisions? Would they exacerbate a minor situation and blow it up into a major explosion? My mind ran away with the horrible possibilities. Usually nothing happened, but that was no real consolation.

A friend of mine stated that while he was physically present in his office, nothing could go wrong. He would defuse any major or minor contention. That was why he was at work at 6 a.m. We cannot be at the job 24/7, and all work and no play does "make Jack a dull boy."

As a working busboy or waiter after a season of laboring in the dining room of the Catskill Mountains, I got the same pangs after Labor Day on my way home to the Bronx. The George Washington Bridge caused me to go into a melancholy state knowing that school was not very far behind.

There you have it!

No more rumbling of the stomach!

No more sleepless nights!

No more fear of the unknown!

Retirement has turned Monday into a glorious day that inaugurates a brand new week. It was worth working for 45 years to be able to relax on the night before Monday.