Retirements and ATF's

Regarding the recent retirement announcements by Janna, Barbie Hart, and others who have recently gotten out of the biz it’s made me think about ATF’s and the effect they have on us.  For those guys who’s ATF’s are the aforementioned I feel for you.  Most of us probably didn’t get into this looking for an ATF but it happens, and for anyone to say they don’t want one is full of it.  Playing the field is nice but having an ATF that you can connect with is something special.  

I’ve had three ATF’s over the last several years, none of them at the same time.  The first was just a summer fling; the other two were only in the biz for about 6-months and then poof their gone.

While they’re still in the biz everything is great, you see them once a week, or once a month, or whenever there in town visiting, you share emails, phone calls, text messages etc.  Life is good! And you convince yourself that when the retire you’re still stay in touch with them and that’s the case for awhile…then all of a sudden she changes her phone number, there’s the first blow to the gut, you stumble but still standing, then the emails get bounced back as undeliverable, that’s the upper cut to the chin that sends you to the matt.  Reality just put a beat down on your sorry ass…funny thing about reality is that it will pick you back up just as quick, that’s when the phone rings and it’s your wife reminding you to pick up the kids at soccer on your way home from work…seeing those little fuckers getting into the car tells me everything is right in the world again.

Time to look for another ATF to start the cycle all over again.