This blog has had quite a rest since my previous post back in 2019. Not going to even attempt to "catch you up" dear readers... Instead, I will start with observations from this side of the the Working vs. Retirement fence.
We will mark our first 5 years of retirement in just a couple months on June 21st, and while it has largely been a very positive experience, there have been some surprises along the way. Here are a few discoveries we've made along the way;
- Age is relative when it comes to friendships. We have made many new friends in our new community in our first years as retirees. Some are our age, but many are much older or much younger than we are. While that made logical sense in our working lives, it has been almost surprising in our new post-working life. We have found many vibrant new friends who are further into their "golden years" than we are. This has been fun and a good thing. It's only tricky when it comes to finding doctors. We generally want doctors who are younger than we are... a good deal younger if possible.
- Unlimited free time isn't all it's cracked up to be. Maybe this one is a hazard particularly for former teachers who spent most of their working lives with very little discretionary time during the work day. In my first year of retirement, I promised myself 6 months before I made any long term commitments. I was tired, SO very tired. I wanted to read, relax, and do just about nothing. That lasted a very short time. We moved just a few weeks after our official retirement because our home in Missouri sold so quickly (less than two weeks!). This meant all the fix-ups we wanted to do on our new residence in Michigan had to be done after we moved in instead of before we made our move. We got tons of stuff accomplished and added a full guest suite to our lower level. It kept us hopping from late June until mid October when we finally declared we were finished. THEN when we stopped, we were suddenly "bored". How could that be?? We decided it was a result of not knowing how to pace ourselves, but boredom does indeed lurk in the retirement world. The solution? Commitments!
- Doing for others with others makes for a great life. Enter the time of "joining" things again. Church, Lions Club, Community Theater, Library Trustees, Soccer Coaching, Set building, Choir, Book Club, Fellowship groups... we got busy again. Our kids tell us we're busier now than when we were working. I don't think it is quite true, but we have found ways to fill our days. When we recently celebrated our 50th we decided to (in Ed's words) "pitch a big one" and invited all our new friends to share an evening of food and dancing with us. We quickly discovered we had nearly 90 folks to invite and 86 of them were able to come! That felt amazingly good. We may have to do it again every five years or so. Partying with the new friends you've made is amaziing. Your friends seem to inter-connect in the most surprising ways. Our church, theater, Lions, and neighborhood pals are amazing and so fun to be around! And we loved having our kids get to meet them all!
- You visit the doctor more than you ever imagined you would. The only negative thing so far in retirement is how much harder you have to work to remain healthy. I used to see a doctor only once or twice in an entire year. Now it has become a monthly or bimonthly visit to one of several medical folks who keep Ed and I doing well. You have primary care, eye care, dental care, skin care, cardiology care, oncology care (Ed, not me and doing fine), sleep doctor care, knee doctor, physical therapists, etc etc. All these folks are wonderful, and we appreciate them greatly. However, they fill up more space in our calendar than we ever expected they would! Getting older is not for the faint of heart in terms of health.
That's where I will stop for today.... and hopefully, I will be back before 6 more years have scampered by.
Staude's out!
