Next

It's been a year now since I retired, and I thought this would be a good time to consider what it's meant to me. For any who've just recently joined in, I was owned by the state for the previous 30 years, more or less, working mostly as a community college English teacher and administrator--the kind of job that was very an interesting and rewarding thing to be doing, but a wonderful relief to quit.

I had worried in one way that my sense of who I am might mostly come from my work and that when I no longer worked I might find myself feeling unsure of where I fit in the world. That turned out not to be the case. When I first started work, I recall its being a huge identity shift (thinking about my first year of teaching high school at 21) because I went overnight from being a kid to being an adult--from rebel to enforcer, in a way. And when I went back to work later in my 30's, that was an identity shift too, from mom to teacher. Required new clothes (which as Thoreau points out can be a bad sign). Actually maybe that's a clue--at retirement, I didn't so much take on a new outer self as just sort of stop using one that was never quite really me to begin with. I'm just being my Saturday self all the time now, and mostly wearing my Saturday clothes (when I'm not in PJ's till noon and yoga clothes after that--but that was my Saturday outfit!) Clearing out the closet but not so much bringing in new stuff, unless I really want to. But maybe too--after all these years!--my sense of who I am no longer comes entirely from things like what I do and what my job is. Or actually maybe I'm getting to where who I am is not all that important. Maybe.

So then another worry was that when I cut out all the mental, physical, and social activity associated with work, I'd be left with great hollow spaces in my life. Well, no--it was kind of more like digging a hole by the ocean's edge. For everything that I took out of my life, lots more was just waiting to rush in and fill it up. Much more regular writing, more seriously studying Spanish, working harder on meditation and yoga, travelling more, spending time with Lydia, etc. Now Lydia (the baby from China) is leaving, but there'll be something to take her place, too. I don't foresee a problem of nothing to do. In fact, there's stuff I'd planned to do, like getting back to gardening, knitting, and sewing, that I just don't have time for. And my travel plans go on forever.

Last worry was money. I didn't work as long as I could have, didn't get the highest benefits, the extra double-dipping I could have done. I won't know if I regret this really until I'm about 90. But for right now, since I did start getting Social Security soon after retirement, I'm making about what I made before I stopped work, and that's plenty to live on and have a little left for saving or travel (or repairing the old house...). For now, I'm healthy, no big debts, no one else to take care of financially. I'm extremely lucky, here. Good genes and good guidance from Bill--I'd never want to use his money, but I'm glad he doesn't need mine, and I'm really fortunate that he knows so much about money. And what would I pay for such good years of freedom healthy and energetic?

I know people who haven't had such a good experience as I have, and perhaps in the future things won't be quite so good for me either. But I feel fine about having made the choice to do this now. I'm more than lucky to have a good marriage, happy and healthy kids, wonderful old friends and new ones (especially you, flist!) and to in a privileged class in a privileged place where bombs aren't falling on my head.

The one thing I'm beginning to think about more and more is the need to contribute something to the world. It's so nice to live self-indulgently, but I think I really need to get serious about finding some ways to do some worthwhile volunteer work.

I know how many people--how many of you--struggle although you work long hours every day, and reading about your lives reminds me daily that life's not fair--why should things be so easy for me, so tough for you? The wheel turns, and I've been in some bad circumstances, and I know how unfair it is to see someone else having things so much easier. I wish the world were different.

"You are old, father William," the young man said,
"And your hair has become very white;
And yet you incessantly stand on your head
Do you think, at your age, it is right?

"In my youth," father William replied to his son,
"I feared it might injure the brain;
But, now that I'm perfectly sure I have none,
Why, I do it again and again." (Lewis Carroll, of course)

I went back to the intermediate yoga class this morning, and discovered it's gotten a lot more demanding, which is ultimately good. Yoga is definitely one experience that reminds you that your "reach must exceed [your] grasp, or what's a heaven for?" Making progress toward a difficult pose really is more powerful than doing one that's become easy for you.

( Yoga stuff )

Well, thanks to Scroll and Ann and all for guiding me to the handwriting analysis link. It is pretty good--I've had a trained person analyze my writing and they came up with something similar.

( My Handwriting Analysis )

Sorry I've been absent from so many interesting discussions--I went to the beach for a week, most of it alone without a computer. Also without a hurricane! I haven't spent that much time alone in a long time--even when Bill's not here, I'm seeing friends, etc., and spending lots of time writing or online. I rediscovered how wonderful is time on your own.

I can remember a time, right after my first marriage broke up, when I was terrified to spend the night alone--every sound seemed like an imminent attack (of course in those days I slept in a first floor bedroom on a busy street and several times woke to find concrete blocks stacked under my window. Now I sleep on the second floor of secure houses in quieter neighborhoods). And I'd grown up with so many ghost stories at the beach, for a long time even the alarm system didn't help (trusting all you fantasy readers/viewers will understand that).

Now the nights alone mean drifting to sleep with the sounds of crashing waves and whip-poor-wills, and waking to the misty sunrise and the chatter of blackbirds and cardinals. Days alone mean reading all morning, going for long slow kayak rides, wandering the beach, going to art galleries, painting windows, writing backstory for the bad guy, and sitting on the dock with a glass of scotch, watching the tide come in and the sun go down.

Maybe someday I'd get lonely. Not yet. But for some reason I made plans so here I am, back again, and glad to see Bill, chapter five, and all of you.

( Revolution )

I've been getting some email from some people in my old school. I knew they'd need to contact me sometimes about details of unfinished business, and that's fine--I tried to leave everything tied up, but know that's not possible. But this is different--it's a brand-new problem. The administration made a faculty member cancel a section of the minority lit course that had been publicized as focusing on gay and lesbian literature--not because of enrollment, but because of content.

This totally infuriates me on several levels: academic freedom, free speech, and of course the idea that it's fine to look at other minorities but not these. Having a gay son makes me identify with this a bit, too. Adding to the complexity for me is the fact that the instructor of the course is a guy that I'd really had some difficult dealings with in the past over completely unrelated issues, and in those cases had taken the side of the administration (still think I was right then).

I did help rewrite the petition to reinstate the course or offer it next semester, but have since decided that I'm no longer paid to get tied up in knots over what happens there. I'm able to ignore other things, even including the fall off in enrollment and possible cancellation of the program that was my baby, but find it more difficult with this one. Now is not the time, but I think eventually as a citizen and taxpayer I will find myself at least sending an email.

But another part of me says drop it completely, that's the old life. Forget it.

The Road goes ever on and on
Down from the door where it began.
Now far ahead the Road has gone,
And I must follow, if I can,
Pursuing it with eager feet,
Until it joins some larger way
Where many paths and errands meet.
And whither then? I cannot say.

-- J R R Tolkien


Today I was listening to an NPR talk show about American nomads, from the RVs to the trainhoppers, and I had this sudden vision of myself on the road alone--packing a tent and a sleeping bag in my Beetle and hitting the road, ( just going on to the next place )