I'm on My Honeymoon!

One week of real retirement is done, and I hope I have a zillion more.

When I first started working in 1980, I didn’t have time to consider retirement. As my career continued and I saw colleagues put in their time, I wondered what real retirement would feel like. Let me tell you, it’s not just lying around and doing nothing. My friends have said that what they found about retirement is that they don’t see how they ever worked because their lives are so busy. After only a week, I’m believe them.

Psychologists determined that retirement is one of life’s major transitions, and like love and grief, has emotional phases that people go through. In 2000, professor and author Robert Atchley labeled the phases of retirement:

1.  Pre-retirement

2.  The Big Day

3.  Honeymoon Phase

4.  Disenchantment

5.  Reorientation

6.  Routine

I’ve passed through the planning and saving of stage 1 and really felt the love in stage 2.

Right now I’m in the honeymoon phase of bragging about not having to set an alarm clock to all of my former colleagues. Although I'm happy that I'm not having to make lesson plans or grade essays, to me the best part of being retired is not having to pick out clothes to wear to work. 

I’m carrying out many of the major plans I made during the last few years of work. These plans are mainly concerning my house and yard.

I know the yard work will never be completed, but I tackle a couple of yard projects each day and then usually jump into the pool to cool off. At times like these, my pool is worth every cent it costs. 

For a year, I have planned for some updates to the pool – new liner, salt filtration, steps, etc. Finding someone to do the work has been an ongoing problem. I talked with five different businesses last fall and only one gave me a bid. This week I called another pool repair business, and the man told me he was really busy but he would get with me next week. What the heck?

This week, I’ve had two contractors come to see about remodeling my kitchen. There’s nothing wrong with my kitchen except that it’s 35 years old. The way I see it, this is the last kitchen I’ll ever have so I’m going to spruce it up and make it something I’ll enjoy for my remaining stages of retirement.

 

The hard part is deciding what I want to change. I'm overwhelmed with all the ideas on Pinterest and Houzz. I’m afraid to make a decision about cabinets and counters because I don’t know how it will turn out. There are many trends in kitchens like glass backsplashes, can lights, granite countertops. 

My husband pointed out that everyone thinks he/she should have granite counters but that trend has been around for about ten years. He thinks now everyone will start tearing them out. The same with stainless appliances -- he and I have both lived through coppertone, avocado, and harvest-gold colored appliances, so he might be right in his theory. 

I’ll get cost estimates from the contractors next week. That’s when I’ll have to decide what trend I’ll go with.

The attic and garage are in line for proper cleanings when the weather cools. I have been keeping the attic door closed for the past few years. After I park my van, I walk through the garage with blinders on to avoid the accumulation of treasures. I always figured it wasn't so bad since I could still park my van in it.

I'm not sure when the disenchantment stage will hit me, but I'm confident that it will. 

During my short time of retirement, I've already figured out that retirement is fantastic if you have lots of money to spend. If I had piles of money, I'd always be in the honeymoon stage. Money may not buy love or happiness, but it can pay for lots and lots of happy experiences which can keep you happy, or at least in avoidance, for a long time.

You Just Aren't Sharing My Vision!

Summer is over. Everyone (but me) is going back to school, and I have to say, I'm ready for fall. It's not that I'm necessarily sick of the hot weather because I haven't had to endure too much of it. I was in the land of cool temps, the Blue Ridge Mountains of North Carolina. Now that I'm back in "Hell"ahassee, I am sorry for those who had to suffer with this miserable heat and humidity.

Like many of you, I can’t believe how quickly the summer months passed. Since it's over, I can get busy living the retired life, whatever that is. 

Whenever I complete chunks of time, I like to reflect on how I spent them, and I can say that parts of this summer are ones that I don’t want to repeat. During these months, I kept thinking of this phrase that I used to say to my yearbook students when they weren’t designing their pages the way I had taught them. I’d tell them, “You just aren’t sharing my vision!”

This summer, I don’t think any of my family members shared my vision I had for me and them. What I had planned for the summer was getting to the cooler temperatures, kicking back and reading lots of books, writing blog posts in order to get ahead, hiking and swimming every day, and laughing a lot. My plan for them was to occupy themselves and leave me alone unless I wanted or needed them. What actually happened was far from my vision.

Much of my summer was spent driving and taking people where they wanted or needed to go. I went to Charlotte, NC, twice to take my daughter to the airport and bus station. I went to Brevard, NC, three times to take/visit/pick-up Drew at camp. I went to Tallahassee and back for my husband’s doctor appointment. 

The only fun trips were to Charlotte to see Taylor Swift and to Ashville to see the Biltmore. The other driving was for the necessary shopping but in all, I put over 7,000 miles on my van in 2.5 months.

I also envisioned not cooking this summer. I thought everyone would be satisfied with sandwiches and cereal. Nope. They actually wanted cooked food EVERY DAY, so I had to make daily trips to the grocery store because when you are in an RV, there’s not a lot of food storage. I got into a rut of shop, cook and clean up.

This summer I also didn’t have a washer/dryer and had to go to the Laundromat weekly. When I was in college, the one I used cost $.10 each to wash and dry. Now it costs at least $2.00 to wash and $2.00 to dry. That’s for one load of clothes, and never did I have one load this summer. Also, the machines only took quarters, and I became obsessed with searching for quarters to feed the white monsters.

Now that summer's over and I'm back home, I may have to adjust my retirement vision. I thought I'd have lazy days when I could binge-watch TV, read an entire book in a day or lounge by the pool all day. The problem is that I look around at all the yard and house work that I put off until I wasn't working and think that I should get busy. 

When does this easy life of retirement that people used to tell me about actually start? Maybe that tale was just someone else's vision that will never become a reality. 

I hope I'm wrong.

Ok, I'm retired. Now what?

When I started this blog over a year ago, I stated that the purpose was to use my writing and your thoughts and comments to help me transition into retirement. Well, June 3, 2015 was my R-Day, the day I've been yearning for, the date I set on my phone’s countdown app, and the date to mark changes in my life. 

That date came and went, and not much has changed except that I will now earn less than half my regular paycheck. Maybe it's because I'm used to having summers off that it doesn't seem like retirement. June, July and half of August were always spent at home or traveling, so this summer feels the same as the others. I'll probably feel differently when my friends and granddaughter go back to school and Drew goes back to work at FSU. I'll let you know.

In order to not get bored, I have lined up some activities to do in the fall. I want to learn to play Bridge so I can keep my mind sharp. There’s a class starting in September that I’ll take. The class is in the middle of the day. Yes, the MIDDLE of the day, and I won’t have to take time off work.  It’s probably filled with retirees, too, so I’ll meet new people. That’s something to look forward to.

I also have home renovations planned, namely the kitchen and my pool. Those projects will take up a lot of time and money, but they must be done. I've always hated projects like these, but now I'll have time to make unhurried decisions. I might actually enjoy spending all that money!

I also have some volunteer work that I hope to do. I’ll get those all lined up in the fall. I hope that I can concentrate on my health now that I have no excuse for taking time for myself. Maybe I’ll lose that extra 50 pounds.

My retired friends say that when I get fully into the swing of retirement, I won't know how I ever worked an 8 hours job because I'll have so many activities to keep me busy. I hope not. For now, this summer, the summer I’ve dreamed and planned for the past year, I hope to spend in North Carolina doing nothing breathing deeply.

One thing I’m unsure of now is what the focus of this blog can be. I can’t very well have it about getting ready for retirement since that’s a done deal. Until I can decide on a focus, I will tell some of my “newly-retired-person” stories. Of course, I’ll write about other events, activities, world issues, etc., that are sure to bore you. I’d appreciate your suggestions of a direction/focus. 

What are you going to DO?

After hearing about my upcoming retirement, people often ask, “What are you going to do when you retire?”

It took me a while to come to the decision to do nothing for a year. I think it’ll take me that long to get used to a new routine of not having to go to work. After that year, I’ll just see what presents itself.

I’ll be only 57 this year, so everyone assumes that I’ll go back to work until that magic age of 62 when I can start collecting my social security. Having only half of my regular paycheck beginning July 1 makes me think I’ll have to get another job at some point. I’m just not sure I want to teach anymore. After 34 ½ years, I’m wondering if teaching was the best choice of a career for me.

Why did I become a teacher? I admired all the teachers I had and wanted to have that type of respect. I’m a pretty funny person and having that captive audience was a good incentive to teach, too.

When I was in high school, I took one of those interest inventory tests which said I’d be a good funeral home worker. Sometimes when I’m delivering the lecture of my life and look out at my students with their heads on their desks or a zoned-out look in their eyes, I think that’s actually what I am doing.

I now have the opportunity to find another career path. Since I’m older and hopefully wiser, I have made a list of criteria I want in a dream job.

1.  Go to work around 9:00 a.m. and get off at 2:30 p.m. No more going to work in the dark! I’d also need an hour for lunch so I could calmly eat a meal while discussing important world events with my very intelligent co-workers.

2.  Leave work at work. Don’t bring home anything from the office to do at home, not even checking work email.  Now that we can access our work-world via the cloud 24/7, more and more work will be done at home. Work stress becomes home stress which then becomes work stress.  Many people love working from home as in virtual teaching or being a virtual assistant and that might work for me. However, I need to be around people. I can’t see being at home all day, cleaning and cooking for my family, as a thrilling job. I know it works for many people, but I’m not sure I’m cut out for it.

3.  Wear a uniform. Honestly, when I look at jobs I might want after I retire, I look to see the dress code.  I’d love to wear scrubs, especially now that they come in such nice patterns and colors. At a local hospital, the clerical staff is required to wear a uniform of gray pants, vest, skirt, jacket with a nice light blue blouse. That’s it. Every day. I can’t imagine having to make no decision about what to wear.

4.  There would be an actual break in the schedule for you to go to the bathroom, get a sip of water or take a walk around the building to clear your head.

5.  The boss has everything planned out for you so you don’t have to invent plans. However, if you come up with something great that would benefit all, the boss would gladly listen and share your plan with others to see if it’s feasible. In short, the boss would be a leader who sincerely listens to his employees.

I know that I’ll never find a job that will give me all of these options, but I said earlier that it is a dream job, right? If I truly find myself needing to go to work again, I’ll take just about any job where I can use what I have learned over the years. 

At my age, I decided that I will never work for a company/boss who doesn’t respect and do its/his best for the employees or clientele. I have often told my friends that I hope I am never so desperate that I have to work for Comcast because of the terrible experiences I have had with that company. It turns out that I am not alone according to a recent piece at Huffington Post.

Most Hated Companies in America -- Time Warner and Comcast

As far as a future job is concerned, I'll just have to wait and see what comes. For the next year, however, you'll find me here:

or here:

Right now, I'm tempted to find a job like Kevin Spacey did after quitting his long-time, well-paying job in American Beauty:

What is your dream job?

Finding Joy Amid a Stressful Holiday Season

We make Christmas such a stressful time. First, we have to do the shopping for just the right gift, only to then worry that the person will not like it. Next is all of the decorating that doesn't get done in one day but becomes an ongoing process throughout the month of December. At my house, decorating gets put off until almost too late to do it. Finally, there is all the extra "stuff" in the house that makes the place feel so cluttered. Often during this time of year, I have to stop myself from becoming the Grinch and find joy in events that don't happen at other times of the year.

Christmas cards – Wow! This exchanging of cards has certainly changed over the years. It used to be that people sent simple cards reminding us of the reason for the season, the joy of the holiday time or the anticipation of Santa Claus. These were prettily/gaudily decorated with some winter scene, glowing angels or Santa and his elves.

Now people send the funniest and/or cutest cards that really show the personality of their family. I have two friends with twins (Is there some kind of mathematical problem here? Friends² x twins²?) whose Christmas cards truly show the joy and trouble of raising two or more kids. These cards bring a big smile to my face each year. I actually save these cards and enjoy comparing them from year to year.

Children's programs – Honestly, I should be done with children’s Christmas programs at my age. However, my son with Down syndrome attends a performing arts program for adults with disabilities, and they have a Christmas performance each year. This year, the clients actually wrote a musical that showed how talented they are. The show included Christmas songs and lively dances as well as excellent acting. These people are serious about their craft, and I’m always amazed at what they can do.

I also attended the performance of the Capital Children’s Choir, a musical program offered by FSU to children in kindergarten through ninth grades who want learn about music. My granddaughter is a member and has been rehearsing for the past ten weeks. This program is one of the best kept secrets in town. For only $30 a year, a child learns to read music and to sing songs in other languages from FSU music students and their college professor, Dr. Suzanne Byrnes.

Silly jokes – We have an Elf on the Shelf in our house. This year, Twinkle has left some pretty funny jokes for Cloee (and me) to enjoy.

If athletes get athlete’s foot, what do elves get? Mistle-toes

What’s a parent’s favorite Christmas carol? Silent Night

How many elves does it take to change a light bulb? Ten – one to fix the bulb and nine to stand on each other’s shoulders so he can reach the bulb.

And my personal favorite:

What did one snowman say to the other snowman? Do you smell carrots?

Parties – I don’t go to many parties during this season; however, my work friends usually get together at someone’s house and enjoy lots of laughs, good food and catching up. We always invite the retired teachers, and I love hearing about how they are doing in their new lives. One friend inspired me when she said, “Next year, we can ride together to party.”

Finishing the semester – I know I’ll miss a lot of my job next year, but this year I’m having fun counting down the days. After giving the semester exam in my dual-enrolled English classes, I started cleaning out file drawers, throwing out countless copies of grammar exercises that I won’t use again and passing on my units/lesson plans to teacher friends. We teachers are packrats, collecting anything that we may one day use to impart knowledge to today’s youth. Some of my units date back to my first year teaching and are printed using a mimeograph copier. I plan to have everything cleaned out of my classroom by June 1 so that on my official last day, June 3, I can walk out of school with only my car keys in hand. (Who is tired of hearing about my upcoming retirement? I only mention it in almost every post!)

I hope each of you has a wonderful holiday with as little stress as possible. Go out and find some fun activities that only happen this time of year.

Money-Saving Tips I Learned from Experience

In two weeks, I'll begin what I hope is my last year working. I am a proud public-school teacher and have been for 34 years. Because I am a poorly paid public servant, money, or the lack of, has often been a concern in my home. Fortunately, we have never had to go without our needs, just some of our wants. We've always been able to pay our bills, so we've never had the electricity or phone disconnected for nonpayment. We've always had enough food to eat.

Why am I now so concerned with money? Because I realize just how fragile my family's economy is. In one year, my salary will be reduced to 46% of what it is now. I'll be 57 when I retire which a long way from that old-age savior -- social security. Ten years ago, when I finally figured out that I would experience such a shortfall, I started saving, but it's something that I should have been doing from day one on the job. But I  was 22, newly married, with house and car and then daycare payments; retirement seemed like something I'd never reach. How short-sighted was I?

What would I do differently if I could start over with saving money?

1. Never, ever, ever get a credit card. Those cards are the spawns of Satan. They lure you in by making you think you really need something, but when the end of the month comes, you usually have buyer's remorse. If you can't pay cash for something, wait until you can. Saving for something, especially for a long period of time, makes you value an item even more. Presently, I do have a car loan and a house payment, which I know is against the Dave Ramsey philosophy, but those are the only two.



2.  Save something each month in an account you can't touch. Tax shelter annuities are great for doing that. You can lock away money that will be there when you retire.












3.  Follow a budget. I'm not the best budgeter. My husband says that I spend what I make and that's mostly true. If I were 22 again, I'd follow the envelope method, dividing up how much money I'd spend on items throughout the month. I know this method works, but I'm not disciplined enough to get through a month without digging into another envelope. 





4. Be selfish.  I have mentioned in earlier posts that I'm an enabler. I like to help people which is not necessarily a bad trait. What is bad is helping people by giving them money and believing that they will change a behavior because of it. I can't tell you how much money I've given to addicts over the years, thinking that if I buy them this car, this boat, this whatever, they will change their behavior. Finally, I have learned; however, it wasn't until I accumulated a great deal of debt and was left alone to get out of it.  

5.  Be careful with a debit card. When I wrote checks or paid cash for everything, I had a much better grasp on where my money was going and how much I had. I balanced my check book register every morning while drinking my coffee. Now I have gotten lazy by swiping that debit card and having the bank write my checks for me. Instead, you should be aware of how much money you have at all times. To help keep up with your withdrawals and deposits, download free printable registers or use software like Quicken or Mint to keep up with your deposits and withdrawals.



Saving money is vitally important. Start young and respect your money at all times. I wish I had taken this advice when I was 22.

What money-saving advice do you have for those beginning a career and/or for those ending one?