Retirement Journey: Part II
“You cannot give your life more time, so give your time more life.” — Unattributed
“Instead of a human doing, I want to be a human being.” — Retirement Aspiration
A Look Back at the Year
As a person in recovery, at the end of the day, I often take a daily inventory, a review of the day to assess my successes and missteps. I ask if there are amends to be made, and how I can do better moving forward. On this eve of the New Year and my 76th birthday in January, I continue to be a work in progress.
At the end of each year, like many others on the eve of the New Year, I look back at the highlights and lowlights — the gains and the losses — the hellos and goodbyes.
For this blog, I often write a year-in- review. Full disclosure: I’m sometimes a bit snarky in response to the holiday letters people send this time of year, yet I must admit, this is my version. I understand why it’s important to review one’s year, to celebrate wins and acknowledge losses, and if one chooses, to share with loved ones and friends. A lot happens in a day, a year, and a life.
I ask, Did I fulfill my intentions? If not, why? What did I learn from my successes, failures, missed opportunities, or the things about which I continued to procrastinate? This process helps me identify intentions for the New Year.
The years between 2022 -2024 were challenging. In December, 2022 I had a hip replacement. My former husband who remained chosen family had his leg amputated at the knee and was transferred to a nursing and rehab center where he remains today under the care of hospice. In the spring of 2023, I had an accidental fall and fracture of my dominant arm at the shoulder. During the 2023 holidays, days before Thanksgiving, I contacted COVID-19 for the first time while visiting our father in the hospital. Days before Christmas that year, he died at home at 93.
In 2024, our family buried our father, the last parent and sold our childhood home. I decided to face the unfinished business of my childhood, the trauma, shame, and stigma that was the final work in my 40-year recovery journey from alcoholism, substance use, and harming behaviors.
I returned to therapy. As a child, I used food to comfort myself. Emotional overeating, in addition to my genetic predisposition, caused adult-onset diabetes. I was morbidly obese. Those are difficult words to write. My life and longevity were at risk. I was prescribed a GLP-1 medication, Mounjaro, which impacts my diet, exercise, and lifestyle to improve health.
It was equally important to address and redefine my family role as the ‘responsible’ eldest child. I wanted to create healthy relationships with my remaining siblings as we navigated how to be a family without two of our siblings, both parents, and our family home. In the fall of 2024, a sister had an accidental fall, suffered a traumatic brain injury, and we rallied together as a family to support her and her husband. Gratefully, she’s made tremendous progress restoring her health and life.
2025 continued the work of healing. What I realized was my capacity to manage my emotional, physical, and spiritual life had limits as I aged. I was struggling to maintain my home as a single person who lives in a 645 square foot apartment. Like my life, my home had reached critical mass requiring me to downsize, make decisions about what to hold onto, and what to let go. It was a metaphor for my life a s 75-year-old.
Supported by my therapist, plus bio and chosen family, in mid-November I made the difficult decision to retire. I’ve been my sole supporter for my most of my life. I didn’t have a pension plan, only a small 401-k which I borrowed from between jobs, and for financial assistance when moving between relationships. Social Security is not sufficient to live on, so my half-time job augmented my income. I received a small inheritance from our parents, yet it is also not enough, combined with Social Security, to sustain me depending on how many years of life are ahead. It’s a gamble.
Who knows what tomorrow may bring?
A Look Back at My Work Life
I’ve worked almost continuously for 65 years. I’ve worked early mornings in a diner, and late evenings and weekends as a baby-sitter. I’ve been employed full-time, half-time, and part-time, self-employed for a short time, salaried and hourly, worked for tips, commissions, and bonuses. I hoped to achieve a degree of self-esteem and recognition for my performance, and sometimes worked to just get by. In my work, I’ve been a people-pleaser, an over-achiever, and sometimes a slacker. I’ve worked for family and friends, and often work colleagues became friends too.
I’ve managed people, teams, and projects and been a member of the same. I’ve been promoted, demoted, downsized, reorganized, laid-off, and fired. I’ve worked with my hands, physical strength, and intellect. I did both creative work, and mind-numbing repetitive labor. I was a late adopter to technology and learned on the job, mastered some skills, and struggled with others. Some jobs I could leave the work at the door; others returned home with me in my head.
Work paid my bills, fed me, provided housing, and gave me a reason to leave my home until I needed to shelter-in place and work safely from home to stay healthy, during the pandemic. I sometimes travelled for work by air and rental cars, and home was temporarily a hotel room. I both hated to travel and enjoyed the destinations, meeting new people, and the simple pleasure of room service.
Most of my life, I worked Monday thru Friday, eight hours or more a day, and enjoyed two-day weekends, paid holidays, and vacations. My Circadian clock was hardwired to facilitate my work life. I didn’t need an alarm to wake up.
When I was between jobs, I treated the job search like a part-time job. It served me. I think the longest period between jobs was four months. I was often called-back for an interview, and frequently made the short-list of candidates. Most of the time, the jobs I was offered and accepted were good decisions; a couple of times, mistakes.
Without a university degree, I earned less money over my lifetime, though my work experience, skills, and work ethic yielded a professional resume in a range of industries, including printing, graphic arts, sales and account management, educational and retail publishing, public relations project management, and business development management. My final work was work of the heart, as a person in recovery supporting the marginalized communities of which I was a member. Grateful.
On this last day of the year, I turn the page on the last chapter of my work life. I say goodbye to the proverbial 9 to 5.
Waving goodbye to my work life. Photo Credit: Cindy Archer
Current Status
First, I want to acknowledge the following from a year-end musing in 2018:
“I know that in the scheme and scope of things, I’m lucky. I have family and friends who love me, a job that helps pay my bills and employs my skills, a home that shelters and protects me, food in my kitchen, my health, and a belief in a power greater than myself, which I can’t define in words, but know deep in my spirit that I’m buoyed when I have a dark night of the soul.”
I’m a creature of habit. As a person who lives alone, my habits drive my life. Though I still need to negotiate and compromise when making commitments, scheduling appointments, and spending time with family, friends, and loved ones, I currently live my life in a way that suits me.
I’m a morning person and fall asleep with the TV on. I schedule things in advance, yet need to practice spontaneity. I rely heavily on my datebook, daily and weekly to-do lists, and the additional Post-It note that I carry in my pocket as a reminder, as I age and grow more forgetful. Yeah, I’m that girl.
The current break between the holidays this year was especially disorienting. I came down with a cold and my holiday plans were disrupted. My workplace closes between the holidays, though this year, I needed to go into the office and organize files, pack up my personal items, and deliver them to my home. I lost track of what day it was, sometimes the time of day, and what was next on my to-do list. Oh, My!
Illustration Credit: Gemma Correll
I feel untethered. Yikes!
Two things I read recently caught my attention and concern me. First, the days after you retire are dangerous for your health if you’re not prepared. Second, health-wise, “At 75, both men and women fall off a cliff,” the Stanford-trained physician, who runs a medical practice in Austin, Texas, said in a recent interview with 60 Minutes.”
I need a plan. Back to work, euphemistically speaking!
A Look Ahead to 2026: Retirement Reset
I’m grateful that I can employ the skills gained from my work life and apply them to my retirement reset. I will manage retirement like a project. I wrote the following in a letter to my work colleagues when I announced my retirement:
“You may ask, what do I plan on doing? I’m a list maker, and I have to-do lists and to-do if I want to lists, that are waiting for my time and attention. I have writing projects, both pending and new projects to complete, films to watch, plus brunches and coffees with friends and family.”
As I survey my home, my closets are full, my junk drawer overflows with yes, you guessed it, junk! My kitchen cabinets can’t hold another glass or cookware. As I’ve joked in the past, the dust bunnies are rapidly reproducing. The oven and microwave need cleaning. I have personal files to sort through and documents to shred. The last box of ephemera and photos from my childhood home need to find a home. I now have work totes lining the wall of my bedroom, artwork from work to find places to live, new shelves to assemble, and purge what I don’t need, or want.
Urge to purge.
I have work to do.
Equally important — no, more important — I have play and avocations ahead. On Friday, I have a ticket to see the film, Marty Supreme which I had to cancel when I was sick with a cold on Christmas Day. In January I’m scheduling birthday celebrations, including a joint birthday dinner during the Madison Winter Restaurant Week with chosen family and sister January birthday, Leanne.
We’ve celebrated this Madison Winter Restaurant Week event for the past 15 or 16 years. I’ve lost track. We choose a different restaurant and prix fixe menu each year. This year, Feast. Leanne and I also took a couple of cooking classes together at Sur La Table, Korean Kitchen, and a Potstickers and Soup Dumplings class, so we’ll do a little more research!
My former partner, Cindy, now chosen family, who hails from Austin, Texas and I have reservations for my birthday in January at Seven Acre Dairy Company in Paoli, for a guest chef event, Chicago chef, Daniel Hammond, featuring Texas BBQ. Yum!
I enjoy both cooking, and yes, eating, and will do more in retirement (cooking that is). Today, I’m making chili to enjoy NYE and New Year’s Day, which over the years I tweak and perfect. I’ll share with others, including my former husband, Frank, under the care of hospice, if he can tolerate spicy food, when I visit him today.
On Saturday begins the Winter Farmer’s Market at the Garver Feed Mill. This summer I’ll walk to the new Madison Public Market. I live in a walkable neighborhood, Atwood, with coffee shops, and restaurants, including ethnic foods and a beloved diner option, a gourmet chocolatier, concert venue, The Barrymore Theater, and so much more. In February, a new espresso, wine, and cake destination opens. I’m lucky. I’ll schedule more brunches and coffee dates with friends and family and visits with books and sketchbooks at my Third Place, Northstreet.
Writing will be my work and passion during retirement. I have pending works to complete, content to edit and self-publish, and new projects to begin. I signed up for a writing group, Writing Your Life in January and February, once a week. Also, in January a workshop, Illustrate Your Year Ahead cartooning workshop at Arts & Literature Laboratory.
There will be movies, music, and museum and gallery visits ahead. And yes, naps in my recliner and content to stream. I’ve been working on a return to the stage to perform a new standup comedy routine, Funny, Not Funny! When, I’m ready, I’ll give back to my community too. I’ve been a lifelong volunteer and will identify where I can contribute my time and talents.
So much to do, more time for life!
“You cannot give your life more time, so give your time more life.” — Unattributed
Additional Reading from Mixed Metaphors, Oh My!
From Human Doing to Human Being
Things Change: A Look Back at 2024 & Look Ahead to 2025
Dispatch from the Hideout: Social Distancing
70 Is NOT the New 60, It’s 70!