Retirement

I’ve decided to retire. Actually, I made that decision decades ago. I’ve always hoped to live long enough, and save enough bucks, that I could retire someday. That day is near, so long as you realize that the term “near” is relative.

Making the decision when to retire has made all the difference in the world to me. In recent weeks I have been happier than I have been in years, and I can only attribute this to having set a definite retirement date in my mind. Now that I know that the time is finite, I can suffer through anything. Like seeing the finish line at the end of a marathon, I can actually see the end rather than merely conceiving of the end in my mind, and the reality of it makes all the difference in my demeanor.

I will render unto Caesar that which is Caesar’s during the remaining months. I will do my duty, but soon my days of servitude will be at an end, and soon enough I will be “free at last, free at last, thank God Almighty I am free at last”. Soon enough all of the work issues that have bedeviled me will be in my past. Not soon, but soon enough to grant me an elusive peace of mind.

You might recall the old adage “Don’t sweat the small stuff “, and the parenthetical adage, “It’s all small stuff”. I’ve become the poster child for the phrase. I’ve taken a virtual chill pill. “This too shall pass” has become my daily mantra. I am approaching the enlightenment achieved by Mad Magazine’s famous fictional character Alfred E. Neuman – “What, me worry?” (I lie, but I’m working on it.)

Written January 2012

Retirement September 2012

Dad and Mom Traveling (Dick and Gladys)

So we had to move Mom (Gladys) out of the house and into assisted living in August 2013. In October 2013 we decided we needed to clear out the house and sell it before some bad people took the opportunity to clear out the unoccupied house for us. In the process I acquired several hundred, maybe as many as five hundred, postcards collected by my folks during their travels. I am using these postcards to send a note to my grand-munchkins once or twice a week just to give them the old-time thrill of receiving mail and letting my daughter know what modest chores I am attempting during retirement.

Within the boxes of postcards that my mother kept is a handwritten list in my mother's beautiful script of their travels. Since I have not written anything new since my retirement in September 2012, and this will be my first post in months, I thought I'd get back in the swing of things by simply retyping my mom's list here. The list of sites is quite impressive. My folks must have loved to travel.

When looking at the dates keep in mind that I, as the last kid of three, graduated from college in 1974, and Dad retired a couple years later once I was no longer a financial drain. Also, Dad died in the fall of 1984, so the trips after that my Mom was traveling on her own or with a tour group. I will attempt to type the list exactly as Mom wrote it.

The list -

1977 Apr to May Atlanta – Fla

1977 Sep             Canada – Bob's

1978 Spring w Walt Okla – NM – Grand Canyon – Phoenix – Tuscon – el Paso – San Antonio – corpus Christie – Beaumont – Atlanta

1979 Jan & Feb     Southern Trip – SE Georgia – Gulf Coast – Florida – Mississippi

1979 Fall               Cape Breton – East Coast – Boston – NH, Maine, etc

1980                      Austin, TX – California - Atlanta

1981 Fall               Bill's (NJ) SE Coast – Tom's Thanksgiving (Atlanta)

1981?                    Canada

1982 Sept              Canada & West Coast

1983 Jan – Mar 07 Marco Island, FL

1983 June               to NJ

1983 Oct                Atlanta & NJ

1984 Jan                 Hawaii

1985 July                Minn St Paul

1985 Sept               Door County

1985 Dec                Chgo Trip

1986 Mar                Texas New Orleans

         June               Tour St Louis

         July                 Cottage NJ

         Sept                 Milw.

         Sept 10-12       Theater Trip Minn

         Sept 27            To Ark

         Dec                  Atlanta

1987 Feb/Mar           Calif

         May                  LasVegas

         Dec                  Atlanta and Gainseville GA

1988 July                   Topsail Beach, NC

1989 July                   Topsail Beach

         Xmas                Al & Joan – Bloomington

1990 July                  Topsail Beach

         Xmas               Atlanta

1991 Jan                   Florida / Nassau

The list ends with the January 1991 entry. The boxes of postcards indicate that there were many more trips that were not on Mom's list, both before and after, but there are so many of them and no way to know when they went to these places. There was a trip to Spain in there sometime and another one to Sweden. Ah well.

Ah fooey, the blog doesn't support the nicely tab-formatted list that I put in my word processor.  Drats.  I'll have to insert a bunch of spaces to neaten it up.  Her list is much prettier that this.

All for now.