Packing Up and Moving On

1/31/2014

After being medically unable to work last year, and then receiving my permanent disability award from Social Security, there was a few loose ends that needed tying up.  And coming to terms with the things that I knew I needed to do caused me many hours of anxiety.  All of my friends and family know that I fret pretty much about everything - AND if I have nothing really to fret about - I fret about that!!

My first decision was the hardest.  Calling my boss to tell him that I was going to retire was the first thing on my list of things I had to do.  So looking at the January calendar I picked a date at random as my official retirement date.  I followed up that call with a note in writing that I was retiring.  Making that call took me days to make.  I knew, and everybody else did too, that it was pretty obvious I wasn't coming back.  But, I had never uttered the words "retire" and "not coming back" to anyone - they were just words and thoughts that rattled around in my head.  Thinking that you're going to retire is one thing, but actually setting the wheels in motion is something entirely different.

Once my decision was made, my next challenge, and it was a big one, was returning to the office to pack up 12+ years of my personal belongings.  Like packing for traveling, or adorning my little cube, I don't travel light!  Lucky for me that my best friend had already wrapped up all of my glass pieces (I love decorative glass), which meant that my getaway would be faster.  I also picked a time to meet my boss when I knew that most of my coworkers would have left for the day.  Luckily for me, they had.

While I removed various art projects and pictures of Ben and opened up drawers and packed up clear nail polish (a leftover from back in the day when you wore nylons and needed the nail polish to stop a run).  The breakfast bars that I kept around just in case I was starving to death, were so flat that the only place they could go was in the trash.  

While I was busy pulling things out of the wall as fast as I could, my hands began to shake and the tears started.  Everybody knows that nothing stays the same forever, but when it's your time to end one chapter and begin another, it's damn difficult.  I could have put off picking my things up, but that final task needed to be done and sooner rather than later.

It was very hard for me to see all of my things put away in boxes for me to take home.  I cried most of the way home.  Jeff very nicely suggested eating out and we had a nice dinner and by the time we left the restaurant I was more in control.

As I walked out of the office, the realization hit me that my 46 year career as a secretary was over, but not my life.  That part of my life is over but the possibilities of what I can do is endless.  I just need to find some organization that needs my skills.

And because I have a lot of free time, I am returning to my "novel" about Wilma the crusty old librarian and Abe Lincoln's missing diary. I have also given thought to trying to put in words a story about the inside of a suicide.  Not an uplifting story I know, but one I feel compelled to write, if only for myself

Today is my baby's 34th birthday!  

Enjoy your Friday and I know most of you will be glued to the television on Sunday to watch the game.  Jeff and I will record the game, so that we can fast forward to watch the commercials!

P