Retired - Now What?

1/9/2014

As I enter 2014, I have been medically retired.  Much like last summer when Jeff was forced to retire from IBM, his career identified him. Luckily for him, he was picked up as a contractor doing similar work that he did with IBM.   Now that I'm also "retired", the thing that I most identified with was my work.  I was a secretary for 40+ years and 15 of those years was spent as a legal secretary. I don't want to toot my own horn - but I'm going to - I believed I was a damn good secretary.

When I started working back in 1968, I carried the words from my high school business teacher with me through my career.  Mrs. Orr told me that if you were going to make your living being a secretary, then you'd better be the best one on the block.  I've never forgotten her words and tried always to live up to high standards I set for myself.

Okay, so now I'm home all the time, except for the many doctor's appointments I have scheduled through the month.  What do I do with my time?  When you're working, having an extra day off from work now and again is pure heaven.  I know I felt that way and always looked forward to those three day weekends.

I am in the process of trying to redefine myself.  And I wonder how I go about this? When you have worked for practically forever, you give little thought to the day, so far in the future you assume, when you will hang up your keyboard, grab your purse and book it out of corporate America as fast as you can. 

I am of retirement age but wanted to hang on two more years until I reached my full retirement age of 66.  The longer you wait to retire the bigger your check.  Being medically retired, I don't know what that does for my actual retirement.  I guess I stay on disability until I reach 66 and then start drawing my retirement money, which is piddly compared to what Jeff will get.  Of course, he's always been the bigger bread earner, so it stands to reason that his retirement bucks would be more than mine. 

I have been spending my time reading, knitting (I can make a really cool strip of yarn which when finished I pull apart and start over again)!  I have clean toilets, laundry is done, and I'm current with my filing.  Doesn't that sound exciting?  

I know that staying home being my usual reclusive self, is not good for my mental health, and I have put some effort in trying to find a volunteer opportunity or two.  I make inquiries and nobody ever gets back to me.  Do these organizations need volunteers or not?  I have responded to several opportunities that indicate they need some help with office paperwork and I think that's exactly my cup of tea, so I don't know why they don't respond.

I can look my psychiatrist in the eye next week and tell her that I have definitely tried to find something for me to do, just haven't had success so far.

For the moment, I'm going to start purging out old (and I do mean old) papers from the filing cabinet.  I'm pretty sure that our utility bills from the early 90's are no longer needed!  

Wish me well on my search for purpose.  There must be somebody out there that needs/wants me, so keep your fingers crossed.  This is a new adventure/journey and frankly it's a bit scary to come to the end of everything I've known.  I know it's not completely everything - I'm still a wife, mother and grandmother and friend.

Our plane's new engine has been installed and Jeff is trying to make arrangements with another pilot friend to go to Pennsylvania to pick her up.  I see some spins in the air during weekends to "break" her in - that will be fun.

Enjoy your day.

P