Retirement is wasted on the old. I mean, there’s no guarantee that you’ll even reach it, and if you do that it will be long. So I’ve adopted the approach of taking mini retirements throughout my working life.
When I can afford to I take time off from work. A month or two, maybe three. Sometimes 6-months to a year. On one occasion two years. The point being to blend working with enjoying life. Taking time to travel or spend time working on your home, car, or fitness.
If you do manage to reach retirement, at whatever age, and you do get to enjoy a long one. Then congrats you got to have your cake and eat it. For me, I’m taking as many mini retirements as I can while both enjoying life and working as retirement at the end of your lifespan is not guaranteed.
Tag: retirement
Retirement is wasted on the old
What would you do if you didn’t need money?
Think about that for a moment. Most of what we do each day is dictated by money. Going to work, shopping, holidays, going for a drive, eating out, etc etc.
If money was no longer an issue, what would you do?
Travel the world, visit family and friends more, write a book just for fun, learn to paint, get fit, sleep more, spend more time in the garden.
I’ve been hanging out with a few retired friends recently and they had faced this very question. They no longer needed to work. They either reached retirement age and had enough saved, or they inherited money or sold a business and decided they were done working for money.
So what did they end up doing?
One learned to paint and spent more time in his garden, joining a few clubs such as a book club, mahjong and scrabble, and a dining club. Another tinkers with old cars in his garage and buys stuff that he couldn’t afford when they were younger just to tinker with or display for no one but themselves to see. Another travels and writes about their adventures.
Thinking about it, there is nothing stopping us non retirees from doing any of this. We can travel, paint, garden, tinker. Why put something off til the tail-end of your life? I mean, there’s no guarantee that you will get there so why put the fun stuff off? Why not have mini retirements? Save up and take breaks throughout your career. Six months here, a year there, and so on.
Retirement is wasted on the old.
Make a list of what you would do if you could and start doing them now.
Richard
I decided to pay a visit to an old friend that I hadn’t seen in a while. His son answered the door. Apparently he had fallen down the stairs some weeks back and is now in a home in the north of the county. He also has dementia.
On my very first day in my career as a professional tester I was given a tour of the offices by a lady who introduced me to Richard as someone who would act as my mentor. I was given a seat next to him and told that he would show me the ropes. She then left and I turned to Richard and asked “So what are we doing?”. “I haven’t a f’ing clue” was his response. We’ve been friends ever since.
Many years later after he retired we would meet up regularly for beers and chat about anything and everything. Others would join us over the years and invariably move on. Then around several years ago he would arrange beers and wouldn’t turn up. This happened several times. Each time he claimed to have just forgotten. Months later I saw him walking his dog. I said hi and he asked who I was. Then he appeared to recognise me and claimed to have been pulling my leg, but I wasn’t really sure.
We lost touch again and I was passing his house so figured I’d call in. I was saddened to hear that he was now in a home and that he had dementia, but in the back of my mind I had guessed what was happening. His son assured me though that I should visit and he was confident he would know who I was having known me for so long.
An hour later I pulled out my phone and looked up the home and decided to call. A lady confirmed he was there and said she’d put him on. I heard her mention my name to him and him replying “I can’t think who that is” in a frail voice. He came on the phone and after several references to past events he knew who I was and we were chatting like old friends. But every so often he would start to mumble and get distracted by something. He would then forget who he was talking to and I’d have to trigger some memories to bring him back, but briefly, he came and went throughout the conversation.
Afterwards I just sat and thought about how sad it was to lose yourself like that. It’s clear that the Richard I knew is slowly fading. I’m not even sure he’ll remember me if he saw me in person. I guess I’ll find out as I plan on paying him a visit soon.