Following Frank into Retirement – Made It!
A series of articles starting 5 months from retirement and into retirement
By Frank
In retrospect, I guess it may not have been the best decision to stop work just before the holidays. I arrived home from my last day of work to celebrate with Suzanne and two of our three kids and their partners. They in turn had just finished their exams and were visiting us on their vacation break. Everyone was pretty much in a party mood befitting the time of year and so I easily morphed into vacation mode – eating, drinking, relaxing, eating, visiting, wishing for snow… It is now eight days into my retirement and the penny has yet to drop that I’m not returning to work in the new year.
Feeling naked
My last week of work was jam packed with meetings, lunches, and dinners, as I continued the transfer of my responsibilities to John, the “new guy”. Each meeting brought me a little thrill knowing that I would not have to follow up on any of the action items identified. On Wednesday evening, I filed my last expense reports, cleaned up my hard drive and left appropriate departing messages on my Blackberry, office phone and Outlook. Thursday morning, I loaded all work-related electronics in a box and gave them to John to return to our head office. It was in my car on the six-hour drive home that the weirdness started happening.
Usually on a long drive, I take the opportunity to make numerous calls and my head buzzes with work plans and tasks needing to be done. This time there was no work to think about and, while I enjoyed the sunny break in the weather and the beautiful scenery travelling down Highway 69, I felt distinctly uncomfortable that I no longer had my phone to call a friend or two to annoy them with my good mood. My dismay deepened on thinking that on my return home I wouldn’t have to return calls, check e-mails or do any last minute requests. Despite feeling ebullient about leaving work behind, I was feeling a bit like a turtle out of its shell. I no longer had my cloak of status, my shield of twice-monthly paycheques, and my trusty electronics that served me so well in battling never-ending tasks. I was alone with myself and was feeling uneasy staring myself in the eyes. Good thing there were lots of people at home waiting for me!
Mañana
The first thing to go was my awareness of the days of the week. I have no idea which day is which after only eight days. On any long vacation I would count down the days until I had to go back to work, jealously hoarding my time. Now I don’t care. Anything that needed to be done soon, no longer needs to be. Tasks that I had postponed until my retirement have been indefinitely shelved until I feel like it. The days are short and the wood fire is warm.
Although I am starting to feel the first inklings of internal pressure to establish a new routine, I figure it will be about two to three months before I finally burst out of my cocoon and test my wings. In the meantime, Suzanne and I have booked up the rest of December and all of January with visits and trips, because we want to and we can! By the time February rolls around, I’ll probably be itching to start romping in the snow and working around our house. And if not, then I’ll give it another month or two or three.
The world is my oyster and I’m in no particular hurry.
Love this!