So it has been a full six months since I left paid employment to join the other team--the Cash For Lifers who have opted to draw down the Canada Pension Plan (in my case, by a pittance) each month. Some of my pre-conceived ideas about retirement have worked out. Others have not.
And before you read any further, here is a spoiler alert. If you are working full-time, raising kids, keeping a house together, trying to have a social life and maintain personal hygiene, you will not empathize with me. In fact. you probably should move onto the allrecipe website right now because your Whirling Dervish life doesn't really allow time for recreational reading. Your schedule is mandated by forces outside your control whereas mine is all my doing. Sorry. Some day you will cross over and find yourself in my weirdly-busy-unstructured frenzy that occasionally allows naps.
Pre-retirement, I had theorized that I would need significantly less income for the up-to-date business-appropriate wardrobe, gas for the commute, purchased lunches and a fortune in take-out coffees associated with paid employment. This has proven to be the case.
What I however did not figure into the equation were leisure-wear clothing purchases, gas to get to me to quilting classes/pickleball games/cultural outings in Southern Ontario, purchased lunches out with fellow retired girlfriends and a small fortune in movie tickets and take-out coffees.
My vision of whiling away my days quietly reading at home, interrupted by frequent trips to restock at our excellent neighbourhood library, followed by regular blogging and contact with long-lost friends has not quite materialized. Instead, I find myself rattling from pillar to post, almost frantic some days to fit in all my activities and get a decent meal on the table at the end of it.
Like I said, I have no one to blame but myself. And maybe those who start sentences with "Now that you're retired have you considered ... " (fill in as you wish: "babysitting my children?"; "serving on the library board?"; "making and donating quilts to the hospital?"; "writing a novel?" etc.)
As I ponder my dilemma, these days I think it is the rigid structure of a work schedule that I miss the most in a love/hate kind of way. That and the great conversations that erupt in a staff lunch room over stale Danishes the day after a holiday.
Oh, and my short-term memory seems to have deserted me in my dotage. I now get the majority of my 10,000 steps a day backtracking where I've been, looking for my glasses, keys, tablet, phone, you name it.
For almost 30 years I presided over the payroll and accounting in the medium-sized family business. Along the way I also raised children and completed an honours business degree part-time and got a meal on the table each night. In all that time everyone's pay was deposited weekly into their accounts, lunches were packed every day, vacations owed were tabulated and taken, presentations were made, deductions were remitted and bonuses were awarded. So you can understand my consternation when last week I realized I had failed to pay my credit card bill on time and was charged interest for only the second time in my life. The first was after a sudden death in the family.
What has become of my former efficiently organized self? Any day now you may see me blithely traipsing through the mall in my bedroom slippers.
Finding a functional level between volunteering, exercising, enjoying hobbies and keeping the laundry caught up appears to be the challenge facing me now. It is the time of year when many make resolutions about the future and I suppose I could do that if I only knew what the ideal equilibrium level for each should be. Should I aim for a 20-per-cent time share for each activity along with another 20 just for living? Wouldn't the accounting be onerous and use up the "just for living" allotment? And isn't retirement about abandoning schedules if nothing else?
But all-out abandonment of order would be the Land of Chaos. I know I don't want to live there. Nor do I want to be rigidly scheduled like a member of the corps in The Nutcracker. So 2015 will be about finding the balance that keeps me--and everyone else in my life--happy. And keeping the credit card balance at zero.
While we're at it, I hope to discover where I parked my favourite reading glasses. If you see me prancing through the mall with them on my head would you please point them out to me?
I wish everyone a happy, safe Christmas and all the best in the new year.
