The longer I am retired, the more I realize how unhappy my job made me. I know a guy that spent five years in prison. He said there were milestones while he was in, one year, two years, and he could count the days he had left before he was eligible for parole.
But the day-to-day grind wore him down. Each day was identical to the last, and nothing ever changed. He stayed away from trouble, never spoke to anyone but his cellmate, and worked hard to be invisible. He rarely left his cell and when he came up for parole, sitting in a room that wasn’t a cell in front of people who were not prisoners was more than a little frightening.
After all, it had been five years since he had seen daylight for more than a few minutes at a time, and it had been five years since he was able to do anything at all without walls around him.
Released into a halfway house, he got a job, worked hard, then returned to the halfway house and hung around with his fellow ex-convicts. When he was finally released from this part of the journey, he moved in with his parents, moved into his old room he had when he was a kid, and started life over again.
That’s what being retired is like. You’re accustomed to living your life a certain way, and then one day it’s gone. Of course, it feels like a vacation at first, but you start to drift away from that life you lived, and you lose track of people you knew at work. It’s coming up on six years for me now. Suddenly, it seems, six years.
My friend who did time, it’s been five years for him. He says it’s like he wasn’t there at all now. None of the people who knew him before talk about it, and no one in his new job knows, or at least they pretend they don’t.
Odd thing, the one thing we share is we both went through a lot of physical health problems right after. Both were digestive issues. Both of us found freedom, but at the same time, the fact we both were in a very restrictive relationship with our time, having time suddenly was overwhelming.
Physically and emotionally, any sort of dramatic change in lifestyle takes a toll, even if that change is positive. For twenty-seven years I rose and went to bed guided mostly by the idea I had to, had to, go to work. It’s what I had been trained to do by my parents, by school, by the bills that needed to be paid, and by the fact everyone else was doing it, too.
Work devoured my life and became a prison. I put off family functions, girlfriend’s lives, my own life, and countless other events and occasions because of work. Work became a mental illness of sorts, a vast blanket under which I hid from living.
And suddenly, I am alive.
Take Care,
Mike
I feel this in my bones. Toward the end of my career I grew tired of being someone’s whipping boy, got tired of looking over my shoulder due to a case that went federal (and when the secret service pays me a visit and says that they’re not sure how deep this goes and to be careful) and once the wife started getting followed home from her work, it was time I hung it up.
I never looked back.
Mike, I went back to work for a year, then was retired, then back for another short job, but even temporary work made me sad.
I wanted to write.
Now I do.
I am guessing your were a lawyer? Maybe a judge?
Special Investigator (white collar)
I’ve been in my career for 30 years. I can’t retire yet because the tax penalties for early withdrawal from the IRA is to high, especially in the current economy. (No sense in being overly patriotic in my sacrificial donations to the beast that is never dated.)
I’m self-employed for the last 21 years, and my income has been modest to pitiful during those years. My job satisfaction has been higher than any time spent as someone else’s minion. Still, I can feel my work live is winding down. I like what I do, but I’m tired and external frustrations are getting worse daily from the constant barrage from the govt agency that controls my field.
Retirement is so enticing. I’m already searching for something to keep me occupied away from the house for a few hours every week. So far, there’s nothing that interests me.
But … retirement is still inviting!
Bev, create.
Your soul will love it.
I was planning on another 5 years of work but my company decided that they wanted/needed to reduce their SG&A expenses. I got an early retirement buy out that kick in in 1.5 years. kind of wishing now that it was earlier with some of the BS going on right now.
Jeff, I retired two months before Covid shut everything down so I went back to work.
I had no idea what was going to happen. After the plague was gone my desire to work bottomed out.
I’ve been at my job for 24 years. I am eligible to retire now, and have been for a few years. I purchased my home in 2016 on a 30 year loan. I honestly didn’t think I’d pay it off before I died, much less before I retired. I have never made “just a payment.” I have paid double, I have paid over toward the principle. I have cut other expenses to the bare minimum so that I could do this. I believe I can pay it off in 2 years or less if I can keep going as I have been. This is my goal. Then I can retire. I don’t want a house payment in my retirement. I want to be mostly debt-free. Mainly because retirement doesn’t go far, but also because I don’t want to mess with it.
I have enjoyed my job, but not the grind, not the getting up and dealing with traffic, not the peopling. I love to just be alone. I don’t think I’ll be bored at all. I have books, there are three libraries in close proximity, I have internet. I can’t wait.
Chick, I always wanted time to read. I read “East of Eden” and was blown away as to how good it was. I had forgotten what it was like to tackle a book like that. Now, if I see a book I like I can just stop and read.
I’m going to a literary fair today and I know most of the writers there. If you want to live a life other than work, you have to go out and meet the people living that life.
When I went to a Math Camp for Adults (geek alert!), a fellow student, who managed people’s 401(k)s said that as one approaches retirement, they should start figuring out what they want to do to keep busy. Maybe start a hobby or pick one up. Maybe volunteer at a place you like.
I still like my job and want to keep doing it–but having a hard time finding work. Being self-employed, this is not good. I might have to join a company and have a boss. Ick.
After seeing how my parents started failing mentally after retiring and not doing anything, I am thinking I may not fully retire. And I have been volunteering for 36 years now, so I should still be able to for many years even when I get to retire.
Tim, I advocate creativity in any form. Whatever you can do and want to do is what you should do.
I do know people who are unhappy without a job and a boss, and that’s fine.
I just wanted to write, and no job ever allowed me that sort of time.
I had been planning to retire this year however I’ve been putting it off because the current administration seems hell bent on wrecking the economy; what “SHOULD” be sufficient savings in normal days feels woefully inadequate when der leader is talking about taking away medicare, chopping social security benefits and driving inflation through the roof with his ridiculous tarriff/extortion racket.
Keith, he can’t live forever.