Your Parachute's Color...

A morning radio program struck a lot of chords as it was called  'The Color of Your Parachute.'

Does what you do define you? Do you work to work because you love it/is just a necessity?   Are you stuck working because you don't know how to do anything else? Are you working toward/ away from your job? Do/ did you have a plan for your retirement? Can your interests be incorporated into something else? In other words, just what does tickle your fancy? 

Do  you have a safety net in place?

 I personally never even really thought about retirement until I became unhappy in the workplace in my mid 50's. Fortunately, I had the financial option to quit this very negative environment. Yet, the funny thing was everybody started asking me what I was going to do and even looking for positions for me. No kidding within a month someone else had found a similar teaching job at another university for me but the same political administrative garbage started rearing its ugly head. And I asked myself, am I getting too old for this? If I quit again, what color was my parachute? What was I going to do with my time?

Callers in to the public radio program included a 70 yr. old retired truck driver who due to health couldn't continue his arduous schedule but he loved driving. What to do? Well now he is a taxi driver for the Amish (50-60 hrs/week.) He also does 'safe rides' providing free rides home for those that need a ride after bar visits.  He takes a percentage of his earnings, contributing it to various charities. He feels better both healthwise and mentally.

Another gentleman, a retired engineer, helps out in a literacy program to teach young'uns to read. It turns out he had a child himself who had difficulty learning to read. His wife was a second grade teacher who complained that 20% of her class had reading challenges. When the caller confronted the superintendent re: one reading program not fitting all, the response given was "We can't reach them all." That response encouraged him to set up a literacy program and now in his retirement, he too volunteer teaches in that very program.

Retirement isn't an easy transition but one listener insinuated a gender difference in adjustment to retirement may be due to social circles. Women tend to have a greater number of social circles where men tend to just have a work social circle. 

After almost a year after retirement, Natureman feels he has found a good balance incorporating both his interests by volunteering (doing for free what he did before) facilitating a jail support group and also being more politically active in grassroots organizations including the power line issue and unsafe oil rail cars. He is actually busier now with meetings than ever before...

I found myself not ready to leave education altogether so after leaving the second teaching university adjunct position, returned to supervising student teachers, something I had always enjoyed. Then, University policies decided to eliminate a lot of the subcontracting outside their staff and I was among the 100 or so cut. Although I wasn't quite ready for full retirement and didn't have a plan in place, I have managed to fill my days with social activities and dormant interests. I admit to missing working with future teachers as I still feel I have something to offer but the silver lining is I don't have to attend meetings and time is my own. 

As the radio show's guest speaker pointed out, it's not about money, it's about waking up each day and having purpose...