Friday (tomorrow) marks\nthe six month anniversary of my retirement, not that it\u2019s really any big deal;\nI think the one year anniversary is a bit of a noteworthy event but not six\nmonths. But I mention it purposefully; while not to any great degree, I do find\nmyself struggling with a bit of an issue. I saw it in my long term forecast\nvision and I feared it, so I prepared for it. But I guess I didn\u2019t fully\nforesee all the facets of something this eventful in my life and I am feeling\nsome side effects now. <\/p>\n\n\n\n
If you\u2019ve read any of\nmy work dear reader, you\u2019ll know I was in a position of significant\nresponsibility and was deeply invested with my work. I took my responsibilities\nseriously and completely to heart and that consumed huge tracts of time in my\nlife. As I wrote back then, it almost exclusively defined who I was. And that\naside, it provided me so much of what my personality seems to crave:\nchallenges, problems to solve, competition, and gallons of adrenaline that\ncomes with constant stress. There was a valid reason to be concerned over what\nI would do once I gave all that up \u2013 who I\u2019d become \u2013 my new identity. <\/p>\n\n\n\n
Thus the plan was carefully\nthought out and revised over and over in the year leading up to retirement,\nbeginning with realignment of the management of my organization at work to\nfacilitate a smoother transition for the team when I departed. I picked the\ntime of year based upon weather, not wanting to surrender another single\nprecious summer to the demands of employment I chose late spring. And to\n\u201crepair\u201d the ravages of being seated at a desk or a conference room table for\nfar too many hours daily, I looked to envelop myself as deeply as possible in\nexercise. Thus the planned dropping of the dead trees so as to provide me\nmonths of cutting and splitting wood. And of course, hiking. A salve for both\nbody and soul, I planned to walk all the rubber of my soles. <\/p>\n\n\n\n
Ultimately the plan\nwas sound; it held me throughout the whole summer and into fall. But as I sit\nhere at the six month mark, and the wood is all cut, split, stacked, and even\nnow being burnt, and the weather is limiting the miles I can hike, I find\nmyself sitting too much. The first hour or so every morning is acceptable to me\n\u2013 couch, coffee, computer \u2013 but beyond that is unacceptable. Yet I find that\nthe hour can slide into two or three, especially with all the horror movies on\nTV now that Halloween is nigh upon us. I still have plenty to do, most\nparticularly another leg of the plan: reading. I haven\u2019t read for pleasure in\nprobably 30 years, all the reading I could manage in the precious little spare\ntime I had was devoted to reading technical material for work. So I desperately\nwant to read for pleasure, for enjoyment. And the first book on the list has\nbeen parked there for many years: The Complete Sherlock Holmes. I own a coy but\nhave looked for it several times over the last week and still can\u2019t locate it.\nSo I started on my phone but it is far less enjoyable than holding a book and\nturning pages. I think I will end up buying another copy. But that is really\nfor those impenetrable outdoor January days.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
Yet as great as\nreading is for a human, it is as sedentary as one could ever aim to be; the\nonly thing that moves for hours are the eyes and the page turning finger! The\nsummer consisting of hundreds of miles afoot and tons of wood moved have\nyielded much of the results intended and I am at least accepting of my physical\ncondition if not satisfied. And I hate to lose that. So there is a new\nchallenge in front of me, a new problem to solve, which is good in a way. <\/p>\n\n\n\n
To be clear at this\npoint, for those wondering, I am not missing work, not pondering going back to\nwork. Not at all! I am loving the freedom of time and the shedding of all the\ntension and stress that come with work. I do miss the people though \u2013 some more\nthan others of course. There were some wonderful people there and I miss the\ndaily interactions, but not nearly enough to jump back into that chaos! No,\nthis is all good and all I\u2019ve hoped for. I just need to develop a winter plan\nfor things to do. One can still hike in the cold, but the pleasure is somewhat\ndiminished with the weather. I still have not even begun to resurrect my\npassion for hunting arrowheads, which is typically a fall\/early winter activity\nso hopefully I can get going with that soon. <\/p>\n\n\n\n
I guess that it is\ninevitable that I would run into this. I won\u2019t say it is preoccupying me or\nthat I even truly devote any conscious thought of it; it is mostly the bookmark\nof the six month point that precipitated the thoughts and this post. But an\nissue identified is a future problem solved, so I will work on my plan for the\nsecond half of the first year. I already have the warm half figured out, just\nneed to solve for the cold! <\/p>\n\n\n\n
Speaking of cold, I\nremember when winters meant frozen ponds and ice skating. I lived across the\nstreet from a pond and it would freeze over by late November or early December\nand would typically stay frozen until late February. I would get home from\nschool and go skate until dinner, than go skate again until called home for\nbed. And weekends or school vacations I would easily spend 12 hours on the ice,\nskating until well after dark. I would love the opportunity to skate like that\nagain but we just don\u2019t get the ice anymore; not cold enough for long enough.\nYes, there are skating rinks but that is just so not the same; being out in the\ncold, surrounded by woods, under the sky, dodging sticks and twigs in the ice \u2013\nthat is skating!! I used to ski as well, but after several surgeries I am not\nsure my right knee is up for that anymore. <\/p>\n\n\n\n
Ultimately it only\namounts to around 8 weeks to manage; December has passable outside temps for a\nlot of the month and February pretty much always has a mid-month thaw and\ndecent temps; it\u2019s mostly January with which I need to reconcile, so not so bad\nafter all. And I still have a half dozen oak trees that need to come down and\nbe cut and split and after doing it this summer through the hot months, I think\nI might like giving it a try in the cold!<\/p>\n\n\n\n
Back to the post at\nhand, it does not feel like six months. I still remember all my 100+ passwords,\ndaily, weekly, and monthly reports, and the energy and effort required to do the\njob right. That is still fresh in my mind. Of course, the stress is gone and\nthat alone has been a Godsend. That part of work feels like a whole different\nlife to me. I think of the folks still there fairly often, and as mentioned, am\nstill in touch with many of them. If you\u2019ve read my early work leading up to\nretiring, you may recall that I used running as an analogy often. And in several\ncases I described how retiring felt like dropping out of the race. I slowed and\nstopped but they kept running, and in fact, are still running \u2013 they are now\nmiles up the road from me. They wage the daily battles that I walked away from.\nAnd I wish them strength and courage and wisdom in those battles; my sword is\ndropped and left laying somewhere back at work; a good place for it! The run now\nover, walking has turned out to suit me just fine dear reader!! <\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"
Friday (tomorrow) marks the six month anniversary of my retirement, not that it\u2019s really any big deal; I think the one year anniversary is a bit of a noteworthy event but not six months. But I mention it purposefully; while not to any great degree, I do find myself struggling with a bit of an […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":617,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_monsterinsights_skip_tracking":false,"ocean_front_end_style_editor":"no","ocean_post_layout":"","ocean_both_sidebars_style":"","ocean_both_sidebars_content_width":0,"ocean_both_sidebars_sidebars_width":0,"ocean_sidebar":"0","ocean_second_sidebar":"0","ocean_disable_margins":"enable","ocean_add_body_class":"","ocean_shortcode_before_top_bar":"","ocean_shortcode_after_top_bar":"","ocean_shortcode_before_header":"","ocean_shortcode_after_header":"","ocean_has_shortcode":"","ocean_shortcode_after_title":"","ocean_shortcode_before_footer_widgets":"","ocean_shortcode_after_footer_widgets":"","ocean_shortcode_before_footer_bottom":"","ocean_shortcode_after_footer_bottom":"","ocean_display_top_bar":"default","ocean_display_header":"default","ocean_header_style":"","ocean_center_header_left_menu":"0","ocean_custom_header_template":"0","ocean_custom_logo":0,"ocean_custom_retina_logo":0,"ocean_custom_logo_max_width":0,"ocean_custom_logo_tablet_max_width":0,"ocean_custom_logo_mobile_max_width":0,"ocean_custom_logo_max_height":0,"ocean_custom_logo_tablet_max_height":0,"ocean_custom_logo_mobile_max_height":0,"ocean_header_custom_menu":"0","ocean_menu_typo_font_family":"0","ocean_menu_typo_font_subset":"","ocean_menu_typo_font_size":0,"ocean_menu_typo_font_size_tablet":0,"ocean_menu_typo_font_size_mobile":0,"ocean_menu_typo_font_size_unit":"px","ocean_menu_typo_font_weight":"","ocean_menu_typo_font_weight_tablet":"","ocean_menu_typo_font_weight_mobile":"","ocean_menu_typo_transform":"","ocean_menu_typo_transform_tablet":"","ocean_menu_typo_transform_mobile":"","ocean_menu_typo_line_height":0,"ocean_menu_typo_line_height_tablet":0,"ocean_menu_typo_line_height_mobile":0,"ocean_menu_typo_line_height_unit":"","ocean_menu_typo_spacing":0,"ocean_menu_typo_spacing_tablet":0,"ocean_menu_typo_spacing_mobile":0,"ocean_menu_typo_spacing_unit":"","ocean_menu_link_color":"","ocean_menu_link_color_hover":"","ocean_menu_link_color_active":"","ocean_menu_link_background":"","ocean_menu_link_hover_background":"","ocean_menu_link_active_background":"","ocean_menu_social_links_bg":"","ocean_menu_social_hover_links_bg":"","ocean_menu_social_links_color":"","ocean_menu_social_hover_links_color":"","ocean_disable_title":"default","ocean_disable_heading":"default","ocean_post_title":"","ocean_post_subheading":"","ocean_post_title_style":"","ocean_post_title_background_color":"","ocean_post_title_background":0,"ocean_post_title_bg_image_position":"","ocean_post_title_bg_image_attachment":"","ocean_post_title_bg_image_repeat":"","ocean_post_title_bg_image_size":"","ocean_post_title_height":0,"ocean_post_title_bg_overlay":0.5,"ocean_post_title_bg_overlay_color":"","ocean_disable_breadcrumbs":"default","ocean_breadcrumbs_color":"","ocean_breadcrumbs_separator_color":"","ocean_breadcrumbs_links_color":"","ocean_breadcrumbs_links_hover_color":"","ocean_display_footer_widgets":"default","ocean_display_footer_bottom":"default","ocean_custom_footer_template":"0","_jetpack_newsletter_access":"","_jetpack_dont_email_post_to_subs":false,"_jetpack_newsletter_tier_id":0,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paywalled_content":false,"_jetpack_feature_clip_id":0,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paid_content":false,"ocean_post_oembed":"","ocean_post_self_hosted_media":"","ocean_post_video_embed":"","ocean_link_format":"","ocean_link_format_target":"self","ocean_quote_format":"","ocean_quote_format_link":"post","ocean_gallery_link_images":"off","ocean_gallery_id":[],"footnotes":"","jetpack_post_was_ever_published":false},"categories":[3],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-616","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-life","entry","has-media"],"yoast_head":"\n