More Retirement Musings

My mind routinely alternates back-and-forth concerning retirement thoughts.  I feel akin to being like an alternating current line, just undulating briefly one way and then another.  

Pros to retiring soon (within a year or two):

• having complete flexibility over my schedule (at least OTHER than how my wife may want to shape it)
• not having to deal with those folks who are annoying... at the U
• not having to "big voice lecture" every single day of the workweek
• having the POTENTIAL to do other things more easily... such as music playing, music writing, novel writing, trips, other hobbies
• having greater POTENTIAL to do meaningful volunteer actitivies.... working with the Catholic Diocesan Office in some capacity, working at the Soup Kitchen more routinely, etc
• having the potential to find a "part-time, hobby" job.... perhaps working part time at a hardware store (big box like Lowes, Home Depot, etc.... or locally owned), perhaps having a part-time gig at a pipe/tobacco shop, perhaps having a part-time gig at a music store
• potentially being able to adopt a "snow-bird" lifestyle..... 1/2 the year (Summer/Fall) up North, 1/2 the year (Winter/Spring) down South

Cons to retiring soon:

• missing teaching in the classroom
• missing interaction with the students
• missing working with my rodents, flies and nematodes
• missing some really nice people at the U
• financial ambiguities..... not necessarily "worries" since in THEORY we are "safe", but more like.... having to figure out a whole new mindset towards looking at income, spending, etc.... my mind is still so fixed on the notion of "work hard as hell, spend as little as possible, save as much as possible".... but living on a retirement income is SO VASTLY different than the mindset that navigated my adult life.... it seems like it needs to be a whole philosophical/emotional  change... and seems scary in many ways
• missing my routine
• potential "loss of purpose" in life... who will I be, who will I become.  How will it be to no longer be a professor or a researcher.... do I have the energy, the fortitude, the stamina to become something else?  Or will I whither away into complete meaninglessness?  

Fun?

• in theory... life..... and life in retirement.... is meant to be fun and enjoyable.  It may sound melodramatic and hyperbolic to some degree..... but I am not sure if I know any longer.... how to have or feel "fun".  
• I do know how to "fill time" and some of that is work, some of it is not work.  And, some of it is "enjoyable".... there is no doubt about that.  But, is it "fun"?  I am not sure.
• It seems when I was younger, life was FILLED with "fun".  But, that feels and seems elusive to me now.  I am not sure I know how to find that again. 

So, I am trying to determine what are the "real and legitimate" thoughts and feelings that I SHOULD focus on, versus those thoughts and feelings that may, in the greater scheme of things be of lower or less importance.  

It is strangely HARDER than I thought it would be to figure out.   I think (very unrealistically I now realize) I had THOUGHT it would be a process akin to a "light switch" in that there would just come a point and either a) I would die before I could retire, or b) a switch would toggle, and I would immediately know to retire and have my whole gameplan.

I was more naive about this than I thought.  And, it is more frightening than I anticipated.  If I were to retire.... my old life seems "done"..... and yet, whatever my new life may be is undefined, unclear, and uncertain.  Those "un" words are damn scary.

• I ran this morning.  It was important for me to do so, as I had dreams (er, more truthfully nightmares) where I relived all the sh*t about the kid I do not talk about any longer.  I woke up very angry and frustrated.  I awoke, wanting to hide from the day and just lay in bed.  
• But, I pounded out the miles to dissipate my anger and my hurt.  It is, of course, not gone.... but it is "farther away" than it was when I awoke.
• Now I will just work through the day as best as I can

PipeTobacco