Middle-aged mammals, I find myself drifting in a vast ocean. My vessel is not taking on water, but the rudder is uncooperative. Before I fall asleep each night under the stars, I have planned my course and set my tiny boat towards the distant shore. In other words gotten my thinking about the Village of Retirement in some semblance of order. Yet each morning on awakening, in a foggy wind-swept sea I find I have drifted off course. Wait, what? Since my late 20’s I have had summers off, but now as I embark on my journey of retirement I’m looking at not 60 days off, but 30 years. How can this be? What to make of it?
I will sit here on the couch with my book and stare out the window in between turning pages. The answer is out there in the trees.
I bought a Swiffer duster and cleaned the tops of the door and window frames. And I’m not ashamed to admit it was the very first time I ever did it. I put a new garbage disposal seal in the sink and was shocked at what I found underneath the old one. I discovered dust bunnies the size of basketballs under a dresser in the bedroom and sucked them into the pet hair eraser. Chores seem to be my new work.
So all this is to say there’s a lot I don’t know about how I will spend the next 30 years or so, I mean aside from doing more chores. I’m still trying to grasp the fact that in 4 days I will not be going into school to set up my classroom. I will not be stepping into a maelstrom of hyperactivity and managing 30 young homo sapiens.
I suppose I will adjust eventually to the slowed pace of life. Due to my natural slothful nature, I’m sure I will take to it in time. I do look forward to spending more time with my people now that I’m not a working stiff. Pam came for an extended visit and it was marvelous. In the fall I’ll go to Virginia to see my brother. In a couple of weeks (once school has started for everyone else) I’m off to a cabin in the redwoods a friend has “lent” me. I will not be visiting France until 2026 and I probably won’t relocate there. For now, my dear old house is my anchor.
Life is not the same as it once was. It is v.v.v.v. different. The bliss hits arrive when I realize I will not return to the classroom, and more importantly faculty meetings – the bane of my existence since my 30’s. I am my own master and commander. The uncertainty arrives when I consider how small my boat is and how large the sea -it goes on forever with no land in sight.
I try not to escape my rudderless situation with digital distractions. I try and sit here and be inside of all of it, but on many days I fail. Thusly I go forward in a floating world as we all do. Making our way with so much uncertainty.
Except I’m certain about one thing: I love public libraries, and I’ve been visiting quite a few this summer!
I like and need to make pictures. Whatever the outcome, I know that every mark has value. I am glad of that. It is a direction I wish to move towards. – reading, writing, walking, being outside, tidying my nest, drawing. The no-plan plan. Letting it be okay to drift, to float on my back, to tread water, to see no further ahead than the headlights on a dark road.
A new way of living is underfoot. And I haven’t got a clue what’s in store.
Do inform me of how you’re spending your one wild and precious life. Someone in the city of angels with lots of time on her hands needs to know.
