I was just filling out the Blogger profile and it asked for my Industry. Now exactly what industry does "Retired" fit under, I wonder? I guess "unspecified" is as good as any.
I actually retired three years ago. Before I retired (at a very young age, I must say), friends and family would ask me, "What do you plan to do in retirement....travel? change careers? go back to school?".
Huh?? "I'm retiring!," I'd remark. "I don't plan to do anything!" I thought I could do that for the rest of my life. Doesn't sound too hard.
But it is actually much harder than it sounds. After working almost every day since graduating from college (and on nights/weekends/holidays during school), I forgot how many hours are in a day. Way too many hours to do nothing at all...even with a husband who is also retired and is pretty good at not doing much of anything except internet cruising and movie watching.
Frankly, doing nothing is pretty boring. Especially when you live in a very, very small town in the mountains where everyplace worth going is at least an hour away. And it makes you a boring person, too. Nobody loves a couch potato with nothing to say. Not even another couch potato.
So, I've spent the last year or so trying to decide how to fill up my hours in retirement. That can almost be a full-time job. Trying something new (or something old and forgotten), discarding what doesn't work, incorporating what does work into your every day life. Learning to be with your spouse again. Learning to be with yourself again.
What do I want to be when I grow up? I dunno yet. I'm still deciding....
