A view of retirement. If I can I try not to directly steal ideas from other people’s writing. However. Every now and again an article or something similar comes along that proves irresistible and I don’t want to ignore it. This is one such article. You may remember a few blogs ago I wrote about passing 1,000 retirement blogs and advertising this achievement in The Oldie (a magazine as you will guess from the title intended for readers of an older persuasion).
As part of the ‘deal’ I get a free copy of this magazine. An expensive way to get a free copy but never mind, that’s what I did. In this copy was an article written by Andrew Cunningham entitled ‘Not the retiring type’ and subtitled ‘just retired after 30 heavenly years as a teacher’. Good to know that some people enjoy being a teacher these days even if he worked in a nice, private (or public) school as Head of English. Still that’s not the point.
Given I tend to skip most of the paper, magazine, or whatever I happen to be reading, it would be silly to not read an article with a title like the above, if only to compare the writer’s experience of retirement with my own and even if the writer is considerably younger and more recently retired than myself.
So for comparison’s sake, Andrew’s 6 observations about his retirement were as follows: 1) broadly was about meeting up with ex colleagues after you’ve retired and feeling that they will think you’ve aged but are too polite to say so. I must have the wrong colleagues most of my ex-colleagues would take pleasure in sharing this opinion. I did write a whole blog about getting together with colleagues for a Christmas ‘do’ shortly after retiring. At this distance I will just say I remember it wasn’t quite as bad as I had feared. Read the whole thing if you wish.
2. Your social life disintegrates. Apparently from at least once a fortnight (in his experience) to nothing. Sorry wrong again, I never had much of a social life when working so not a lot to lose. 3. You’re surrounded the whole time by old people. In the absence of any people this doesn’t really apply either. 4. All your free time ‘evaporates’. Well largely true but that’s of my own making given my retirement activities, as so often described in this blog, do pretty much fill whatever time I have.
5. He relents with the negativity or realism, you choose, slightly and admits ‘it’s not all doom and gloom’ and describes colleagues who have gone on to engage in rewarding and enjoyable voluntary work. I admit I can’t really comment on this. Voluntary work is an aspect of retirement I’ve always thought I should get involved in but sadly, maybe, never have, I’m not quite sure why, not enough time I suppose.
And just to show how much he really did enjoy his job he writes of his envy for those colleagues who were ‘asked back’ to work as a supply teacher. Quite unlike any teachers of my acquaintance who retired from teaching, they wouldn’t have returned at gun point. But it shows how much Andrew enjoyed his teaching (as he said ‘mixing with (mostly) cheerful and positive young minds is one of the biggest perks of the job’). Hmm. So all in all his negative view of retirement is not so surprising. And I have to say I broadly have the same view of being a psychologist.
And finally 6) not having access to IT support. Well with all that’s gone before I would say this if it applied to myself which it didn’t really would be a fairly small potato. I probably should have mentioned how he started (and I am finishing) this article with reference to the number of people (from April to June, 2022) of over 65s who have returned to work – 173,000 – as inflation ‘took a toll on their pensions’. Fortunately not so far at least a problem for me and I say that without any hint of smugness.
A view of retirement summary
So there we have it. Interesting to compare my retirement with Andrew’s who presents a view of retirement very much based on having enjoyed his working life and the particular problems this brings for a retiring person. Early days yet for Andrew of course and perhaps little comfort for him if I said I was still experiencing some negative thoughts about retirement not quite the same as his, but challenging nevertheless. One day I’ll relax, I hope.
PS. Andrew did mention no big trips for him as he couldn’t afford them. That’s something we have in common, if for different reasons.