My parents raised me with the notion that every one of us was responsible for giving back to others, not just family and friends, but the local community as well. They modeled that behavior. But as I look around it’s clear to see that most people are self-absorbed, typically being focused only on their own…
Category: How to have a happy retirement
To have and to hold…
When my father died my mother had inscribed on his headstone the words, ‘to have and to hold and in time let go’. It’s from a poem I believe although I do not know which poem I’m sorry to say. It surprised me a bit because I never really thought of my mother as a…
What’s the point in having retirement data?
Over the extended life of this retirement blog I have written on a number of occasions about the role, of what I have called, ‘data’ in supporting a quality of life particularly as I have undoubtedly got older. Some people have associated this activity with, what has been called, (as in the article I am…
Adapt or… be miserable
The older I get the harder I have to work just to stand still. Not the most positive start to a retirement blog but there it is. I still feel that my original retirement goals are right for me but they’re difficult to maintain. So I’ve had to cheat / adapt a bit whichever word…
At least try and look on the bright side
You know you don’t have to be a deep thinker to realise that as you get older there is an increasing amount of rubbish that will, if you let it, not only clutter up but come to totally dominate one’s existence. Ergo (I like that word) you have to concentrate very hard to notice the…
Do’s and don’ts. Really?
This is the kind of blog – you might call it advice giving – which I wrote a lot of when I first started this retirement blog. I’ve written fewer and fewer of this type the further I’ve got from retirement – over ten years and counting. I also used to read the newspapers /…
Nearly Christmas, number 9 in retirement
Nearly Christmas. Well it’s about that time again and quick glance at my retirement life will tell me things are a little bit different this Christmas. Probably not with the actual Christmas bit itself but rather in the general context and lead up to it. I’ll let you know next time about actual Christmas. As…
Retirement travels and travails
Retirement travels and travails. Way back in the mists of time. In my teaching days in fact when we went on our summer holidays we were confined to the actual school summer holidays along with many others. True it’s been quite a while since we operated under such restrictions, educational psychologists could pretty much take…
Retirement gardening 3 or 4
Retirement gardening. I’ve written before in these retirement blogs how I expected my retirement to constitute the following activities – long haul travel, golf, photography and probably gardening. For the first time in the eight years that we have been retired I was able recently to write about our plans to fly to America. Golf…
Retirement and Television 2
Now for retirement and television. There is no doubt that for many retired people television is something of a Godsend. It wards off the loneliness and fills in those empty hours. Phew, that’s quite a miserable start to this retirement blog. I’ll just say in an effort to be more positive, that with a little…