Retirement

I was just going to write that I was retired and then I looked up the meaning of retired. One official meaning is: left one’s job and ceased to work. Another is: Archaic ( not seen by many people.) These two definitions are very ARCHAIC.

I would rather like to think of the rest of my life in terms of Robert Frost’s poem “The Road Not Taken”. I chose one of those paths and had a very rewarding career. I was a Teacher & a Principal In the Elementary setting.

What a lot of wonderful experiences I had teaching and being taught by children, parents, other teachers and life’s experiences. Along with my work I raised four wonderful children who have gone on to raise their children (my Grand children) and now they in turn are raising their children ( my Great Grand Children) . Now I have the joy of interacting with my children, my Grand Children and my Great Grand Children.

A couple of years ago I started on my journey of the road less traveled. Part of my family moved to Boise, Idaho and one of my best friends got married and eventually moved. I was faced with a choice to stay in my comfortable 3 bedroom house and not have a lot of interaction with very many people or move into a small one bedroom apartment hooked onto the home of one of my Grandchildren. I was faced with the daunting prospect of getting rid of a lot of my “stuff”.putting some in storage, selling some “stuff”, and giving away a lot of “stuff.”

I am still working on downsizing, but I am happy to report that I love my small apartment, I love the interaction of people as they drop in and throughout the day. We all sit down together for a family dinner in the evening.

Life after retirement can be awesome if we make it awesome or boring if we make it boring.

So now that I am RETIRED.I have the opportunity to (using the thoughts from the last three lines of Robert Frost) “take the one less traveled by, and make it make all the difference."