For the past couple of months Dave and I have been looking forward to his retirement this coming Friday – in two days! After years of careful planning and the blessing of our financial planner, Russell, we were ready to toss the alarm clock and begin a new life as retirees. In fact, I was going to rededicate my blog to our new life and had every intention of beginning on the first of the year. But, life doesn’t always follow the course we think it will, does it?
Don’t panic, nothing really bad has happened to us – it’s all good. I was delayed in getting back to pounding the keys due to a really nasty cold bug I came down with between Christmas and New Years. Between the sneezing, coughing and nose blowing, I didn’t really have much to say and my head was too clogged to contemplate any pithy thoughts so the blog got pushed to the side until now.
Somewhere in the middle of my cold, about two weeks ago, Dave received an email from a former work acquaintance letting him know about a position opening up in another company he might be interested in. Short story version, he checked into it, met with them and just yesterday signed the offer to begin a part time position on a business development team for another Beltway Bandit in a couple of weeks. So, instead of fully retiring, he’s just dipping one toe into it. It could be just for a couple of months or years; time will tell.
I know some people spend years dreaming of retirement; the trips they’ll take, new places they’ll live and in essence, totally reinvent themselves. We’ve never really done any of that stuff.
Oh sure, we’ve thought about not working. I highly recommend that unless you’re doing something you really love. If you’re not, it’s a good time for a change. But, throughout Dave’s Naval career, and even with our last move, we’ve had to reinvent ourselves so many times, we’d like to just stay put and see what where we are has to offer. So moving is not a thing for us right now.
We definitely want to travel. I’ve been diligently studying German on my Duolingo App for almost five years now and would like to put it to use along with the French I studied in school. I wouldn’t say I’m fluent in either language but I think I can read enough to get around and could probably understand someone if they spoke very slowly. Most of my “people” are from Germany and I’d really like to go to see the place for myself.
Our next big trip will be to Lakeside Chatauqua in Ohio for our son Andy’s wedding this coming June. I just made the reservations for the rehearsal dinner yesterday so the excitement is beginning to build. I will try to cling to that excitement as I begin the task of finding the perfect “mother of the groom” dress.
So 2020 has started off a little differently than we’d expected, but has offered us opportunities we hadn’t even considered. I hope our life stays like this. Good surprises will always be welcomed and embraced and will always provide me with something to write about.