Tag: retirement

Retiring is an exhausting process

chores involving Social Security, Medicare…

Retirement planI was surprised to discover that retiring, which I have been looking forward to, is an exhausting process. Maybe I thought it’d be better because my employer has engaged a company to make it “easier.”

The company, which I will call Noah, had a representative contact me a week before our scheduled phone meeting. He said, “Hey, do you want to put your medical providers in the database? It’ll help you decide what coverage to get after you retire.”

“Sure.” I’m always willing to let other people do tedious work for me. Later, I put in my medications in the system. Then a couple weeks after that, I got an email from Noah, requesting that I put the list of medical providers in the database.

I go to into the system, and sure enough, the provider list is no longer there. Stuff happens, no big deal. I try to re-enter the list of doctors. No luck.

I call Noah, and that rep can’t enter the information either. This guy tells me he’ll have someone call me when it’s fixed, probably later that day. A week and a half later, I finally get the message. I STILL need to enter that info.

Oh, and I have chores involving Social Security, Medicare, my current insurance company, my credit union (for automatic deposit), and a bunch of other things. If I were RETIRED, I’d have time for all this.

Another rant, related only in that I wanted a working DVD player for retirement. I ordered one online in March. We put in a disc, which plays great. But it doesn’t eject, yet the screen says the slot is empty. After too much of a back-and-forth, I’m STILL waiting for a box to ship it back to get repaired.

All of this is an exhausting process. What will I do when I finally DO retire? All the things I’ve postponed the past month to do “later.”

The R word: retirement

Everything that I’m doing now except…

retirementAs a relatively small number of you know, I’ll be in the state of retirement from my job as a librarian for the New York Small Business Development Center on June 30.

That’s a Sunday? Yes, I know. My last day of work is June 28, but I don’t have to start handing over my Medicare Part B card until July 1.

People keep asking me, “What are you going to do now?” The quick answer, and not entirely untrue, is “Everything that I’m doing now except I won’t be going to work.” More than one recently-retired friend has quipped that the job gets in the way of the other stuff.

I mentioned recently how busy the weekends are, in particular. I’ve blown off meetings, rehearsals, even events I was looking forward to because it was all too much.

I’ve known for at least two years I would retire this year if I possibly could. The timing is based on a number of factors:

My wife, who is a teacher, and my daughter, who is a student, will be out of school in the summer. This means we can all go somewhere together. Our primary limitation getting away is finding someone to feed our cats, one of whom is finicky about who he lets in the house.

My daughter and I are going to Indiana, the state of Mike Pence and Pete Buttigieg, in July, on a church-related trip. I’ve never been TO Indiana, through I went THROUGH it on a train twice. Ah, state #31 for me.

No more fretting about going back to work and dealing with 666 emails. I’ll have ZERO work emails. My list of personal emails, which has grown tremendously in the last six months, will diminish, as I take those reminders and turn them into blog post or tasks I want to finish.

I WILL finally get to that pile of clothes at the foot of the bed. Old copies of The New Yorker, unread, will finally get the love they deserve. The three Marvel movies I recorded months ago will eventually exit the DVR queue.

I have no plans to take up golf at this time.

This retirement process has its complications, of course, but that’s a post (or three) for another day.

When To Retire QUESTION

Firing the debate is Dylan’s “status as the ultimate music icon, the caretaker of a body of work that, many would agree, stands in contrast to his current sound.”

For some of us, when to retire is dictated by the policies of our companies, our governments, or perhaps, our health, possibly tied to the amount of our nest egg.

But for some, in the fields of music and sports, e.g., when it’s not always that clear. There’s a new movie called The Fighter, which I saw on New Year’s Eve, about a middling boxer who wonders if he should hang up his gloves, or stay in the ring.

In real life Brett Favre, an NFL quarterback has retired for the last three years; this year’s proclamation, playing on a losing team, seemingly will stick.

But I was most intrigued by an article in the Wall Street Journal a couple of weeks ago called When to Leave the Stage, which is about a “generation of music icons…hitting retirement age, along with their baby-boomer fans.” Writer John Jurgensen targeted one particular performer: “Is it time for Bob Dylan to hang up his hat and harmonica?”

“Why single out Mr. Dylan when Judy Collins and other graying veterans are out there touring unmolested? Firing the debate is his status as the ultimate music icon, the caretaker of a body of work that, many would agree, stands in contrast to his current sound. He’s also got a touring schedule that would put some hungry young acts to shame. He’s been doing roughly 100 gigs, year in, year out, since 1988…

“Casual fans, especially, are vexed by Mr. Dylan’s ongoing habit of mutating his most familiar songs.” The latter I know to be true from seeing Dylan myself a couple of years ago, and being totally unable to recognize some of his most famous works.

But should he retire? I contend that he’ll retire when people stop buying tickets to see him and/or stop buying his records; some of his best albums have come out in the past 15 years. So I say no – let the market decide. I had had opportunities to see artists such as Sly Stone and James Brown perform, and I declined, despite loving their music, because their erratic behavior at their concerts had become legendary.

What thinkest thou?

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