SIL - Jan/Feb 2019

A Note to Baby Boomers
Why Does Retirement Take so Much Work?
I
was about to head to my favorite Florida
beach.
Hurricane Michael beat me
there.
My visit got put off, of course. I will
get there when the getting again is good,
or good enough. Michael’s victims are too
many. I certainly am not among them.
Once more, though, reality rules.
The reality is that retirement is harder
to figure out than my cellphone bill. A
dear friend just called. An early-retirement
offer had come in her email. She was excited.
She was frightened. She was ready
to say yes. She was ready to say no.
She was me, going on seven years
ago. Let’s get together, I urged. I will help
you through this.
Yeah, right. Like I have a clue. Before
I teach senior citizenship, I had better
learn it.
How’s retirement? Great, I want to
say.
It’s a constant adjustment, however.
Long after my buyout, retirement remains
as much a challenge as a comfort. How do
you decide to give up work? Retirement
keeps happening both to me and for me.
I hug it some days and wrestle it others.
I had assumed retirement is something I
could do.
I also figured I could disco dance or
do yoga. No and no. The thing is, I cannot
exactly drop out of retirement.
Actually I can, of course. I could
greet Walmart shoppers or fill orders at
Amazon. I could deliver lunches from
Panera Bread or drive for Uber or, heaven
help us, substitute teach.
If only all old people acted their age.
Instead, peer pressure flits around me as
pesky as mosquitoes.
Our president is older than me. My
cardiologist is older than me. The woman
who runs the local homeless shelter is
older than me. People work into their 80s
and 90s. They make me feel like a bum. I
cannot be the only old guy happily sitting
around with little better to do some days
than to read every obit and to eat lunch
at 11.
Travel more. Volunteer more. Read
more. Exercise more. I do all that. I recommend
all that. None of it comes with a
paycheck, however. I have had some sort
of paycheck since I was barely a teenager.
Paychecks are addictive. A job comes with
the satisfaction of a job done well.
An occupation still defines me. I am
not Dale Moss the traveler or Dale Moss
the volunteer or Dale Moss the avid reader
or Dale Moss the YMCA regular. I am
Dale Moss the columnist.
I only write two or three pieces per
month, all freelance. This time last decade,
I was writing four columns each week and
wearing out every adverb in my vocabulary.
Writing identified me.
Making decisions can mean making mistakes
and there’s no cheat sheet. I do my best, but
my best has not been all that great.
My career has downshifted into my
pastime. I flirt with writing still less. I flirt
with saying farewell to what little schedule
I keep, to what little responsibility I
take. I try to convince myself to become a
full-fledged has-been.
Then one of you kind readers compliments
me about something I’ve written.
Bless you. It only takes one such reminder
of why I matter. You don’t intend
to complicate things, but the plan to hang
up my thesaurus goes out the window.
So shut up. No, wait. Don’t. Please.
I don’t need fancy. I no longer miss
missing out on being at the biggest concerts
or ball games. I am okay with stuff
that’s more OK than oh wow. Culver’s
cuts it just as nicely as does one of the
steak places down the block.
I do welcome predictability, however.
It ruined my day when the grocery
stopped selling my favorite salad dressing.
My barber ponders her own retirement;
I’m almost glad I’m almost totally
bald.
That beach trip? I take it annually.
However understandable its delay, I am
thrown off. To me, surprise is a four-letter
word.
Talk about unpredictability, retirement
requires work. So much for the
headaches stopping when the job did. Get
up later? Put off taking Social Security?
Do the snowbird thing? Leave, or spend,
an inheritance?
Making decisions can mean making
mistakes and there’s no cheat sheet. I do
my best, but my best has not been all that
great. I would tell my retirement-contemplating
friend to do as I say, not as I have
done.
But I’m not sure even what to say.
Let’s see. I met with a financial planner.
That proved quite helpful, more comforting
than any glass of pricey bourbon.
Also, I let almost nothing get in the way of
my gym visits. That, too, is a bigger plus
than I had imagined.
Part-time work, though, it surely
does cut both ways. Worth the effort or
the pay? If only I could figure that out one
way or another.
Until I can, here I am. I guess I can
keep writing as long as you keep reading.
What I do is what I am, all in all. You may
not need me. But apparently I still need
you.
Could be worse. You should have
seen me disco dance. •
After 25 years, Dale Moss
retired as Indiana columnist for
The Courier-Journal. He now
writes weekly for the News and
Tribune. Dale and his wife Jean
live in Jeffersonville in a house
that has been in his family
since the Civil War. Dale’s
e-mail is dale.moss@twc.com
Jan/Feb 2019 • 9