People keep asking about retirement and I finally figured out a good metaphor!!

People keep asking about retirement and I finally figured out a good metaphor!!

I remember this: kissing him good by in the morning, and then thinking through what I would do for the rest of the day, but honestly, it goes back to 1965 when we were first married.  Retirement is like that first year of marriage, if you lived far (relatively) away from your parents, and did not work outside of the home.

Back then, every afternoon I would polish his boots (he had two pair) and lay out his uniform for the next day, from the skin out, so we would have a few extra minutes together the next morning.  Then after a nourishing breakfast of fried eggs and toast and juice, he would leave our first three room apartment a block from the Boardwalk and head to school at Fort Monmouth, New Jersey.  That first year, he studied; the second year they sent him to instructor’s school and he taught.

BUT, I stayed home.  Every weekend we hit the base library, and I selected a dozen books on everything from cooking, marital adjustment, then pregnancy and child birth, and just good escapism.  At home I scrubbed every inch of our tiny apartment, baked bread and cookies and pies, and selected new recipes for what he would call a year of adventure.  He grew up eating beans and potatoes and meat.  I learned to cook by color: green salad, white carbs, red and yellow or orange veggies and meat.  That was a new one for him.

Then I scrubbed clothes in the deep sink to save money, made homemade Christmas ornaments and gifts and made a poor stab at baby quilts for our first born….and read.  We didn’t even have a TV.

So, here I am again, kissing him good by in the morning after cooking his breakfast, and laying out some of his clothes the night before.  Then I tidy up the kitchen – maybe start dinner, but set the table.  Oh, and I had my devotions back then, as I do now, though my resources are much better now…  I do laundry in my real washing machine now and explore new recipes….

I write things, like this blog and work on workshops and classes I will be leading, and I try new things – like I did back then.  This last week I  read my way through books on basic quilting and altered books, and sometime in the next few weeks hope to attempt a quilt for someone I love and journal my way through an altered book to explore just how bad an artist I really am….though the book is not for anyone but me to see, so that’s OK!

So, if you wanna know what retirement is like – it is a whole lot like that first year of marriage – figuring out who I am at this place in life, longing for my husband’s return at the end of each day ….and other stuff that goes with that place in life.  I keep busy every day, and at the end of the day, there is more to do, and it’s really kind of nice!!