The Retiring Sort

Where’s My Golden Pond?

Posted on December 13, 2012 by The Retiring Sort

In the game of Financing Retirement, there are two sides of the ledger. I’m dedicating various other posts to the Money In side (IRA’s, 401k’s, pensions, savings, Social Security, home equity, etc.), but the only way to figure out when we have enough in that column is to estimate what we’ll need on the Money Out side. One of the two biggest expenses we anticipate in retirement is our housing.

My husband and I got into home ownership a a little late – three children and ten years into our adventure together. We never really owned a small starter home. We started with three bedrooms, 1-1/2 bathrooms, a large family room, and a big yard in an established family neighborhood.

This is where I digress to speak to younger folks: If you live in the US, don’t own a home, and plan to be in the area where you live for a while, talk to a real estate agent about incentives for first time buyers. Right now, interest rates are low. So far, congress hasn’t taken away the capital gains exemption for home sales or the tax deduction for mortgage interest (which is considerable), and you can sell a house or condo if it becomes too much. But if you are paying rent every month, you will never get a penny of that back.

OK, I’m back. The bottom line is that we do still have a mortgage. One of my retirement tasks is to research places my beloved and I might want (and be able) to live once he doesn’t need to be in commuting distance of his current job. There are a number of facets and parameters to this search, and money is only one of them.

We want a simpler, but still comfortable, quality of life, and for the next ten years or so we still plan to travel whenever we can. We have to decide on the characteristics our new home will have, taking into account a lot of very subjective qualities, like proximity to family, weather climate, and daily routines. For example:

City, suburbs, or country?
Proximity of neighbors?
Proximity of services/recreation?
New England? Mid Atlantic? Upstate New York? Another part of the US? Another country?

We know we want to be somewhere we can kayak/canoe, walk, easily obtain medical services, find a church, and still visit our grandchildren when we can. We know we want to be able to get into a city occasionally for cultural events, and that we don’t want to be where it’s too hot. We know we’re not ready to share walls with our neighbors. We want a place where we might find part-time work to fund vacations. We think we’d like everything on one floor. A place where my beloved can play in his wood shop and I can play with family history and photo archiving.

We know we don’t want to stay where we are. We’ve moved many times since we married 43 years ago, so we aren’t tied to a single home. This isn’t where our kids grew up, so we aren’t inclined to “retire in place” like many people our age. In fact, our current residence has never completely felt like “home” to us.

So, where to? We’re trying to envision where we want to be 10, 15, and 20 years from now. We’re looking for a place that’s on the upswing, and for that elusive feeling of home. Over the holidays, we’ll be down in Pennsylvania and will be looking at some areas there. We looked around some places in Upstate New York over the Thanksgiving holiday. We have a little time to keep funding for this, but not much.

I’ve been researching the financial climate in various states – income taxes, senior services, costs of living, and things like that. Pennsylvania and New Hampshire get some points there, depending on the community. But that’s a whole other post…

For now, we are champing at the bit, anxious to find our “Golden Pond” – that place that will feel like home, where we can welcome our family, and be self-sufficient for many years to come. It’s out there, and we’re zeroing in on it. We just have to keep looking, because I really believe we’ll know it when we see it.

Soon. Fingers crossed.

____________________________

Danke Sehr, Liebschen!

Posted on December 12, 2012 by The Retiring Sort

‘Tis the season to be jolly! I’m feeling the love. Cee at Cee’s Photography has shared the Liebster Blog Award with me – Thank you, Cee! Of course, this means I get to share the award with eleven other bloggers, and to share those bloggers with you. The conditions of accepting the award are as follows:

A) Paste the award picture into your blog. Done!

B) Post 11 random facts about yourself. Here goes: I love being a grandmother; I wish I had more artistic talent; I love travelling; I love to laugh; I’m not very graceful; I make lists then forget to read them; I cry at sappy movies and songs; I wish I played any instrument better; I love to cook, but not as much as I used to; I hate long car rides – I get claustrophobic after a while; I love to blog-surf.

C) Answer the 11 questions asked by the person who nominated you.

If you could spend one day doing what you wanted, what would it be? Traveling with my husband.
If you could be famous for one thing, what would it be? Kindness.
If you could have three wishes granted, what would they be? Continuing good health for my family. Eradication of violent anger. Eradication of cancer.
If you could know the answer to any question, besides “What is the meaning of life?”, what would it be? How do we cure cancer?
What one thing you miss about being a kid? The sense of an unlimited future.
What habits are worth keeping? Reading, Correspondence, Prayer.
What is your favorite day of the week? Saturdays – all day with hubby.
What word describes you best? Scattered?
What would I do if there was no way I could fail? Sing, or write a book.
Will you share and describe a happy moment in your past, recent or distant? Having so many of my friends and my family together for my birthday last year.
If you could spend 15 minutes with any living person, who would it be and why? That’s a tough one – maybe Condaleeza Rice – although I doubt she’d answer all my questions!

D) Write-up 11 NEW questions directed towards your nominees. OK, then:

Why did you start blogging?
Have your blogging goals changed?
What’s your favorite thing about the blogosphere?
Who’s been the most influential person in your life so far?
What do you think is your greatest strength?
What do others think is your greatest strength?
What’s your favorite book?
Where do you want to be in ten years?
How do you relax?
What’s your favorite comfort food?
Describe yourself in three words.

E) Pass the award along to 11 other bloggers. Here are the folks who will find this award from me in their stockings! These are mostly newly discovered treats for me. Please take a moment to visit them, to give yourself a treat as well!

All the best to you and yours for the holidays and the New Year!!!

Posted in Blogging | Tagged Blog, Blog award, Gratitude, Liebster Blog Award | 21 Comments

Letting Go and Moving On

Posted on December 8, 2012 by The Retiring Sort

Reluctance by Robert Frost

Out through the fields and the woods
And over the walls I have wended;
I have climbed the hills of view
And looked at the world, and descended;
I have come by the highway home,
And lo, it is ended.

The leaves are all dead on the ground,
Save those that the oak is keeping
To ravel them one by one
And let them go scraping and creeping
Out over the crusted snow,
When others are sleeping.

And the dead leaves lie huddled and still,
No longer blown hither and thither;
The last long aster is gone;
The flowers of the witch-hazel wither;
The heart is still aching to seek,
But the feet question ‘Whither?’

Ah, when to the heart of man
Was it ever less than a treason
To go with the drift of things,
To yield with a grace to reason,
And bow and accept the end
Of a love or a season?

This has been a strange year of changing seasons and moving on for me. Like the oak trees in my yard clinging to their faded leaves, I feel a little caught between seasons. I’m too young to consider this the winter of my life, but I’ve stepped into retirement ahead of my beloved and many of my friends. I’m certainly not unhappy, but in a way, I’m neither fish nor fowl.

Like most people I know, I resist change almost by reflex. I want to know I still have a purpose and can accomplish something every day. I want to know that all my friends and family are safely in their places. I want to know my keys are where I believe I left them. I want to know that the various mechanical and electronic devices I use will work the way they are expected to.

I don’t always get what I want.

My husband and I had a scanning project planned for this weekend. Thursday, I cleared space on my desk next to our high resolution scanner for him to lay out the documents he wanted to scan. I preset the scanner to save to a USB thumb drive with a clear folder name on it. When he got home, I showed him how to scan and save at various resolutions, and promised him access to the computer all day Saturday.

This morning, the scanner died. Hmmmph. Not only did this throw a monkey wrench into his plans, but it meant that my (9-year) old companion has to be junked and I have to learn to use a new scanner for the thousands of family photos I’ve been archiving. I did some quick online research, and we headed off to Office Depot, where for about $80 including tax we purchased a new scanner, earning 4.2 stars out of five online, complete with OCR, photo editing capabilities, and resolutions up to 4800 dpi. Trust me, these are good things.

After about half an hour of software downloads and experimentation, I was ready to retrain my beloved. Before I knew it, he had happily filled his thumb drive. Project completed. Crisis averted. As an added benefit, this scanner works with our newer computer and laptop, which the old one did not.

Not every change this year has gone so smoothly.

Although I am grateful to be retired, and to have left the madness of my job behind, I am sometimes a little lost in the morning – not quite sure yet how best to prioritize all this free-form time. I find I am using my Outlook calendar and synching it to my phone to suggest daily tasks and activities, and to keep me from getting lost in blogs or books. I’m finding a new rhythm.

More dramatically, this year we lost two old friends to cancer, and my mother to strokes. There is something so unsettling in knowing these beloved people can no longer be visited or reached by phone, email, or Facebook. They won’t receive my Christmas cards. My grandchildren won’t ever spend another Easter with my mother, and I won’t shop this year for a calendar with photos of Scotland for her to open on Christmas morning.

I have to let some more leaves go.

I have to move on to my new scanner, and my new lifestyle, and to the place in my life where the fresh losses of these loved ones are a reality. I know that as I move through the Autumn and Winter seasons of my life there will be more human losses close to me, both in affection and in age. As beautiful as these seasons are, they have this painful down-side. As I have done at other difficult times, I will trust in the higher plan and learn to accept what I can’t change, weaving all of these changes into my life.

To every thing there is a season, and a time to every purpose under the heaven… He hath made every thing beautiful in his time.

Ecclesiastes 3:1, 11a, KJV

There’s no point in fighting it – just as there’s no stopping the change of seasons. Everything happens in its time.

_____________________________________

This post was partly written in response to a WordPress Weekly Photo Challenge on the topic of Changing Seasons. To see other bloggers’ posts on the subject, click here.

For my previous ruminations (and a musical interlude) on the changing seasons in our lives, please see my Fall post: To Every Thing there is a Season.

Posted in Family, Photo Challenges, Retirement itself, Ruminations | Tagged change, Image scanner, photos, postaday, postaweek, retirement, Robert Frost, Seasons | 51 Comments

Some Say the World will end in Fire… or on December 20th

Posted on November 30, 2012 by The Retiring Sort

Fire and Ice by Robert Frost

Some say the world will end in fire,
Some say in ice.
From what I’ve tasted of desire
I hold with those who favor fire.
But if it had to perish twice,
I think I know enough of hate
To say that for destruction ice
Is also great
And would suffice.

What with reports of pressure building under the Yellowstone caldera, global warming, solar storms, and nuclear capabilities expanding to unstable nations/unaffiliated groups, that’s a lot of heat – so I suppose fire is the likely proximate cause (that’s insurance speak for what starts it all) for the end of the world as we know it. Then an ice age is almost certain to follow: ash blocking the sun, a tipping point in the oceans, or nuclear winter precipitating that.

Yikes.

There’s been a lot of wild talk lately about the end of the world. The Mayan calendar supposedly predicts the date to be December 20 or 21, 2012 – coming right up.

Of course, it turns out that’s not what the calendar says at all. It says the next major earth era starts that day. I guess that’s also scary, with solar storms predicted and the world in turmoil, but it also shows how pointless panic about all this is.

It’s really all too much to think about. I don’t mean to make light of this – I’m actually a bit of a tree-hugger myself, but the fact is that most of us can’t control anything bigger than our own carbon footprints, and I don’t believe we were meant to focus on the date. We were meant to focus on living our lives every day as if we can’t “get around to it” tomorrow.

If you’ve had a life threatening illness, or lost someone unexpectedly, you understand the urgency to this.

Some people spend a great deal of time trying to calculate the end of the world – or alternately the coming, or second coming, of the Messiah. The Christian Bible says he will come like a thief in the night (see 2 Peter 3:10 – a vote for fire, by the way – and 1 Thessalonians 5:2). In other words, we aren’t to worry about predicting when, but rather to spend our days believing it could be any time. The point is to live each day as one you won’t regret, and can perhaps even be proud of.

So, I will busy myself with preparations for the upcoming season and post-December 20th religious and family celebrations of Christmas in my home, then in my sister’s home, then on to a larger family gathering at my uncle’s home.

And then I will move on to the many things I have planned for the New Year of 2013. And aside from financial fiscal cliffs, world turmoil, and craziness around me, I will try to make each day a good one.

Regardless of your faith or understanding of science, the world will end when it ends. Until then, I figure our responsibility is to make it the best place we can.

I leave you with the Serenity prayer, which I have always loved. Although the total is a Protestant Christian prayer, the first and best known part has been found valuable for those of any faith.

Serenity Prayer

God grant me the serenity
to accept the things I cannot change;
courage to change the things I can;
and wisdom to know the difference.

Living one day at a time;
enjoying one moment at a time;
accepting hardships as the pathway to peace;
taking, as He did, this sinful world as it is, not as I would have it;
trusting that He will make all things right
if I surrender to His Will;
that I may be reasonably happy in this life
and supremely happy with Him
forever in the next.

Amen.

___________________________________

Photo: Night view of Halema’uma’u Crater on Kilauea

This post is partly in response to a challenge by Ailsa of WheresMyBackpack, on the subject: Hot. To see other heated responses to her challenge, click here. Other related posts and information:

Posted in Family, Ruminations | Tagged choices, family, Fire and Ice, lifestyle, photos, Religion and Spirituality, Serenity Prayer, Weekly Travel Theme | 18 Comments

Hawai’i Travelogue, Part 1 – Oahu

Posted on November 26, 2012 by The Retiring Sort

For forty years, my beloved and I talked about going to Hawaii. Finally, we were able to go last Fall. We figured we would treat ourselves to this big vacation while we were both working,

Hawaii is probably one of the most photogenic places we have ever been. We spent the first leg of our trip on Oahu, and saw all the touristy things we’d always heard about. (On the second leg we went to the “big island” and saw a very different place – which is a whole separate post. Here, I’ll focus on our week on Oahu.)

While there, we were total tourists and took full advantage of our splurge. We stayed in Waikiki, and did both group bus tours and separate day trips in a rental car. These photos barely scratch the surface of what we saw, but give a sense of the variety of lovely and interesting places packed onto this relatively small island.

One of our first stops was Pearl Harbor. There are museum displays and outdoor exhibits explaining what happened on the day of the attack. Undoubtedly for us, the most moving part of the park was the Arizona Memorial, built across the hull of the sunken ship. Alongside, you can see the USS Missouri, where the treaty with the Japanese was signed.

Looking over the side of the memorial at the deck below, you can see droplets of oil that have been gradually seeping up from the ship, called the “tears of the Arizona.” The legend is that they will stop once the last of the survivors has passed away. Scientists have estimated that’s likely – the oil will run out in a few years.

We went to the North Shore of Oahu, famous for surfing and the “banzai pipeline.” While there, we briefly stopped at Sunset Beach and watched the surfers for a bit…

The coast of the island presents some gorgeous spots….

Twice we took the Pali Highway between Honolulu and the opposite coast. This shot was taken at the approach to the Nu‘uanu Pali Lookout over the Waimea Valley.

We had fabulous views of the beach and Diamond Head from our hotel…. the beach was part of every day while we were there. I have always loved the ocean, and staying right on the water gave us so many opportunities to enjoy the surf.

We spent almost a full day at the Kualoa Ranch, where we saw TV/movie filming sites (Lost, Godzilla, Jurassic Park, etc.), took a jungle ride, and sailed on a catamaran out to “Chinaman’s Hat” island. The views from the hills above the ranch are just spectacular.

We enjoyed a day driving to all the remaining things we wanted to see, which started at Diamond Head (which we climbed enjoying views of Waikiki and several rainbows), Punchbowl cemetery, a Round Top Drive overlook, and a stop at the Polynesian Cultural Center, which was interesting, but sort of a disappointment – it felt a little Disneylandish to us.

We took in a luau one night, walked the beach from one end of Waikiki to the other, and shopped at the International Market Place and the ABC stores (a chain of cheap little souvenir shops – so fun!)

In Honolulu proper, we took in the Bishop Museum, beautiful Iolani Palace, and the court building across the street from the palace, famous as the home of Hawaii 5-0 on TV.

We were fascinated to learn that there are no predatory animals in Hawaii, other than birds. As a results, chickens brought to the islands by Europeans have flourished in the wild – and we saw them everywhere. Someone also had the brilliant idea of bringing the mongoose over to reduce the population of some snakes (also not indigenous) – and learned once the mongoose population took hold that one species was nocturnal and the other wasn’t – so now both species are still thriving there!

For a glorious week, we toured, relaxed, ate at restaurants overlooking the beach watching the sunsets, and in general we just totally enjoyed being tourists! Traffic is as bad around Honolulu as in any other US city, and it’s not a very economical vacation venue, but Oahu was fabulous fun, and an indulgence we will always remember.

(To see the photos enlarged, click on them or see the slideshow below. A description comes up if you hover your mouse over the photos in the post.)

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Posted in Recreation, Travelogues | Tagged Arizona Memorial, Hawaii, Honolulu, lifestyle, Oahu, Pearl Harbor, photos, Sunset Beach, Travel, Waikiki, Waimea Valley | 30 Comments

Thanksgiving Reflections: On Being Seriously Grateful, and Finding Contentment

Posted on November 22, 2012 by The Retiring Sort

“Be thankful for what you have; you’ll end up having more. If you concentrate on what you don’t have, you will never, ever have enough” – Oprah Winfrey

“It isn’t what you have or who you are or where you are or what you are doing that makes you happy or unhappy. It is what you think about it.” ― Dale Carnegie

Without even thinking, when people are happy about an issue’s outcome, they’ll say “Thank goodness!”, “Thank God!”, or even “Praise the Lord!” It’s almost a conditioned response.

Are they truly grateful, or just relieved?

I grew up in a nice middle class family with parents, grandparents, and a little sister who loved me. I’m one of 22 first cousins on my dad’s side, and I have a nice extended family on my mom’s side as well. We had the normal assortment of family upsets and illnesses, and some months we were very tight in our budgets, but overall I had quite a lot to be thankful for.

As I meandered through my life, I made some good choices and some not-so-good choices, but I am blessed with a wonderful husband, three beautiful children, five adorable grandchildren, and that same little sister, who still loves me. I even have two stepsisters and their families now.

This time last year, I’d just had a wonderful big family birthday party and a long-awaited trip to Hawaii. It was wonderful. But I was so stressed by work, minor health issues, and things happening with some friends and family, that I really wasn’t as grateful at the time as I should have been. In fact, I was so down last December that I did no Christmas letter for the first time in 25 years. Yikes.

“If all our misfortunes were laid in one common heap whence everyone must take an equal portion, most people would be content to take their own and depart.” ― Socrates

With a truly grateful heart this Thanksgiving, I can tell you I’ve made some major adjustments in my perspective. My beloved husband helped me figure out how to retire earlier this year to give me relief from those pressures and precious time with my ailing mother. And I came to terms with a number of things:

I am a cancer survivor, and my health will never be perfect. I have other issues, which may someday affect my mobility, but for now they just remind me to take care of myself. I am not in chronic pain, I can see, hear, walk, write, and travel. I can’t change anyone else’s condition, but my husband, children, and grandchildren all have fairly stable health. I am very fortunate.
I will never be rich or famous, have a grand home, or own a Mercedes. My beloved and I have a nice home, serviceable economy cars, and we are working hard to make sure we have properly financed our retirement so he can retire as well in the near future. The economy is challenging us, but we’ll work through it.
I’ve made mistakes I can’t change. I can think of a million moments I’d redo to make my marriage and my children’s lives more perfect, or to improve on my friendships. I’ve neglected prayer sometimes. Still, I have a wonderful family. My children are all grown with families of their own; I have some great friends and an amazing life partner. God has been forgiving and good to me.

So there you have it – health, sufficient wealth, family, friends, and faith. I have everything I need, and more. If I’m really honest, I actually have everything I want and more. I have learned to concentrate on the things I can change. I am seriously blessed, and seriously grateful.

“Many people lose the small joys in the hope for the big happiness.” ― Pearl S. Buck

“He who is not contented with what he has, would not be contented with what he would like to have.” ― Socrates

My life is certainly not perfect; nobody’s is. And I know life doesn’t come with guarantees. It’s fragile and things can change in a heartbeat. I don’t want to take a single moment for granted.

“Be content with what you have;
rejoice in the way things are.
When you realize there is nothing lacking,
the whole world belongs to you.” ― Lao Tzu

And so on this Thanksgiving Day, let me offer you my prayers for health, whatever sustenance you need, spiritual well-being, and the closeness of family and friends. May these things come to you, stay with you, and offer you contentment and peace of mind.

If you are seriously grateful, contentment will follow. It’s not always easy, but go ahead, give it a try.