One Year

Approximately one year ago I was cleaning out the last of my career detritus as I closed down thirty-one years of teaching. It was a heady time filled with cleaning decisions, farewell decisions, employee exit decisions and am-I-doing-the-right-thing decisions. Fortunately, I was distracted enough to keep myself from crawling too deeply into my head. One step at a time and just do the next thing.

Now that I have had a little time to process the process, here are a few things I learned.

1) It is okay to not have an exit plan.--I can hear financial planners and forward thinkers choke on their coffee with this one. When I retired, I didn't have an encore career ready to go as my next step. I didn't have elaborate hobbies in the wing. Yes, I enjoyed reading and cooking but somehow that seemed less respectable than activities such as woodworking, quilting or gardening. I wasn't training for marathons. I wasn't preparing to care for grandchildren three times a week or ever, I only have granddogs and grandcats. I wasn't producing sassy old lady Youtube videos about sassy old lady things. I was just retiring, plain and simple. And I am still retired, without any grandiose plans, and glad for every minute of it.

2) Paperwork never stops.--Most jobs come with a fair amount of paperwork and teaching is certainly no exception. There were student assignments to correct, grades to record, and forms, forms, forms and more forms to complete.  I certainly do not have that volume of paperwork any more but I am still filling out forms. Leaving the safety net of a full time employer forces one to jump through lots of hoops for pension payments, insurance changes and status adjustments, all of which involve more forms. My husband just turned 65 so the world of Medicare became another mountain of forms to decode. Most forms are online which is good and bad, depending on the day. The good news about the forms I complete now is that I have the luxury of time. Gone are the days of completing paperwork while eating lunch. Sorry, kids, for all the coffee stains and crumb spots left behind on your papers.

3) Friendships are golden.--When I am asked if I miss anything from working full time, I immediately respond, "I miss my friends." There is nothing like working side by side in the trenches with great people. Good days, bad days, dull days and crazy days are all made better by the folks who have your back. I was blessed to be surrounded by a group of people who saw the value of beginning the day with interesting conversation, lots of coffee and laughter, sweet laughter. We may not have agreed on everything but we always gave each other support and respect. If we are truly honest, we spend more time with our work friends than we do with our own families. That is not a fault, it is just a reality and it is okay to treasure our work friends as the gifts they are to us.

I am still learning retirement lessons and my exit plan is still not noteworthy. In light of recent events, maybe that is okay. For me, being present in the moment has been enough.

Dem Bones

"Your ankle bone's connected to your shin bone. Your shin bone's connected to your knee bone. Dem bones, dem bones gonna walk around." And so goes a popular song enjoyed by kids and adults alike. The intent of the song ranges from understanding Biblical theology to teaching kids about our skeletons. I am not going to dive into either meaning. That seems like too much for quarantined mush brains. My reference is simply that everything is connected. And that fact is evident more than ever with the shopping habits of folks during the past couple of months.

It all began with the hording of toilet paper which led to a spike in sales for paper towels which led to a spike in sales for Kleenex tissues. My elderly brain remembers the Sears & Roebuck catalog as a back up in any self-respecting outdoor toilet years ago. The thought of paying for toilet paper when there was a free catalog available was often the rationale. My family did not have an indoor bathroom until I was about ten. Many memories of my youth are fond, but the outdoor toilet is not one of them.

The next shopping challenge was hand sanitizer which led to a shortage of disinfectant wipes which led to a shortage of hand soap which led to the shortage of any product with the word disinfectant written on it. Fortunately, I usually have a ready supply of good old fashioned bleach on hand and I was able to make my own solution of bleach spray. Long before hand wipes and sanitizers were invented, my mother would soak a wash cloth in soapy water, put it in a plastic bag and use it to wash our hands when we were traveling. I put one of my bleach sprayed cloths in a ziploc and carried it with me when I thought I might need a moment of disinfecting while I was out and about. No fancy sanitizer needed.

Another shortage was yeast. I don't know if there ever was a shortage of ready made bread in the stores but folks went crazy over the need to knead bread on their own. Social media was full of sourdough bread projects and ways to capture wild yeast. Those of us who have dabbled in the "starter" world know that it is a full time babysitting job that takes on a sense of moral obligation. I took my chances with the yeast I already had on hand and I also found plenty of bread on the shelves of my local grocery store. That being said, I was intrigued by a friend's suggestion of using raisins to create "yeast water." I liked the experimentation involved in the process so I went for it. I am on my second attempt as the first attempt was an epic fail. Time will tell if I am on the road to success as I am several days away from actually baking a loaf of bread. I suspect the vast majority of baker wanna-bes have already shifted back to purchasing bread and our yeast supplies will get back to normal.

Our latest potential shortage is meat. This is the only shortage that rattled my husband's cage. He loves his vegetables but meat is king. I don't think it helped when I told him I have plenty of tuna on hand. Fortunately, grocery stores have learned a few lessons along the way and are now limiting meat purchases as it has become very clear that folks tend to go berserk and buy up everything in sight whenever there is a whiff of shortages. My niece mentioned that it might drive people toward vegetarianism and I pointed out that there would then be a run on beans and lentils which would lead to the next shortage. 

And so it is. I cannot predict the next shortage but I do know that my rhubarb plant looks like it is going to keep me well supplied with desserts and that will take the edge of any crazy day.