WHEN Did You Retire? Tell Us ABOUT Your Retirement!

[Anonymous]

Me, retired July 2020. With the pandemic still active, I have had to REMIND myself to CREATE an alternate retirement journey. Had PLANS of doing LOTS of fun volunteering in person. But fortunate to have created one where I am the ONLY volunteer 🙂 I saw a NEED, asked if I could FILL it and got a YES!!!! Now I get to travel to a homeless clinic, see the staff and our resident doggie Athena every other Monday. I create and water planters for their waiting room. Not dealing well with this forced isolation, so my trips to the clinic FILL me up with HUMAN AND DOGGIE LUV 🙂 Other than that it is Walmart, where I fight to get my 6-feet when checking out after my clinic trips. I use to shop every week, reduced it to every other week when I RUN OUT of food. Hate going. I did try using my shopping cart to the RIGHT of me = 6-feet away from me this Monday. Had seen my customers at my side job, around my real job do that. Lol, use to think how selfish! Now I UNDERSTAND. Forces folks to WAIT for you to PAY before they are BREATHING down your neck. It worked and got cussed out by a man. HE felt a need to COUNT the squares for ME/lol. Now keep in mind there are signs on the FLOOR telling NEXT person to WAIT 6-feet away. Hmmm, guess he cannot read. Anyway, with OLD age, I have learn't to IGNORE and he got more ANGRY and left/lol. Goodbye jerk 🙂

[Rebecca2004]

I retired in 2018 after 46 years of working in an office.  I planned on working a few years longer but there were people creating a very toxic atmosphere so I decided it was time for me to leave.  I am a person that needs to always be doing something and I loved the work I was doing.  However, when you all of sudden don't have your days planned and you are looking for something to fill many hours a day, it takes a toll.  Thankfully I love crafts, art and reading so I'm finally getting used to the change.  It's not an easy transition.

[bw3491]

Retired in 2016. When I had to go to the local Social Security Office I was the only grey haired person in there, pretty easy if you pay attention and follow the rules, one woman didn't and when she was chastised for using her cellphone in the building by the armed security guard she barked back "I'm not using my cellphone it's 'SnapChat'.... circus. Then hearing the fellow in the wheelchair whine on why his benefits were being cut off I thought, maybe try one of them real expensive powered wheelchairs next time? double circus... LOL....

Other than the trips to Social Security it's been pretty smooth sailing minus the Covid BS.

Oh wait one more, when applying for Medicare the agent tried to upsell me to part 'D' to which I declined and he said something along the line of 'What about drugs?' I just replied "The Lord is my drug".  LAFF 

Where are my *FREE* N95 masks? (still waiting)

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[DeahWA]

I declared myself retired from self-employment in December 2019, just in time to not take the classes and do the travel and meet the people I had thought would fill time in 2020. Having worked from home for the better part of 20 years, pandemic isolation was no big change for me, but relieved the guilt of ordering in groceries and meals that I coulda / shoulda / woulda gone out to get myself. The need for creative outlet in the last year has returned me to writing, an early in life pursuit.  I've published and re-published a number of fiction, non-fiction, and poetry ebooks so far, and have more in development. Looking forward to digital chatting with other AARP members.

[Anonymous]

Hi @DeahWA how EXCITING!!!! NO pressure to respond, tell us about your books and poetry - titles and where we can purchase. I luv READING and always looking for NEW material!!! I do appreciate you making time to stop by to join our discussion 🙂

[DeahWA]

I'd love to tell you about these works. Unfortunately I've been trying for an hour to upload links and the reply keeps getting rejected.  So I added urls to my profile here. Hopefully those can be copied and pasted into your browser. 

Two paperbacks on Amazon are drawn from my dissertation and are mostly for doctoral students. 

Healing Presence is the collection of interviews done on the felt sensation that occurs when a patient is truly cared for by their clinician.

Organic Inquiry is a guide on how to do a qualitative style of research that in addition to other measures includes a spiritual and transpersonal aspect to data collection.

On the Smashwords platform I've published some non-fiction aimed at coping with anxiety, including:

Creating Sanity in Troubling Times

and

The WorryTamer Collection

Also there is my recent poetry collection under a pen name:

Love is a Struggle: Poems on the Evolution of a Reclaimed Relationship

And a couple of short chick lit fiction pieces under another pen name:

Hot Flashes: A Month of Mini Fiction

and

First Time Again (this is mild to middlin' erotica for seniors)

I have at least 3 -5 other writings in process. Seems I've become addicted. 😎

[Anonymous]

Hi @DeahWA the AARP website can be a challenge 😞 Thank you for all your hard work. I will take a look at your info. You are BUSY!!!