Surprise! Retirement is not Exactly What you Expected

My birthday came around again last month. Sixty-something. (No I didn't forget, but I don't know you well enough to tell everything - yet.)

I got a nice gift from a friend. It was a paperback book titled "Not Quite What I was Planning." The book is a collection of six-word memoirs wherein authors have summarized their life experience in six words. The book is filled with terse autobiographical summaries chararacterized by wry humor, regret, delight, chagrin and acceptance.

Such philosophy leads one down the path to examining one's own life experience. In my case, the title of the book seemed to parallel to my own retirement experience: Not Exactly What I Was Expecting.

People who have been getting-up and going into an office or job site on a daily basis for thirty years or so, begin to develop fantasies about how it is going to be when they retire. They think that retirement is going to be like going to heaven without the inconvenience of dying.

Golf, fish, drink beer, go to the beach, see the latest movies, travel to foreign ports, road trips, more golf, more beer, naps ...

Achieving Nirvana is an elusive goal. Actually, it's a fantasy. Don't get me wrong, I love the fact that technically I am free to go fishing or sleep all day - whatever I choose. But, like most aspects of life, there is a murkier side. The life of leisure costs money, more money than you or your accountant thought you would need. And there is never enough time...

Logic tells you that you can live more cheaply after retirement. After all, when you quit working you no longer have those commuting costs, or the need for professionally cleaned and pressed clothes, or those exorbitant lunch expenses, right? As a retiree you think you'll just wear the same clothes for at least week, make your own frugal lunches of egg salad or tuna sandwiches, and take long walks in the morning...

Not so fast, amigo. I can verify that you quickly get tired of cheaply assembled DIY meals. Sometimes, it rains and those long morning walks do not seem so necessary when the torrents are licking at your ankles.

The other thing you realize in retirement is that people think of you in a different way. You no longer have the excuse of the all important job to avoid the demands of family and friends. Suddenly, you realize that there are people who need you. Perhaps it is just the favor of a ride to the Dr.'s office or an occasional pick-up at the airport. These people would never have bothered to ask when you were working.

If your grown kids live nearby, they think that being retired means that you have nothing to do. So, they load you up with babysitting requests - which you cannot refuse. Freedom to nap is severely limited when you have toddlers to monitor.

And, now that you have the time to schedule lunches and even cocktails with working friends and fellow retirees, the calendar gets filled-up fast. But all these lunches and cocktails cost money, and you can't wear the same clothes for a week at a time if you are going to be social. You need to get a decent haircut every three or four weeks.

And you want to take those trips you always deferred. No more 4 day get-a-ways; now you can stay as long as you want. (How about a month in Florida next Winter? Can I get a 'Hell, yes?')

Many people plan for retirement by socking away enough money in a retirement account to throw off enough interest to help fund their retirement expenses. We did that. But we did not foresee the meltdown of everything we hold sacred, and the erosion of the nest egg. So, instead of going to boat shows, and taking leisurely tours in Europe, I am getting haircuts at the bargain place and touring Canada.

Mind you I am not complaining; I am merely noting that as someone said, "the gods laugh at our plans."

 So, you might want to plan accordingly