Reinventing Retirement

Writers never retire. They die.

I can’t remember exactly where I first set eyes on that adage but I do remember when: not long after I took the decision to leave my ‘day job’ as the Expat Expert.

The words, coined by some unsung scribe somewhere, offered me a twisted sense of comfort. If I kept on writing, anything, I wouldn’t really be retiring from my chosen career until it was lights out. This was very important to me because I had quickly learned that the first stage of retirement is denial.

My momentous decision to cease working took place over three years ago. I was at the conclusion of an exhausting speaking tour in South East Asia and utterly sick of myself. My own stories were boring me to death; the sound of my voice grating. It was time to move on.

It is never stressed enough in all the advice offered about self-publishing that books do not sell themselves. The author/reluctant-and-ill-equipped-publisher has to do that herself if she wants to make back her considerable investment of both time and money. So, despite never being comfortable as a lecturer (yes, I know, I have the ability to talk to anyone, anywhere, about anything) the economics of self-publishing required I travel and speak to sell my books.  As the content is global not local, my readers never did live nearby. It was imperative from the get-go that I schlep around the world with my books on my back and vodka in my carry-on. (See Welcome! It will explain my need for alcohol).

I was burnt out. Moreover, I was disgusted with myself for engaging in bad habits on the road like smoking cigarettes. I wouldn’t dare light up in Vancouver.

So I leaped. I wasn’t wearing a parachute either for I hadn’t figured out my next move. I only knew the status quo wasn’t working. Among other worries, I fretted about standing in front of an audience and overhearing a pointed, “Is she still doing this?” Better to get out when people still wanted to hear me, especially when a moment to step back magically presented itself in Bangkok. I spoke to the mother’s group I helped start almost three decades earlier (BAMBI); the venue was Samitivej Hospital, where my daughter had been born; and the doctor who delivered her was even in the audience.  From the picture window in my hotel room overlooking the Sukhumvit Road area, I spotted our old apartment block.

The circle was closing too neatly to be ignored.

No one believed I would actually ‘retire’.  What would I do? Who would I be? Wouldn’t I miss traveling?

The travel has carried on, ironically, primarily under a new banner I never thought I would carry: accompanying spouse. And my husband had me doing the communications for his company Maple Bear Global Schools in less than a blink of an eye, pointing out that all the social media crapola I had managed to figure out would go down the drain without a place to use it.

Having covered the ‘doing’ I found the ‘being’ slightly more problematic. In fact, during the first few months of directionless activity, I understood why professional athletes ‘unretire’ at the first identity crisis. I think I was feeling retirement remorse.

I was already well-acquainted with reinventing myself. As a diplomatic spouse, my career in traditional journalism had been a non-starter abroad without a lot of pro-active tweaking. I acquired skills I could apply immediately to my post-retirement writing career.

That the idea and practicalities of retirement are being reinvented by baby boomers didn’t shock me. After all, my demographic has been responsible for changing work itself. Retirement is the logical choice for being the next big life stage. As previously noted, though, many people are trying to dodge it.  

“Oh, I’m not really retired.”

If I had a nickel for all the times I have heard this disclaimer being repeated by a member of the not-working-for-money crowd, I could….retire.

“I have all sorts of projects on the go,” is usually quickly added.

Of course it is, because not being busy, busy, busy all the time can be very scary.

I feel fortunate as I’m comfortable with all the blank space on my calendar. It leaves me room to catch my breath and to enjoy a new sense of possibility.