Tag Archives: retirement

Retirement is Looming!

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Four weeks from today I will begin a new journey, retirement. I have spent over 26 years as the secretary to the superintendent of our local school district. My school district actually. The one I attended and both of my children attended. I have been an Ardmore Tiger all my life. I have poured my blood, sweat, and yes tears into this job. It has been anything but boring. It has been challenging, rewarding, stressful and at times unbearable. There are so many aspects of the job I dearly love, but just as many in the end that I just couldn’t handle anymore. Can you say “burn out?” I’m there.

I have had the opportunity to work for five different superintendents and 19 different school board members. You know they say “change” is a four-letter word. But if you can’t roll with the change, you are in the wrong job. Sometimes change was good, and sometimes change was hard. Sometimes it was a breath of fresh air and sometimes, it was tough coming to work. Regardless of who my boss was, my job stayed pretty much the same, assisting the superintendent with their vision for the school district. I did that to the best of my ability and I’m proud of the things I accomplished while in that position.

So here I am at 62 years young and I’m retiring. I never planned on retiring at this age. When COVID hit here in Oklahoma and the country shut down, including all schools, my husband and I worked from home a lot. Some days we went in to work and some days we could just work from home. We spent an enormous amount of time together, just us. We went for walks, rode our ebikes, played pickleball by ourselves, cooked meals together, watched a lot of Netflix, and spent some quality time on our back patio. I absolutely loved it! Just me and my best friend in the whole world. I began to think that I could do this every day. Then I began to yearn to do this every day. I finally said out loud, “I think I might want to retire.”

Eventually, I shared my revelation with my boss and the office. I was giving them a little over a year and a half to adjust to the idea and to find my replacement. So the countdown to retirement officially began. We have a small office of five staff members. Our receptionist and my dear friend Kathleen also decided to retire. She has been with the school district for 33 years! We are going out together. We were so excited so I made us a “countdown” calendar starting July 1, 2021! Every day one of us goes into the breakroom and marks off another day. We have had a lot of fun doing that. We are so close we can taste it.

So I have had this vision in my mind about getting my office ready for someone else to come in and take over and getting someone trained. I began preparing notes and a “things to know” notebook, getting files straightened up, and just preparing to hand everything over and to have closure. Well three weeks into the countdown, my boss had to take an extended medical leave. That changed the trajectory of everything. He was out of the office for six months. Unsure of whether he would get to return or not, nothing was done about looking for a replacement for me or a timeline that we would. Ok, I’m not panicking yet.

We worked through a very difficult six months in the office when the boss returned in mid-January. While we were all thrilled to see him, we knew pretty quickly that his health was probably not going to let him continue in his capacity as the superintendent. Because the “powers that be” weren’t sure if he was staying or going, putting off posting my job and finding my replacement continued. Panicking a little now…..

In my boss’s absence, our assistant superintendent became the acting superintendent. We all knew that if something happened and “the boss” couldn’t return, she was fully capable of doing the job. And what I didn’t know at the time, was that if she did become the superintendent, her intention was to bring her current secretary with her. To make a long story short, the “boss” did decide to retire and go enjoy his life without the stresses of public education. Hey, that’s what I’m going to do too!

So now I know who is going to do my job and she just works down the hall. She has one of those jobs where she never gets to see the light at the end of the tunnel. She meets herself coming and going. Taking over my job will probably be a welcome change. But because she can’t see the light at the end of the tunnel and everything she does has timelines and deadlines, she hasn’t been able to do any training for her new job. Panicking a lot now! THIS has me massively stressed out. Not only will she be learning my job probably after I’m gone, but she is also going to have to train someone new to do her job. Did I mention that I am retiring four weeks from today?

For all of you out there that have already retired, you may be able to relate to my next topic; being superfluous. Since this is my first and only go-round with retiring, I have no experience with this. What I have been feeling didn’t have a name until about a month ago, when my husband named it for me. “You are superfluous,” he said. I knew he would understand because after he announced his retirement at his J.O.B. the same thing happened to him. I remember him coming home with very similar stories as mine. I saw how much it hurt him at the time, but I didn’t think that it would happen to me.

So what do I mean when I say “I’m superfluous?” It means I am no longer necessary or needed. Did you find that after you announced your intent to retire, you were no longer brought into the inner sanctum of discussions? No one told you anything anymore. Your opinion didn’t matter because you were retiring. You are no longer on a need-to-know basis. Now I am saying all this and I have every confidence that the people who are doing this are not doing it intentionally. They probably don’t even realize they are doing it. Nevertheless, it hurts just the same. I have been a vital and critical part of this district for 26 years and should continue to be that until I retire in four weeks. In talking to others I know who have retired, this is not uncommon, but I don’t have to like it.

So today I begin the countdown to my last four weeks. My job now is to just “let it go.” I need to be OK with not knowing everything. I need to be OK with the high possibility that I won’t get to spend much if any time training the person who will take my job. I need to accept that I may not get the closure I so desperately wanted. While I will continue to do my job to the best of my ability, my focus is on June 3 when my top priorities become my husband, my family, having fun, traveling, playing pickleball, and BEING RETIRED!

Pickleball in Punta Gorda

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My husband and I started a new tradition when I turned 60 two years ago. Let’s go somewhere fun and play pickleball for my birthday. When I hit the big 60, we traveled to Las Vegas to play at the Plaza. For those of you that don’t know, the pickleball courts are on the pool deck on about the 5th floor. Shockingly, it was pretty chilly in Vegas on December 30. But we did find one other couple who was visiting from Canada, and we had a few good matches, weather allowing.

Then Covid hit and we did not travel anywhere for my birthday the following year. So, we still have Covid, but things seem a bit more flexible. In September we started planning for my 62nd birthday pickleball adventure. We have both been vaccinated and boosted and were ready to go. But this time, let’s go somewhere we are pretty sure will be warm and beautiful. Let’s try Punta Gorda, Florida!

Getting there however, proved to be a bit of a challenge. As I said earlier, we made these plans in September, hotel reservations and flights. We got our bags packed on Sunday for our Monday morning flight. Got up at 6 a.m. Monday morning to learn that our flight had been canceled. Remember seeing all those flight cancellations after Christmas on the news? Yup, ours was one of those. At least we hadn’t gotten to the airport, which is two hours away.

My husband couldn’t book a flight that day, so he found us a flight for Tuesday. The non-stop flights were all gone, so we would have to fly from Dallas to Charlotte, North Carolina and change planes to get to Ft Myers. DFW Airport is a very large place and we have always parked at the Remote North parking lot. It’s just easier than parking at one of the terminals. We arrived at the North Remote Parking to see that it was closed. We have never seen that. Should have known that was a bad sign. We drove into the airport and parked at the terminal our plane was assigned to at 8:15 a.m., checked in and boarded our plane right on time. Exciting. After sitting on that plane for about 45 minutes it was announced that we had a bad tire and that it would take at least an hour to replace it. That means, we will miss our connecting flight. Then they made us all get off the plane.

Lots of people on the plane had connecting flights and now had to find other flights, including us. We found a nonstop from Dallas to Ft Myers, but it didn’t leave until 3:55 p.m. We spent a lot of time Monday wandering the airport all masked up. We boarded the plane on time, and we sit, and we sit, and we sit. About an hour later, we were told that the plane had a mechanical problem, and we all had to get off. Really? Again? This time they are going to find us another plane.

All 173 of us had to go from Terminal A to Terminal D via Skylink. We boarded our new plane, and we were finally on our way. It just took one car, two trains and three planes. The sun was setting, and the day was pretty much done in Dallas. Next up, Punta Gorda.

Leaving Dallas as the sun sets

By the time we landed in Ft Myers, got our rental car and drove up to Punta Gorda, it was 10:30 p.m., and we were exhausted. Tomorrow would be a new day.

We got up, ate a little breakfast and headed out to find the Pickleplex in Punta Gorda. This is a fantastic pickleball venue with 16 beautiful courts. All the courts were full when we arrived, and they were already “stacking paddles.” We signed up, paid our $5 guest fee, stacked our paddles and waited our turn. We played each of the three mornings we were there and met some really nice people. They were very welcoming, and everyone was around our age and skill level. Mostly retired peeps who were wintering in Florida or who had moved to Florida. And why not? The weather was fantastic. I think it was 82 each day we were there, no wind and no rain. It was perfect.

We have never been to that part of Florida, and we know that we want to go back. Lots to see and do besides pickleball. We ate at two very yummy restaurants; Hemingway’s and Carmello’s Italian for my birthday. Carmello’s may be our new favorite restaurant. We had lunch at the Village Fish Market overlooking the bay and took walks along the water. The margarita I had from the bar at the top of the Wyvern Hotel packed quite a punch, but I am a bit of a lightweight. Thank you, Punta Gorda, for your hospitality. Maybe next time we bring the RV and stay for an entire month.

The retirement countdown continues, less than five months to go.

Goodbye 2020

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Happy New Year!!!!  Let’s all take a big breath and be grateful that 2020 is gone…. but certainly not forgotten.  I’m not naive, I know that the problems we had in 2020 are not going to magically disappear, but I can begin the new year with the hope that 2021 will be much better.  We had a really wet and cold New Year’s Eve with thunder and flood warnings.  Then at 9:30 p.m. all the lights went out in our house.  We opened the front door and all was dark everywhere we looked.  Wasn’t that just a perfect end to 2020?  The power was only off a couple of minutes but maybe that was the universe giving us a reset.  Fingers crossed.

With all that went on from March through December, I had one personal realization and we suffered two tragedies. 

I had a light bulb moment about 3 months ago.  My priorities were changing.  An opportunity for a new chapter in my life; a new chapter where I spend more time with those I love doing the things I love.  In order to begin this new chapter, I must retire.  And so I shall on July 1, 2022!  Life is short and I don’t want to put off that next chapter any longer than I have to.  If I could retire today, I would.

My husband came into my life when I was 44 and we have been together 17 years now.  One of the wonderful things about our marriage is that we would rather spend time with one another than with anyone else.   When we went into lock-down mode and spent even more time together, it made me aware that I needed more of that. Thankfully, he feels the same way.  When he asked me what changed my mind about retirement it was an easy answer.  I want to spend more time with you.  Retiring will also give me an opportunity to see my daughter and her family more.  They live in Arkansas and COVID kept from seeing them for a whole year.  Do you know how much a 9 and 12-year-old can change in a year?

In the middle of everything else going on last year, we lost both of our beloved Cavalier King Charles Spaniels within four months of one another.  We are heartbroken.  This was the first holiday season Keith and I haven’t had a dog.  I have to tell you; it is a huge hole in our life.  Both dogs suffered the horrible heart disease that Cavaliers are prone to.  We lost Maggie in July and Shawn in November.  She was just a few weeks away from her 9th birthday and Shawn was 9.  Both deaths happened unexpectedly and we were not prepared.

When Maggie died I told my husband that at some point I might not want to have a dog in our life.  He was quick to respond by saying, that’s just your grief talking.  Of course he was right.  Shortly thereafter, we started trying to find a friend for Shawn, another Cavalier.  While we were actively trying to find another Cavalier puppy, I was taking Shawn to doggie day care for a half a day.  He absolutely loved it and we saw another fun side to him.  Then it happened again one Saturday night.  He went into congestive heart failure we lost him.  Again in my mind I told myself, no more dogs…..but of course that was my grief talking again.  Yes, we want another dog in our lives, we just need to grieve for a bit.  This time I had an additional emotion to add to my grief, anger.  I am not sure why, but I felt extreme anger over both of their deaths for weeks.  I still cry some days when I think about them and I still expect them to greet me at the back door.  It’s a process and we are working through it.

In moving forward, I was adamant about us not getting another Cavalier.  How was I going to get my husband on board with that?  Their personalities are what sold us on the breed to begin with.  A dog that would be happy just hanging out was what we wanted and what we got.  They were sweet, happy go lucky and great little travelers.  If I was going to talk him out of another Cavalier, I would need to find us another option and sell him on it.  After my research, I had come to a decision about our next dog breed and I called my daughter to talk about it.  When I told her I wasn’t sure I could sell my husband on it she had some sage advice.  “Mom, all he wants to do is make you happy.  Just talk to him.”  She was right of course.

I pulled up a picture of the Shih Tzu on my phone and went in to talk to him.  I tearfully said I couldn’t do another Cavalier and he agreed he couldn’t either.   “So what kind of dog would we get?” he asked.  I turned my phone to him to see the picture.  “What is that?” he asked.  A Shih Tzu, a Chinese lapdog who wants nothing more than to sit on our laps and hang out.  Then I said to him, “Guess what they most often die from.”  “What?” he asked.  OLD AGE, NOT HEART DISEASE.  So the search for our new baby has begun.

So as we begin 2021 with hope for a better year, I will remember 2020 for the things it gave us and for the hardships that came with it.