Two years ago, I began a phased retirement. Last Thursday, I conducted a University class meeting for the last time, presided over my final Faculty Senate meeting, and (by coincidence) also celebrated my 38th wedding anniversary. And today — Tuesday — is special because, on my Tuesday/Thursday teaching schedule, I would have been teaching today. (I mean, I wouldn’t have because it’s finals week so class wouldn’t have met anyway, but you get the idea).
My brother, who retired fifteen years ago, recently had a piece of advice for me.
The weeks leading up to retirement, and the weeks after retirement, are particularly nice. Do savor them. Don’t just let them slip by as if they were ordinary weeks.
I’ve been trying to take this to heart.
Although we agree about many things, we sometimes actually come at things from quite different perspectives. He never really wanted to work and pursued a career with the goal of retiring early. I, on the other hand, aimed to find a career that gave meaning to my life and represented what I would have wanted to be doing anyway. I tried to embody the aphorism, “Do what you love and you’ll never work a day in your life.” I am not a spiritual person, but I believe in the sanctity of work.
I decided to dedicate myself to science education. As an edutainer, I had visited hundreds of elementary-school classrooms and had seen how few teachers understood what science really was: Not merely a collection of facts, but a way of knowing and apprehending the world. I believed that improving science education was a potential way to help people make better, more-informed choices about the environment.
When the Internet happened, I was given a front-row seat to helping faculty transform education using technology. For a brief moment, I was in a position to show people how technology could be used, not merely to reproduce the existing paradigm, but to create new environments to foster learning.
The work felt important to me. It seemed like work worth doing. I could make a case to myself that it was worth dedicating my life to the task.
In part, I was motivated by Journey to Ixtlan. It’s a rather silly book. But I read it as a young man and certain themes appealed to me. In particular, the notion that, since death may arrive unpredictably, you should aim to use what time you have intentionally.
This was reinforced for me when I had a cancer scare in graduate school. A barber spotted a questionable mole on my ear and recommended I get it looked at. I made an appointment with the campus health service and a physician’s assistant inspected it. She studied it, pulled out an illustrated guide, studied it some more, paged through the guide, and then finally announced, “I think you’re OK because it looks like this one.”
I said, “You’re pointing at a picture that’s labeled ‘Deadly Melanoma.'” It was. It was literally labeled “Deadly Melanoma.”
She paled. “Oh. Oh! Oh… Let me me go get the dermatologist.”
They took a biopsy and, a week later, the results came back. It was not malignant. They still recommended getting it removed, so I scheduled the surgery. But a week of having that in the back of my mind was rather… focusing.
Similarly, my decision to retire was significantly influenced by my hospitalization when I was diagnosed with a chronic lung condition. This made working and teaching seem a lot less fun. And got me thinking that I had better things to do than keep beating my head against a wall.
As I’ve approached the end of my phased retirement, I’ve attended several workshops where people talk about retirement. One person suggested that, rather than “retiring from” one should aim to “retire to”. For a lot of people, this is perhaps a useful distinction, although it was never really in question for me. If I wasn’t doing work, I would be doing something else creative. I have no shortage of interesting projects I intend to work on in retirement.
I have plenty of things to work on. I have several fiction writing projects. I have several books in progress and a lot of short fiction that I should be shopping around to publishers. I have wanted to make a new book of haiku for a couple of years and just thought of an idea for an accompanying art project that might be fun to work on. There are also some gardening projects that might be fun to try. I would also have fun doing some technology projects again as well. And, of course, there are also my service commitments to SFWA and Straw Dog. There is plenty to keep me busy.
After my two years of phased retirement, I still have several months to savor as I approach full retirement. This week, I’ll get the grading completed for my last class. Since I’m on a nine-month appointment, the summer is a period of “non-responsibility” (or irresponsibility, as my brother likes to joke.) So, although I’ll still be formally employed, I won’t have any more official duties. I can attend a few Rules Committee meetings and join them to meet with the Campus Leadership Council. And August 31 will be my last day. I will have been a faculty member for 30 years and one month.
It’s enough.
