I was at a work event today chatting with a colleague from a different unit about retiring. She’s ready — after 2 kids and three grandkids she just wants some time to to herself to do things she enjoys. She wants to sew and putter in the garden — that type of thing.
I shared that I was ready too. I have not spent my adulthood raising kids so I don’t feel quite the same sense of anticipation for me time — me time is all the time at my house — but I think I could handle the guilt of retiring early.
I shared this with my loved one who vehemently does not agree that I should retire early (not that I could).
To wit:
“How hard is your job anyway? You talk on the phone, write emails and memos and chat with people you like all day.”
Yeah, that’s what we do in public relations. That’s just what I did all day today…all morning it was email after email and memo after memo — then, after a long lunch, I called a few friends on the phone to talk about my new shampoo. I capped the day off with a few visits to colleagues in their offices to chat about American Idol.
Okay, it’s true that I do enjoy my job and I probably would lose my mind at home — it would be very clean but I’d probably go stir crazy and start inhaling Javex after about a week. But for the record, I do more than send emails and write memos. In fact, today I faxed something and made a chart in Excel.