A glimpse into retirement

This morning I woke up a little depressed. I return to work tomorrow after the Christmas and New Year break. I don’t really want to go back, and the inertia is compounded by wife not returning until next Monday. I’ve only got two days to get through until the weekend, but I should have taken them off too. It should be quiet at work as some won’t be back, but I still can’t avoid a feeling of desolation. It will soon change as things pick up and I get busy, but I can’t deny that I feel like throwing in the professional towel.

I’ve enjoyed being off for the last 10 days even if, or maybe because, we’ve been busy. We moved house last year into a home that needed a lot of renovation, so there’s no shortage of decisions to make. We met friends and family and had time to ourselves to chill. It’s been a glimpse into what retirement will be like, and I like it.

Retirement has been on my radar for a few years. I haven’t taken the plunge, mainly because I didn’t feel ready for it. I still mostly enjoyed my job and hadn’t found a suitable replacement for it. I don’t want to just sit on a sofa and vegetate. I want the option to vegetate of course, but it would be the exception rather than the rule. That is what my vision of retirement is. It’s about flexibility to do what I want when I want to do it. It’s about the focus being on what’s good for us, not my employer.

The last 18 months at work have been more difficult. Not because I can’t do the job, because there’s a lot more office politics at play. There’s been redundancies and more than a few reorganisations. This uncertainty plays into my feelings of disloyalty. No matter how many times I’m reminded of the firm’s values and principles, I can’t help feeling like being told to such eggs.
The last ten days off work have seen me do pretty much what I wanted to do. I’ve read, written the odd blog post, tidied the garden, tidy up my office, do some housework, and a myriad of other things. Most of those tasks, like in my professional life, needed doing, but they didn’t feel like a chore. It felt great having the freedom to do what I wanted. If that is what retirement is like, I can’t wait for the day when I can wave goodbye to the corporate world.