I am sitting alone in my room watching the first feathery light flakes of a new snow drift onto the gray shingles of the roof outside my window. In the background I can hear the sweet sad horn of Chris Botti playing on the stereo. I had been to a concert of his recently and remembered that I had not listened to his wonderful music in a long while and pulled out the three CDs I own.
Today is one of those days of strange dichotomies. I am lonely and yet savoring it. I am sad for no reason but know that this sadness can only be appreciated because my cup overflows with happiness. I feel the pace of my breath and heart slowing to a rhythmic peace in sync with this silver gray day. This sadness is bittersweet. This melancholy is the one side of the whole that keeps me from flying off into space.
I am savoring 'Empress of China" tea in a cup I had made with my daughter at a pottery place a number of years ago. It is an ugly green and purple and thus fits completely with the strange day.
I know that part of this strange feeling is the nearness of my retirement. I have told the important people at work and therefore solidified this leap. In the spring, I will be retired. No matter what angle I look at this, it is another milestone in my life. It is another major corner turned. It is like a gift that I have been given, but it is like a large beautiful bowl in which I must find beautiful things to place. There is a real danger of filling the bowl with bits of flotsam and jetsam.
This milestone also means that I have definitely moved away from those parts of living that meant so much. There is no innocence, there is no pureness, life is what it is. When the bowl is full there is no more pleasure in finding new things to place there. At the very end, there are only old memories after all. All the fresh new memories will be made by those that follow us.
It is sad, but it is also wonderfully sweet this little bit of life we have been given.
Well, golly, Tabor, don't go all sour-sweetness on us. Be well.
ReplyDeletesuch a good post, tabor. my retirement was filled with wonder and excitement and the thrill of new opportunities. i had a new place to live, new people to meet, new land to explore, and a new life to create. we moved 3,000 miles within 6 weeks of my last day at work! i knew NO ONE in my new city. it was scary but thrilling beyond words. i have the gift of time before me...time to do anything and everything i want.
ReplyDeleteit is that, the freedom to "own" my schedule and do with it just what i please that has given me such joy. i did have some feelings of nostalgia as i prepared to leave, memories of days gone by when i was young and physically stronger, when i worked with many fabulous people i enjoyed. by the time i left i was no longer as content with my work environment or the staff i supervised. i was ready to leave.
it is the closing of one book and the opening of another. it is the last part of life's journey, for sure. but, oh, there are so many things ahead and so much to discover.
i love the image you used with this post, and i enjoy days like the one you describe here. i associate autumn especially with moments of both joy and melancholy. it is a season i love, perhaps even my favorite, but each time it arrives there is something off in the distance that opens me to a quiet sadness which i embrace.
You are right that retirement leaves a big empty spot and you have to be careful to fill it with positive things. I am approaching retirement gradually, but I am having a hard time giving up the people with whom I associate. The work I can quit, but the people? Not so much.
ReplyDeleteI found out that retirement and change was what I was looking foward to but just the thought of it was the depressing part. Now I look back at it and say "Why didn't I do it sooner?" You will find so many things to fill the time.
ReplyDeleteI was forced into an early retirement. Caught in a time when it was too early for social security and too late to find a job equivalent to what I had. So I stayed home and got angrier by the day. I wised up eventually and have been having a blast ever since. My husband and I adopted two kittens that are now 1-1/2 yrs old, and they keep us well occupied among other things. I love being able to sleep as late as I want, eat when I want, not having to drive in bad weather, and all those things that made me hate having to work at all.
ReplyDeleteSo sit back and enjoy the ride because life is what we make of it and nothing more. Loved your post, as usual.
What a beautiful post Tabor! You nailed how I sometimes feel over my early retirement. I really miss my job sometimes.
ReplyDeleteI know it will be full of new and exciting things for you!
ENJOY & congrats!
You have really caught, what is for me, the tenderness of this last quarter/season of our lives. I have never been happier than since my forced "retirement" and never sader. It is something we do not often say outloud. Judith
ReplyDeleteI feel this one to the core. Life is so bittersweet. When I was young I listened to songs that made me yearn for a life. Now I look back on my life and yearn for the start of it.
ReplyDeleteThis perfectly captures "the balance" of human life. So good that you could make us SEE this intangible conundrum. ML, Full Fath.
ReplyDeleteI took an unexpected early retirement 5 years ago and When I left, I never looked back! My life was and is sooooo busy that I dont know when I EVER had time to work! Of course now it is TOO busy, and I wonder at how busy it is going to continue to be.
ReplyDeleteYou will LOVE being retired!!!
This was bittersweet, as people have said. Yet you seem very grounded and peaceful with all the complexity of this time. It came through.
ReplyDeleteThe bowl metaphor gave me such a feeling of holy fullness/emptiness at the same time. The bowl is empty, yet it contains a space that can be filled in so many ways. I pictured my beautiful, very simple blue pottery bowl filled with bright red pie cherries.
Right now memories are pale compared to the "real" connections you are about to leave. But don't discount the reality and importance of memories. They will always be there and able to feed you.
Best wishes on your retirement and thanks for writing this poignant piece.