On being a Senior Citrizen, Some Thoughts..

It has been spectacular weather these last few days- what we come to Florida for. The nights are so cool we put on extra covers and welcome the dog who runs hot at our feet in bed. The early mornings are foggy and the blackbirds scream and chuckle as they pass by. The cool weather vegetables such as peas and lettuces are thriving. The garden is still full of butterflies.

We have our wonderful routine of breakfast and then reading the papers. Then I have many plans for the day: weeding the gardens, clipping, fertilizing, and then working in my studio on whatever quilt or painting or photographs or writing project I have going. Some days I have my volunteer work in our local school and I love this! My new knowledge of Spanish has helped me enormously. I am energized to be of help. There is never enough time to do all I want to do.

Yet, to be a senior citizen, someone who has been a long time worker (for a wage!), has its complexities. There are many aspects of being retired that we all love. You surely cannot miss those staff meetings or those stomach turning events when you have to fire someone or you know you have screwed up or you have to do way too much in a day, and we wonder what we'll do.

So, here we are, retired, full of experience and some wisdom and on Medicare and Social Security. What will we do? For the first couple of years we flop around, thankful not to be on a work and commute schedule, and we cast around for what will make us feel purposeful. We try various volunteer activities and some of them stick. You cannot make a life out of baby sitting the grand kids.

I think women have a better grip on this period of life. Because we are in this generation we have known what it is to have been in the first cohort of women who worked and also had to do the work of being the wife and mother (as our mothers did). And so we have a great deficit of time for ourselves. While we were raising the kids and going to work we dreamed of having time for ourselves. And now we do - and we are going for it!

Our husbands who made the lion's share of the household economy, and worked so hard for their families got left out of even thinking about what else beyond the work they were doing they could do in the future. Shuffleboard isn't enough.

I know so many women my age whose husbands are now so bereft in retirement. I see these men following along behind their wives in the grocery store. Women tell me that their husbands don't do anything, just sit there and read magazines or watch t.v. or play golf. Are they waiting to be invited to the great platter of life?

I think that the next generation prior to the baby boomers will be better prepared for the long and glorious generative years than we are. They will have the experience of being unemployed, scratching for their roles in the family. I only hope they will have the wonderful benefits we do (Thanks to the government !).