For the second time in my life, I submitted my retirement letter.
My second career finding its natural end. In both careers I served many years and was surprised how fast my perspectives changed once they started. From “All in and don’t get in my way,” to, “I think I might be done.”
The first time I retired I was 38 years old and putting the wraps on over 20 years of U.S. Coast Guard service. Fun life, exciting life, varied life. Good pension. I’ve been receiving it now for longer than I served. I loved the job. I lived a lot of good stories. I still encourage any young person to try serving and see if it fits. It’s a good life if you pick right.
I built cell towers for two years in the Shenandoah mountains of Virginia after that and then moved to Idaho with two kids and a rescue greyhound on an offer to be a drummer. No job, no place to live, lots of drums. The five of us lived in a borrowed fifth wheel (thank you, sir) in a lower-end RV park for too long and then settled in and bought a nice house. Not a stunt I’d recommend but in retrospect I can’t imagine now not doing it. I was a good drummer, and I created even more stories. I met a lot of people who were on a similar adventure. Funny how that is: “Oh, you too, huh?”
After seeing an ad to self-study and certify in the public education industry, I took and passed the tests and became an Idaho Certified 6-12 English teacher. If you’re one of my former teachers – stop laughing. I found an interesting opportunity in a new online public school start up and they liked my start-something-and-finish-it-attitude. And away we went. Marketing, teaching, traveling. I finished my MBA, picked up my M.Ed., and moved into a leadership role. In the back of my mind, I toyed with the fantasy of double pensions: one federal and one state. And I loved the job.
But eventually, in both careers, after 21 and 18 years respectively, the drive waned. I’m not sure how or why it happens. And as I began to feel the professional paint peeling, I consistently remotivated and reframed and recalculated. If you’ve lived this, you know the incredible amount of energy it takes to remain invested. It can be exhausting. And whatever that magic was; ambition or hunger or success or natural talent – it just kept seeping out of me like a bucket with a hole in it.
My pilot friend said that after 37 years of professional flying, he found that the stress of the job just hit differently as he aged. He used to like thunderstorms and dodging weather, training every 9 months, and greasing a landing. All that changed as he aged. Weather stressed him out, training became a lot, and landing hard or soft made no matter. He was “losing the edge” and decided to go out while he still had his A game, or at least his A- game.
Like the tides in Maine I knew as a boy, they go out sneaky and quiet, until boats rest on their sides in the sand. My mom would say about resisting life’s inevitabilities that it’s like shoveling shit against the tide. My mom said a lot of things. But maybe it was time to sell the boat and go do something else and leave boats and tides and moorings to others.
So, I did. I was never much of a dawdler when it comes to making changes. Once you know, you know. Might as well get to it. I guess everyone has their own internal clocks, questions, reasons, dialogue. It felt good to do it. Like opening a window in a musty house and letting the spring air in. There. That needed doing.
So, for the second time in my life, at age 65, I penned and sent a retirement letter, this one effective June 2nd, 2027. As of this writing, I’m about 6 months out. It’s one of my next big life events. I want to do it well, and I’m considering what that looks like. And my fantasy of double pensions for life? Check.
I’m optimistic about the future, my Act III, if you will. I’m fortunate to have time to prepare, whatever that means, and I want to end it like I ended my first career: proud. I had a great run. I’ve done everything I wanted to do and, like my friend, want to go out while I’ve still got at least my A- game. I’m looking forward to freedom and not living by anyone else’s ideas of how I should spend my day. As a matter of fact, I think I’ll just remove most of the “shoulds” from my life altogether.
I’m excited about the opportunity to yet again reinvent myself. It’s exciting to think about the world of possibilities, what I might do, and who I might become.
And I’ve been thinking about a house on the beach.
Wait, would I need another boat?
Uh oh.
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