SECOND STAR ON THE RIGHT AND THEN STRAIGHT ON TO MORNING.

New Year, New Background

Big changes this year.  I lightened up the background of the blog.  Brown was too dreary.  Falling leaves on a washed out peach color is good for old people.  Oh wait, that's another change.  We are too young to be retired.  PLUS, retirement as we knew it, as we planned for it, has changed and changed without our permission. 

Were We Find Ourselves in 2013

At odds with the world, politics, finances, opportunity or lack thereof, in search of ourselves in spite of ourselves.  I am lost without the daily news yet I hate what is reported in the news and most of the news shows are just talk shows disguised as news with flirty, attractive journalists.  Please, somebody deport Pierce what's his name, oh, Morgan.  What right does this Brit have critiquing America?  Go back to the Queen's village. 

New Year, New Views

I'm annoyed with how life is perceived in the media, all media.  For instance, in the last minute a couple flew in a hot air balloon, bought a chevy, went to a basketball game, visited disney, used a huge million dollar camera to photograph bugs and a group of friends were getting drunk in a bar while eating chicken wings.  No wonder my life sucks so bad.  Then, we are bombarded with financial planning and planning for retirement however, nobody takes responsibility for when circumstances outside of our control change drastically and the few rules I did follow are blown out of the water because made a few mistakes in the market.  Five years ago we both lost 1/3rd of our retirement accounts.  That puts us in the company of almost all our peers however as modest the original balances they were ours. Please, when they find the guy who took our money, I would like mine back.   

The next change kills me.  You work 30 years and earn a retirement pension but when you reach the age of SS, your pension is decreased by the amount of SS you receive.  Growing up (ha ha, I'm still growing), I heard "I have my pension and SS"; however, I never heard from a single pension that it is reduced when SS kicks in.   We assume, and this is where we make asses out of ourselves, I am sure that the reduction of pension is published in one the million pieces of mail we got from GM during and after the bankruptcy and had one of us read a few of those million pages we would have realized we would not be getting a full pension plus SS.  So it is what it is and that's the fact.  Well it is also a fact that somebody stole our 401K money.

So there is the working retired and I haven't discussed them yet.  There are alot of people putting off retirement and continue working.  It is also healthy to be socially connected.  The whole concept has me considering looking for a job, just to be out and about.  Maybe 2 days a week, for about 5 hours a day.  That's social enough, don't you think?  So who do you think will hire a woman with MS and fatigue and mobility issues?  My husband found a job in Utah driving a shuttle bus between the hotels and the ski lodge but I wouldnt let him take it because he would be away from home for 5 months.  He's still annoyed with me about that.

What They Failed to Tell Us

Shared hobbies, interests and sleep schedules are overwhelmingly important when retiring with a spouse and nobody has stressed that point clear enough.  Seriously, forget about each person having their own lives, friends and interest.  That's fairy dust thinking.  You need each other until the bitter end and it is so much easier when you're in step with one another.  My husband could live in an RV and drive from shore to shore over and over until the Big Guy calls him home.  I don't care for that. I prefer staying in one place and playing with fiber and other earthly gifts like pine cones and rocks.  He doesnt care too much for that.  We both agree on the grandkids.  Watching them grow, stated simply, rocks. 

I'm a daytime person.  The husband is a night owl and sleeps in. 

We have major differences but we'll live with it, or die trying.

Meanwhile I see starry-eyed couples on TV, obviously retired, enjoying couple's messages in foreign countries, golfing 18 holes (obviously nobody has back/knee/hip problems), riding roller coasters (I'll do that with my daughters now that I realized life is too short not to ride them) and finally, dressed to the 9s and dancing under a starlit sky gazing into each other's eyes like it never gets old.  Perhaps I'm the most unromantic woman in the world or far too realistic for my own good.   I fear the Edith and Archie Bunker version of life.  But they didn't have a pool, never left the Bronks and don't have two adorable grandchildren who walk on water and have halos.  At least I can see their halos.