Getting ready to retire

One day left. After 46 years. Howthehell did I ever manage to last with one company all this time? And how did I ever figure leaving it would be easy? Actually (I'm afraid this will turn into a ramble, forgive me.), it hasn't been only one career, it's not even technically my first retirement. Production, Toolmaker, Wood Model Maker, retire to take a contract design job (pretty cool, double dip, get to play with Unigraphics - one of the world's coolest toys. Thanks again, Ed Mau, for a wonderful opportunity), meet a sweet, bright, sexy woman in the next cube, finally hit the end of the road.

It's time to take down the buttons from my cube wall, box up my accumulated essentials. What essentials? I'm not doing this any more. Leave the double handful of pens and pencils. Reference books- a full bookshelf's worth, desk calendars, half a dozen metric rulers, stapler, Leave'em. How does one person accumulate 4 sets of headphones? I suppose I'll have to take the batch of desk knick-knacks if I can't give them away.  Last week Liz and I smuggled a semi-huge peace lily into her 3rd floor hallway. Adopted out the truly huge one (Goodbye Lil, we'll miss ya) . 

Tomorrow there'll be a party at a suitably middle-class, funky bar. Goodbyes, keep in touch, we'll miss you, etc. Same here. I love you all and now it's over.

Getting started

Okay, I'm brand new at blogging. I've got a month to learn some things about this before taking it on the road. We've been mentally preparing for this for a couple of years, though the actual detailed planning and equipping began a few months ago. My lovely bride is the chief planner (not to mention instigator) of this trip. Competent and enthusiastic doesn't begin to describe her.

We're three days from retirement and a month and three days from vacating this lovely apartment and seeing the world (okay, a tiny bit of it - a few high spots in and around the Pacific Ocean). You have no idea how difficult it is to divest yourself of most of your wordly goods until you've tried it. Go ahead, take a look around your house and imagine you've got a few months to empty it, leaving only a minimum of treasured goods in a very few safe locations. No cheating, you don't want to pay storage rates for a few years. 

We've scanned picture albums into the computer (Liz keeps a thumb drive always available and even shipped a couple of them off for safekeeping) and distributed them to adult children and other relatives. I actually had the experience of seeing a woman (gasp) THROW AWAY photo albums. Amazing. She had a similar experience, watching me tearfully disposing of my library. Not a trivial matter, there were enough books to fill 30 or 40 milk crates. Sold and donated to various libraries. Not to worry, we now possess Kindles and a Nook. A very good friend (Thanks again and again, Doug) helped us fill them with at least enough reading material to get me through the next few years. Even our music (also Books on Tape) got stuffed into an Ipod. Again backed up to a fare-thee-well.

Most of the furniture is being sold or distributed to friends and relatives with some favorite pieces stored in a friend's attic. For the first time in our adult lives we'll be without a car. For an American, this is the ultimate in insecurity. Once we return, we'll be finding an RV and setting off around the U.S., just to satisfy whatever wanderlust is left. No need for all that physical encumbrance.