Retirement isn't for everyone. My father retired in 1980 and was gone in 5 years. Though he died of prostate cancer I have always believed that his fantasy of retirement was not his experience of retirement. I think he was lonely for the guys he worked with because Mom like to read romance novels and go to malls which left him with his dog building things on his 2 1/2 acres and growing organic gardens and hiking with his dog. They traveled a lot first in his cabover camper on his 3/4 ton pickup truck and then eventually bought a 34 foot Winnebago. But they only had the Winnebago a couple of years before he died. But I took a couple of trips with him to the Colorado River and up through California up Interstate 15 before he got too sick to drive it himself anymore.
I have had a completely different experience. In 1999 doctors didn't know what was wrong with my heart. A heart virus is very difficult to diagnose so most people with heart virus' die before their illness is diagnosed. After 7 months of thinking I was going to die in May 1999 my doctor said, "Well. We figured out you had a heart virus because your heart has healed itself up. You'll be okay now. You might even live into your 80s. Having been forced to retire the previous October 1998 I walked out of the doctor's office very happy to be alive and to actually have a future because I had a 3 year old daughter as well as grown kids but wondering what this new life would bring me?
One of the best decisions I made when I thought I might die was to start a website to share my experiences which I started in 1999 at Geocities which later was bought by Yahoo. When the free site ended last year I now pay about 10 dollars a month for a new site and this blog site at Blogger is free at least for now. dragonofcompassion.com is my yahoo site where I keep it as an archive site for all my books and ideas that I keep working on over time. There I have "Memories" which is an eleven part book on 7 web pages as well as sequels and other stuff there. Most of the newer stuff since fall 2007 I first write on my Blogger pages and then move it eventually (if I like it enough) over to the dragonofcompassion.com site.
Here is a word button to click on for it:
I have to say here that many people may not make it as retired people. If you are a person who lives to work with and meet other people, retirement isn't really for you and you should either find somewhere to volunteer your time as if it were a real job you get paid for or buy a small business to run or get a part time job because unless you are someone who can occupy your time and entertain yourself without working all the time retirement may not be for you.
Though I'm not a perfect fit for retirement (I don't think anyone really is) I fit into retirement better than most people because of my temperament. First of all, I prefer to keep to my family and a few select friends and I like to write, to travel, to walk into the forests with my dogs and along the beaches with them. I like to ride my Dualsport motorcycle out in the country on paved roads and on dirt roads. I have a motor home so I can go camp somewhere if I wish to. And one or more times a year we go to someplace like Hawaii or Mt. Shasta where I ski or southern California to visit my son and his wife or my cousin and his wife. Or we travel to places like Yellowstone or Teton National Park or Yosemite National Park or Mt. Rainier National Park or go to Europe or something like that. So, in this way we always have something to look forward to.
Also, I have always been since age 26 a family man and continually since 1974 raising at least one child under age 15. My youngest daughter will be 15 in March so I guess that might not be true after that but you never know the way the world is. Maybe we might adopt another kid along the way. It's hard to say. We have two God Daughters, one in Oregon and One in San Diego that will get married next year sometime. I think my wife and her are planning it now for next year. So, for me, family is the center of my life after God, and God is the center of my life that I try to share about on my websites. I know everyone has a different experience so I try as best as I can to be sensitive about that. But I still feel it is important to share to "Witness" one's experiences because it often saves lives all around the world.
So, whether I am "Witnessing" about God, Jesus, Buddha, Saint Germain, Archangel Michael or whatever type of spiritual thing I am writing about or just sharing knowledge about investing worldwide or trying to help people understand better what is happening in the world because most people don't have the time I do to really understand the fullness of what's going on that I do. So, I try to gather information for others so they can make better decisions in their lives than they might have otherwise.
I have found all through my life that there is never enough information when you need it to make good decisions most of the time. So one is left with making half assed decisions that one often regrets later. So, I try to research enough about given subjects so you have enough information to make better decisions in your lives. I don't know everything but I do know a lot about some things. And then if I research something that I think is important enough, then I can share my research with you and that just might be helpful and makes lives better or save lives.
I was freezing in about 20 degrees Fahrenheit with my family one day. It was snowing and a fan belt broke on my car and I was scared because I knew that it would destroy my car to drive it that way and we were in the woods about 20 miles from a gas station. A man drove up who said he was from Alaska with a pickup truck. He looked at my engine, walked back to his truck and tilted the drivers seat forward, pulled out a used fan belt, walked back to my car and installed it, tested it. I said "How much do I owe you?" He said, "I"m from Alaska where we help each other like this all the time. If we didn't a lot of us would die in those conditions. Just help the next person you meet."
When I write I think like this man taught me to think.
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