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Last week I wrote a post about the state of our finances three years into retirement. But in that post, I never pointed out what I liked and didn’t like about retirement. Today’s post aims to correct that dreadful oversight. Here we go.
Three Things I Like About Retirement
No Shortage of Things to Do
The main reason I decided to blog was that I wanted something to do in retirement. My biggest fear was endless days filled with soul-crushing boredom.
Fortunately, those fears turned out to be greatly exaggerated. Sure, finding land and building Groovy Ranch occupied the bulk of my energies during the first year and a half of my retirement. But even after Groovy Ranch went operational, there’s been no shortage of things to do. Here, for example, are just some of the more important things currently occupying my energies:
- Blogging
- Talking Trash
- A couple of Groovy books in the hopper
- Reading (my reading list—thanks to Groovy sister-in-law—is continually being reloaded with great reads)
- Travel (both planning and enjoying)
- Furnishing and decorating Groovy Ranch
- Building my workshop in the garage
- Welding (some fantastic yard art should be popping up on Groovy Ranch within the next six months)
The Lack of Scheduled Activities
Once I retired, scheduled activities went—for the most part—bye-bye (see the Quick Aside below). And I can’t overstate how liberating that has been. From the ages of 6 to 55, I invariably had to be somewhere for several hours. If it wasn’t school, it was work. And on many a day, it was both school and work.
But now, nothing I want to do has to be abandoned because I have to be somewhere at a particular time. If it’s raining in the morning, for instance, I don’t have to forego my daily constitutional because someone own’s a piece of my time later in the day. I can shift my walk to the afternoon if the rain subsides. And that kind of flexibility does wonders for one’s sangfroid and happiness.
Quick Aside: I’m currently taking a welding course that meets Tuesday and Wednesday from 6 to 9:30 pm. And even though I enjoy the classes immensely, I still find having 7 of my 168 weekly hours being controlled by my community college for four months somewhat annoying. A man of my esteem should never have to wolf down his dinner at 5 pm so he can get to class on time, goddamit!
Shopping During the Week Durning Normal Business Hours
Shopping Monday through Friday between the hours of 9 and 5 is glorious. The stores are delightfully free of shoppers—and long checkout lines—because most of my fellow North Carolinians are stuck at their miserable, uninspiring jobs. Suckers!
From the day I retired, I summoned my inner Scarlett O’Hara and vowed:
“As God is my witness, I’ll never shop on the weekends again.”
And I can honestly say I’ve had no regrets abiding by that vow.
Three Things I Don’t Like About Retirement
Two Key Aspects of Travel
I have a big quandary when it comes to travel. I love exploring and visiting far-off places, but I loathe flying and I loathe sleeping in beds that have been slept in by scores of strangers.
It wasn’t always this way. When I was a kid, I loved flying and I loved staying in hotels. I couldn’t get enough of turbulence and vending machines.
Now, however, turbulence turns me into a girly-man and there are rarely any vending machines around to take my mind off the gross things that occurred in my hotel bed prior to my visit.
Quick Aside: This past August, I spent two nights at the Golden Nugget in Atlantic City, and I shudder to think what a UV flashlight would have unearthed in our beds!
An Inability to Spend More
Just prior to retiring, Mrs. Groovy and I proposed a retirement budget—not including emergencies and capital purchases—of $4,000 per month. That works out to an annual budget of $48,000.
Now, forty-eight thousand bucks isn’t a lot in San Francisco. But it’s a lot in Louisburg, North Carolina—especially when you own your house outright, don’t pay for water and garbage pickup, and have a combined property tax and electric bill that works out to less than $250 per month.
So have Mrs. Groovy and I taken advantage of our good fortune? Yes and no. We’re doing everything we want to do. But our annual spending has averaged only $38,500 per year. This means that we have left nearly $10,000 on the spending table for each year of our retirement. Not good. We could be having an even bigger zippity-f*cking-doo-dah retirement!
Old habits die hard, unfortunately. We know we can safely spend more, but after being kick-ass savers for ten-plus years, we can’t bring ourselves to do so.
Family and Friends Are Still Working
Mrs. Groovy and I are truly blessed with wonderful family and friends. And one of the bigger attractions of retirement for us was having more time to spend with these wonderful people. But here’s the rub. We have all the time in the world to spend with family and friends, but the vast majority of our family and friends have no time to spend with us. They’re still working!
Final Thoughts
Okay, groovy freedomist, that’s all I got. What say you? Does our retirement experience to date leave you even more excited about FI and early retirement? Or does our experience leave you crestfallen? “Really? I hope my retirement isn’t as lame as the Groovies!” Well, whether this post has left your FI senses tingling or not, let me know what you think when you get a chance. Peace.
Although only recently retired (May ’19) you’ve hit some of my similar observations so far. Shopping during the week is a breeze! Friends don’t think I have anything to do because I don’t have a 9-5 schedule, but I couldn’t be busier! I’m loving the freedom early retirement has brought me. As for that airplane thing…I’m the same way. No issues when I was younger but now it freaks me out. Spoke to my doc and now I take a little pill 30 minutes before take-off and I’m fine. Amazing things medicine can do these days!
Mr. P2F recently posted…The Point of Growth
Thank you, Mr. P2F. And I never considered getting a “little helper” to make flying less mentally taxing. I’ll have to give a try. Love the way your mind works, my friend. Cheers.
a GOOD thing about retirement is the existential angst it creates. what shall I do when I don’t have a master giving me orders? those with a natural slave mentality will find this terribly off-putting. it’s also off-putting to realize you’ve got a slave-mentality and that it’s the natural state of too much of mankind. (a proper slave would have said person-kind just now. and a proper master knows when to say “rude-word-starting-with-f you.”
why is it a good thing to have existential angst? If you’re thinking about what you’ll do with your life, you’re thinking at least, and you’ll do better with your life if you’ve thought about it than if you just went through the motions.
“those with a natural slave mentality will find this terribly off-putting. it’s also off-putting to realize you’ve got a slave-mentality and that it’s the natural state of too much of mankind.”
Very sobering, my friend. Very sobering.
There’s always something in your posts that make my smile…are you sure you’re allowed to say “girly-man” these days?🤔😂
David @iretiredyoung recently posted…Early retirement travels – week 5 Costa Rica to Colombia
Good question, my friend. To avoid the wrath of the very numerous woke-scolds, I might have to use “non-binary man” in the future.
*sigh*
I’m reading this at my desk as I’m about to gather my things together and race off to teach year 8 and then year 9 English.
I feel for you, FDJ. But your “sentence” will be over soon enough.
” A man of my esteem should never have to wolf down his dinner at 5 pm so he can get to class on time, goddamit!”
-Brilliant! That’s one of the reasons I haven’t jumped into some structured thing or another since retirement. I’ll get past it at some point but until then I’ll be borrowing that line.
Like you, I have come to despise air travel. It’s not turbulence, but the sheer inhumanity of security screenings, cattle calls to board and being shoehorned into a tiny seat. Blah!
“It’s not turbulence, but the sheer inhumanity of security screenings, cattle calls to board and being shoehorned into a tiny seat.”
LOL! Couldn’t agree more. For me, turbulence is the icing on a very unappetizing sh*t cake.
Interesting!
I think we’ll have this same problem – the inability to spend more. Being frugal is ingrained now. I’m not sure if I can stop it.
LOL! Indeed. One of the unpleasant side-effects of mastering FIRE is toxic frugality. Hey, perhaps we should start a counseling service that helps FIRE people get over their fears of spending. That would be an interesting side-hustle.
Mr. G, there are pros and cons to everything, so it’s no surprise that we both find the same in retirement. Like we’ve done throughout life, the key is to focus on the positive and savor the good. And, in retirement, there is SOOOO much good!
My Uncle has his 80th birthday party this weekend in Chicago. We hate flying now (ironic, since I have 1 Million Delta Miles), so we’re taking the time to drive. Ahhhhh….retirement.
“Like we’ve done throughout life, the key is to focus on the positive and savor the good. And, in retirement, there is SOOOO much good!”
Couldn’t have said it better, my friend. I hope you guys had a blast at your uncle’s 80th birthday party. And I hope the Chicago winter didn’t start the day of your arrival. Cheers.
excited, tingled – both – particularly powerful on a cold weekday.
Thank you, Gofi.
It’s a good life but since I still choose to work about a day a week consulting, and since I chair a college board of trustees and a large foundation board and am active on a national education committee and with my university engineering department and the state chamber of commerce and play team tennis and serve on various church committees and probably another half dozen commitments I volunteered for I have much of my week mapped out in advance. Last week I was clear across the country in San Francisco at a college trustees meeting and tonight I’ll head 100 miles north to our state capital for two days of settlement negotiations for a dozen of my clients followed by two days playing in the state tennis tournament. Looking back, eleven of the last 13 days I’ve had to be on somebody else’s schedule. And that’s not unusual for me, but since all of those are voluntary, including the eight hour work week and blogging, I could turn them off tomorrow. But I feel good about giving back to causes I believe in, I love playing tennis with new opponents and I like funding my FatFI six figure budget without touching my growing portfolio, even if it’s larger already than it needs to be. I also love keeping my old network alive and doing deals for my clients so I choose this way to live. I’m still free most of the time most weeks and have vastly more leisure time than in my old life. I have more than enough down time to feel very balanced and relaxed. Some days I do nothing at all but chill and read or watch movies. It’s not your life but I think it feels about the same to me Mr. G. When I read your posts, which I never skip, I always feel an empathy. Our evil retirement plans are a little different but they work very well for each of us. I loved the post, it made me think about why I spend my time like I do. We all need to ponder that question often, so we can adjust when we need to.
“And that’s not unusual for me, but since all of those are voluntary, including the eight hour work week and blogging, I could turn them off tomorrow.”
First, let me say that you’re a very impressive dude, Mr. S. As I was reading your plethora of commitments, I couldn’t help but think: “This guy leads a very fulfilling life. Bravo.” But I think the key to your frenetic yet fulfilling life is captured by the above sentence. Knowing that you can step back whenever you want makes a busy life considerably more tolerable. You’re the best, my friend. Thanks for showing us that a highly scheduled life isn’t always a detriment to one’s happiness. Cheers.
If my situation at your age is anything like yours, I will consider it one of the biggest achievements of our lives. You, guys, are truly inspiring.
I agree with all your points on the positive side (especially the business hours shopping part).
In terms of the negatives, well I share your loathing of flying. I jokingly say that if I travel and things go south I can walk, I can swim, but I can not fly. Also, from now on you probably ruined the hotel stays for me too 🙂
[HCF] recently posted…Brave New World
Thank you, Mr. HCF. I can’t tell how much your kind thoughts mean to me and Mrs. Groovy. Cheers, my friend.