Your Most Disturbing Realizations

[tonyb]

I retired ten years ago this October. A few years back I took a security job: what I did to work my way through school at some points. I quit after 3 days: when you're not desperate for the money you suffer fools a lot less. Job itself was fun: I provided security (onboard and perimeter) for Navy vessels at a shipyard. Management of the company that signed my check, not so great.

My wife recently got her nursing license in the state where we retired and will soon (at 70) be returning to work for 20 hours a week. She's excited about the job, and it does pay well. For her, it's more about getting back into her field than the money: she actually misses providing clinical care.

I love being retired, although this pandemic has cramped our wanderlust a bit. So, we're saving a little money <shrug>. Others have suffered severe financial hardships because of the pandemic, so I'm grateful for what we have.

I’m supremely grateful for what I have. God knows I’m no more deserving of it than people in far more trying circumstances.

Gratitude comes easier to those of us who have done without. We know how good we have it.

 

[Turnip]

I worked til I was 69 years old as I loved my job......lots of talk I was preventing a younger person from gainful employment......I just read a recent study that claims the current labour shortage is caused by us boomers leaving the workforce....(finally) and there are just not enough youngsters out there to take our place. But no, I ain't goin' back!

The vast mass of employment contracts here have a paragraph claiming the employment to end with reaching the official retirement age of the employee latest, currently 65 years here.
Many folks working in all sorts of trades, especially those construction related, roofers, bricklayers, carpenters, plumbers… but also many industrial workers don’t even make it to that silver lining cause they’re simply physically worn down before. Nursing trades as well plus their mental component additionally.

…

My wife recently got her nursing license in the state where we retired and will soon (at 70) be returning to work for 20 hours a week. She's excited about the job, and it does pay well. For her, it's more about getting back into her field than the money: she actually misses providing clinical care.

…

Beside that all above named trades would take at least a 3 1/2 years apprenticeship here before you could gain the respective, and required, skilled worker’s title.

 

[Turnip]

Also, there are currently almost eight billion heads around on this planet. I’m sure there could be found more than enough very suitable minds within to gain any required qualification and to fill any, real and imagined, gap.

 

[Tiki Tom]

I’m supremely grateful for what I have. God knows I’m no more deserving of it than people in far more trying circumstances.

Gratitude comes easier to those of us who have done without. We know how good we have it.

Absolutely. Very true. I humbly try to work a little thankfulness into my daily routine.

 

[belfastboy]

The vast mass of employment contracts here have a paragraph claiming the employment to end with reaching the official retirement age of the employee latest, currently 65 years here.
Many folks working in all sorts of trades, especially those construction related, roofers, bricklayers, carpenters, plumbers… but also many industrial workers don’t even make it to that silver lining cause they’re simply physically worn down before. Nursing trades as well plus their mental component additionally.



Beside that all above named trades would take at least a 3 1/2 years apprenticeship here before you could gain the respective, and required, skilled worker’s title.

My buddy, a lifetime carpenter had to chew multiple Ibuprophen each morning to ease the pain in his shoulder from swinging a hammer for 45 years. My work was physical but varied and doing the work itself was OK but I found even working a 4 day week I needed the first 2 days of my weekend to recuperate in order to get back at it on Monday. I was a contract employee so I could have worked as long as I wanted......which I did.

 

[LizzieMaine]

I can see sixty-five in the too-near future, but I have no intention of retiring, then or ever. Not because I love my job so, or because I'm trying to spite some kid willing to work for 60 cents on the dollar, but because the alternative is to die in a cardboard box on the street. Simple as that.

 

[tonyb]

It wasn’t until I got married at what some might think a late point in life (age 44) that I gave much consideration to how I would get by once I got old. Perhaps that was due in part to it taking that long for me to accept that I would indeed grow old (if I was lucky) and partly because another person’s fortunes were tied to mine.

Too many people give far too little thought to the effects of their decisions on the lives of people depending on them. That was true of me and many guys I knew when we were young and concerned more than anything else with getting our willies wet.

 

[LizzieMaine]

I wish somebody would have told my father that.

 

[belfastboy]

It wasn’t until I got married at what some might think a late point in life (age 44) that I gave much consideration to how I would get by once I got old. Perhaps that was due in part to it taking that long for me to accept that I would indeed grow old (if I was lucky) and partly because another person’s fortunes were tied to mine.

Too many people give far too little thought to the effects of their decisions on the lives of people depending on them. That was true of me and many guys I knew when we were young and concerned more than anything else with getting our willies wet.

My father died when he was just 45. He worked 2 jobs / 6 1/2 days a week as he could not abide debt, not even a mortgage and he wanted to save for his old age. He worked, he saved and he died never getting to reach that 'old age' marker he was saving for. It made a deep mark on my soul and I have been walking a knife edge much of my life.....spending and enjoying my money with the realization that I may be fortunate enough to reach 'old age' and actually need some money to fund my post work life. It is but one of the bitches of life....saving for an old age that might never arrive and risk leaving the fruits of my labour for someone else to enjoy. I used to admonish my mother, a child of poverty, to spend her damn money. If she left it for me I would just piss it away.....I would enjoy pissing it away but as it is her money she should get to enjoy pissing it away!!!

So now the challenge is having reached that old age milestone the question now becomes...... How much can I spend versus keeping $$ in the bank to fund this entirely unquantifiable length of time between the here and the hereafter?

 

[Who?]

I am old enough to understand why elderly couples often follow one another rather quickly.

 

[tonyb]

I wish somebody would have told my father that.

I suppose it’s small consolation to know that your father was in plentiful if not good company.

My father died when I was four months old. My stepfather was in my life less than a year later, so he was the only dad I ever knew. His inability to hold a job wouldn’t have been such a problem if his entrepreneurial chops weren’t as bad as he thought they were good. His pursuit of his pie-in-the-sky ambitions resulted in frequent relocations and multiple bankruptcies and a general instability. Truth is, we were far more dependent on my mother’s income.

He’s been gone seven years now. My Dear Old Ma is now much more financially secure than she has been since before he came our way.

 

[LizzieMaine]

Haven't seen my father since I was six years old, but I hear he's lost in dementia. I feel bad about that. He deserves to know that death is coming for him.

 

[Turnip]

Dementia is often more painful for the families than for the person affected.

 

[belfastboy]

Dementia is often more painful for the families than for the person affected.

I am watching my sister go through this......the beginning phase is a bitch as she is aware that she is losing her mind. It scares the shit out of her......as she slowly observes herself losing it.

 

[tonyb]

^^^^^
My occasional forgetfulness has me fearing, not entirely without good reason, that senility is on the horizon.

My wife’s dad died last fall. Alzheimer’s did him in. My favorite uncle is gradually slipping away with vascular dementia, among other things. He still knows who he’s speaking with, most of the time, and we’re all thankful for that, considering how many don’t. My Dear Old Ma has gotten to where she recites the same story she told me a day earlier, or five minutes earlier. She’s still quite capable, and I doubt that her memory lapses sink to the level of a diagnosable condition. But it’s still concerning.

The above mentioned are a generation ahead of me, and I ain’t young. But still, a fellow I’ve known since age 16 or 17, a guy maybe three years older than me, died with Alzheimer’s just a few months ago.

 

[belfastboy]

^^^^^
My occasional forgetfulness has me fearing, not entirely without good reason, that senility is on the horizon.

My wife’s dad died last fall. Alzheimer’s did him in. My favorite uncle is gradually slipping away with vascular dementia, among other things. He still knows who he’s speaking with, most of the time, and we’re all thankful for that, considering how many don’t. My Dear Old Ma has gotten to where she recites the same story she told me a day earlier, or five minutes earlier. She’s still quite capable, and I doubt that her memory lapses sink to the level of a diagnosable condition. But it’s still concerning.

The above mentioned are a generation ahead of me, and I ain’t young. But still, a fellow I’ve known since age 16 or 17, a guy maybe three years older than me, died with Alzheimer’s just a few months ago.

My mother lived to 95 and only the usual cognitive decline.....I am praying hard I have a big chunk of her genetic makeup. My buddy began his decline into dementia at 59.....can't imagine what it was like for him but damn it was hard to witness.

 

[Trenchfriend]

Foxtrott Uniform Charlie Kilo, my childhood is finally over.
I now realized, what the point with the yellow part in Chris Isaak - Wicked Game with Helena Christensen is...

 

[Edward]

You never see "mutts" anymore, the random-bred dogs that ran around every neighborhood -- the result of dogs roaming free. Pretty much every dog I know is a "bred" dog, even the rescues. Sometimes that's not such a good thing for the dogs, especially the novelty breeds that are manipulated into existence to satisfy various human vanities regardless of the poor health that results for the dogs themselves. As a mutt myself, I miss the company of other mutts.

Less free roaming, probably more emphasis on responsible pet ownership involving neutering. Also - perhaps ironically - the rise of cross-breeds as desirable over many pedigrees meaning that mutt-breeding is more controlled than before....

We just rescued a Mutt, so-to-speak. His Mom is a Siberian Husky, and his Dad is a Treeing Walker Coonhound. His name is Cody, and he is currently 6 months old.

View attachment 440023

Gorgeous boy! Give him an ear-scratch from me.

^^^^^
Looks a lot like our Sandy, who went to doggie Heaven late last year. He, too, had been neglected before he came our way. The rescue we got him from showed us a photo of him when he came into their shelter. He was a vaguely dog-shaped pile of matted fur. He was the type of dog that really needed a haircut at least a couple times per year.

It's horrific what some people will do to an animal. We've seen similar photos of Mimi Dog when she was first rescued, after spending an estimated three to five years on the street. She's such a sweetheart, too. I was never a poodle fan (my maternal grandmother has a series of poodles over the years, all yappy, spoilt little things, who went ape-excreta if she even went out of the room to go to the toilet), but Mimi has totally won me over to the joys of a poodle cross. Having always been a cat person, I knew a dog would be a lot more work. In practice, it turns out that was less so than I anticipated; she's more like a high-maintenance cat. Harder to leave her on her own (with a cat, you can go off for weekend at the drop of a hat and they're find for one or two nights with enough food and water), can't do that with a dog. On the flipside, I love having a pet we can take out with us.... swings and roundabouts.

I can see sixty-five in the too-near future, but I have no intention of retiring, then or ever. Not because I love my job so, or because I'm trying to spite some kid willing to work for 60 cents on the dollar, but because the alternative is to die in a cardboard box on the street. Simple as that.

Similar here. My academic pension has been razored down by they in control (with the full-throated support of our present University principal, who openly treats academic staff as an annoyance, a cost, and with complete contempt) to the point where if I had to rely on it now, it wouldn't cover the bills I have coming out every month. (On day one of my salary arriving, about 60% of it goes out in bills; my pension as it currently sits would be less than a third of what I earn). Said principle also earns well into six figures, and has free, tied accommodation.... but hey ho. I console myself with the fact that new academics starting out now don't even have any job security, most of them being almost entirely casualised well into their thirties.

 

[Turnip]

I currently make it to a monthly saving of about 35% of my income, chunk for necessary/desirable maintenance/investment on the house included., 35% go out for current costs like food, heat, electricity, water, minor repairs…and 30% for other costs like car related,, goods of daily life and fun. (Very German approach…)
At this point my pension is forecasted to be about 65% of my current income (conservative variation), depending on whether I’ll make it to the finish line or not.
As my house is paid, core restoration from roof to cellar completed, I don’t have additional mouths to feed and my last shirt has no pockets I will hopefully not have to join the returnables business.

 

[belfastboy]

I currently make it to a monthly saving of about 35% of my income, monthly chunk for necessary/desirable maintenance/investment on the house included., 35% go out for current costs like food, heat, electricity, water, minor repairs…and 30% for other costs like car related,, goods of daily life and fun. (Very German approach…)
At this point my pension is forecasted to be about 65% of my current income (conservative variation), depending on whether I’ll make it to the finish line or not.
As my house is paid, core restoration from roof to cellar completed, I don’t have additional mouths to feed and my last shirt has no pockets I will hopefully not have to join the returnables business.

I was in Costco last week and there were a number of people returning portable air conditioners. I asked a clerk I know....."Why?". He said...."This is Costco and the heat wave is over for now".