59: day 40 Time - Who's time is it, anyway?

What is it about being retired & feeling like we have to justify how we spend our time?

I had lunch with a friend who's been retired for 1 year; she and I discussed something which each of us thought was just our personal perception or experience but which seems universal, at least in our community:

When people ask "So, what have you been doing?" the subtext heard clearly is: "How do you account for your time?" Questioners seem to expect that there will be something Meaningful-with-a-capital-M that we can cite as justification for how our time has slid away in the previous day or week or month.

In my years since retiring, I have filled my time with a variety of interests, activities, and volunteer work. Don't get me wrong, I've loved all (well, most) of it. But in the past several months, it has felt like I was participating in some things because I felt like I Should (capital "S" intentional), because why? Someone was going to judge me.

"Should?" Says who? I'm retired, damn it, and now is when it's time to explore who I have become, where I'm going from here, my relationship with my wonderful husband and adult daughter, love my friends, and give back to the world/community in whatever way I find.

Since moving to my new home (4 years ago), a passion and joy - quiltmaking evolved into an artistic outlet including sales at a gallery. But now that has become "production work" and an obligation and the joy has been sucked out of it. I'm on hiatus - Mental Sabbatical - rethinking, mulling over just working on my own pieces for the sheer joy of it, removing the selling aspect. Selling does not confer legitimacy upon an artist.

I had let things go, or put them on the back burner: personal work I wanted to do for myself: returning to my music, finally organizing ancient photographs, exploring my love of computers and technology, reading, simply "Being."

At lunch, my new friend and I realized that we don't have to account for ourselves. No one is keeping score. Life is for living.

From now on, my answer "What have you been up to?" will be: "So much that I can't keep track." Or maybe simply "Living and loving it."

59: day, um, who knows? Some Things Never Change.

The last time I posted, it was that painful and frustrating non-season of not-quite-Spring...still more snow/wind/rain/crap to come.

Now, 3 1/2 weeks later, we're moving into glorious full-bloom Spring with predictably sunny days and ever-warming temperatures.

I could torture my words into a metaphor for habit-changing, evolving, growing, blah blah blah. But that would be forcing words and thoughts into some neat little package.

Here's the thing - I may be a grown-up on paper. I may be approaching one of those pivotal Passages, moving from my 50s into my 60s. But at heart, I am still a procrastinating 8 year-old; a recalcitrant, emotional, stubborn 13 year-old, a 16 year-old who can't "journal" or keep a diary for more than a few days before losing interest and moving on to something else.

I'd like to think I can change these things but honestly? They are part and parcel of what makes me "me."

And perhaps there's a little personal lesson for myself in this realization - I'm me and that's a good thing. Even the bad stuff is good. It's all a matter of acceptance and finding a way to work with the Me-material I was given when I was born.

I seriously considered giving up on this blog - maybe it's silly, pretentious, self-conscious and who the hell cares what I'm writing anyway?

But then again, the writing itself is somewhat cathartic. Certainly harmless. And if I plunge back in - not every day (obviously THAT isn't going to happen!), maybe at the end of a year, I'll have learned a little something about myself.

Or maybe not. And that's just fine.