Birthdays

 Today I celebrate my 69th birthday, that is to say the 69th anniversary of my birth. So what we really mean is that my 69th year is now complete not just beginning. What is beginning is my 70s. According to everyone I know who has passed this threshold, things start to happen in your 70s and they are usually not the things to which we look forward. They are the effects of age creeping in and slowing everything down. They are disease and death. I'm not in any way trying to be morbid, just prepared. I am on watch. I am on watch for faulty joints, for an increased slowness in my morning walks, for wayward cells that my white blood cells can no longer fight off.  So as I look toward this next trip around the sun, my goals are not about finances, they are about longevity.  I still have much to do so planet earth needs to maintain its hold on me for a bit longer. As I step into year number 70, I plan to eat right, exercise, get plenty of rest, take my pills, and greet each new day with joy and appreciation. Along with that, I plan to take the time for self care - for me that means to hold on to the stillness of morning prayer throughout the day, monitor the daily schedule and keep the pace slow. And much like I spent today, I want to take advantage of the beauty that surrounds me and go into the woods as often as I can.  

Retirement 2.0

 I have been retired (for the second time) now for 2 weeks.  Nothing is ever for sure but I have certainly entered into this version easier than the first.  Two good signs are that I haven't made plans to move and I am rearranging furniture inside and out to embrace my hobbies.  Perhaps the worst of it is enduring everyone's jokes about whether or not I will stay retired.  

The more I ponder the difference between this time and 6 years ago, the more I come to understand all the pieces of making these transitions in life more or less successful.  It definitely helped to return to my prior job even part time to realize all the reasons I left it before.  Energy is first on the list.  I was tired almost every day and sometimes I would feel tired just thinking about what I had to do.  A close second is the challenge of working with adults - definitely not my forte.  But the most profound reason is despite all my preparations, I don't think I was ready to retire last time.  I did all the right things, discernment and all, but in retrospect I think my initial move away was fear of not knowing how to create a life of leisure in a place where I had only worked.  It's easy to recreate a new life in a new place but not so easy to do in the place where you already live.  You must combat everyone's opinion of what you should be doing in retirement even though none of them has done it - volunteer, substitute, find a part time job outside of education - as well as dream up who and what you are without work.  Add on to that the fear of being able to make ends meet financially in one of the most expensive places in the country.  I just couldn't imagine I could ever do that; any of it.  It was really so much easier to move and justify to myself and others that it was a financial decision as well as familial; I would be living within a few miles of my sister.  I don't regret any of it.  Life is all about learning.  I learned lots about cold temperatures and a little snow - not a problem - and about sunlight exposure as you move north - BIG PROBLEM for someone who had been in sunny California for 40 years.  

So now it is finally time to confront the issues of being unemployed in the place where you were defined by your work.  Financially, I have all my tiny pots of money in place; Social Security, two pensions, and my savings.  Socially, I now have a few friends who are retired and have blazed the trail ahead of me. Familial, I am blessed to be living 2 blocks from my daughter and her family. Spiritually, I continue to work on the call to serve.  Professionally, yes, I will be volunteering at the school I left to fulfill part of that question.  But no thank you to the substitute or part time job options.  

I have begun work on a weekly schedule to make use of the larger blocks of time I have to work with so I won't "just read" or find out what's up next on Netflix.  It definitely helps to have done this before.  Monday is laundry day, Tuesday is still a cheap day at the movie theaters and always a good day to grocery shop.  Wednesday will be my field trip day so that I can continue to enjoy everything the Bay Area has to offer but without the crowds.  Thursday will be my appointment day so I don't chop the rest of the week into pieces.  In between are blocks of time set aside to read, write, and garden.  It all looks great on paper.  And here is evidence that it can work.  It's Monday and the laundry is in the dryer and I wrote this!

The Pilgrim Returns

 A few days ago I returned from 12 days in Spain and a pilgrimage from Azpeitia to Barcelona following the journey of Ignatius of Loyola.  I went into this adventure with anticipated views of a dirt or rock path and little else.  So I was certainly unprepared for the beauty of the mountains and valleys of the northern provinces of Spain.  I also assumed that all would be revealed to me while walking the path of the Camino.  Granted, there were thoughts and images that brought many questions to a close but I certainly did not receive any answers to the big questions: What do I do next?  Which direction do I follow?  

So what was it all about?

Gifts of the pilgrimage:

• God is with me. Traversing the mountain from Arantzazu was definitely a challenge and as I struggled to breathe and walk simultaneously I called on God (something I have struggled to do in real time of challenges). As I attempted to put one foot in front of the other I repeatedly told myself, God is here, God is with me, I am not alone.
• I am human with physical limitations.  The last 3 miles down the mountain brought back to me the pain of my running years and the tightening of my IT Band.  My only consolation was that if I could keep my knee from bending, I was pain free so I knew it wasn't anything serious.  I was humbled to come to terms with the fact that I would not be walking the entire pilgrimage.  I am grateful that experiences with half marathons taught me that every body has a tipping point and you just can't push past the pain without creating much more serious problems.  "No!" rings through the air.  
• Being in the same space of a man I have respected for years, 500 years later was quite overwhelming.  I was breathing the air Iñigo breathed, I stood in his family kitchen, I stood beside his death mask and sat with him in the cave in Manresa where he too wrote his thoughts.  I felt his spirit everywhere and struggled to leave behind each of those spaces.  
• My plan of getting a simple tattoo before I left has grown into a much more complex design.  I fear that no longer will it fit on my wrist where I would see it daily.  I'm trusting that with Tessa's help, "all will be well."
• I can't explain how I know it, but I was reassured that my invitation to the Pierre Favre program in September is exactly where I need to be.  The feeling that you are at least heading in the right direction is enough to know that this is the call.  
• Being invited into the stillness.  The quiet reflection of the pilgrimage has continued as I have returned home and attempt to find my place in the world again.  I step slowly into my life once more.  Returning home as retired is extremely helpful to my prayer practice.  It is day 3 and I remain significantly outside the world.  I am reconnecting with family and friends that I know will attempt to understand this experience or at least nod their heads knowing that whatever it is I experienced was something beyond language and was all good.  

When people ask me about the pilgrimage, I just say Spain is beautiful.  There is little else I can say about a pilgrimage that is supposedly a trek up and down a mountain and through the valleys toward the docks of Barcelona but in actuality mostly takes place in your inner being.  So I slowly, ever so slowly reenter life extremely aware that God is guiding my steps if only I take the time to wait, ponder, and reflect.