I’ve realized my goal/thought that I would write every day may have been a bit ambitious and, after all, I don’t think my favorite newspaper columnists used to write a column every single day, so I’ve reconciled that in my brain. I thought I had my retirement routine down, I had “found my groove” and maybe I have: My routine is no routine. No timeline, schedule, no deadlines, no pressure. I wish I could have had my brain in this place while I was working, but that wasn’t how I rolled. I relish my morning routine: I’m a “Morning Person” and with dogs, it’s forced somewhat. They are so used to getting up early with me when I was working and they still have that schedule in them, but I really don’t mind it. Having nowhere that I HAVE to be makes the mornings great. I get up, get the dogs fed and let them out, and then they all are ready to go back to sleep but me—by that time I’m up and awake, especially on cold mornings when I get that blast of cold air in my face when I let them out. As a result, I make myself a cup of coffee and I have time to journal, meditate (yes, I do that and it does wonders) exercise, and catch-up on TV shows I like that aren’t The Fisherman’s cup of tea. Speaking of journaling, I have two that I write in. One is just 365 blank pages. Those pages are for what the Life Coaches call “Thought Downloads” or “Paper Thinking.” The other journal is one I set my sights on about a year ago and I finally took the leap and got it. It’s a 5-Year Journal. It’s produced by a company called Rustico and they produce a wide variety of leather journals, log books, and notebooks, among other things. I’m not getting anything for mentioning them, I simply love their products and their 5-year journal is fantastic and on sale right now. What I love about it is that they give you a prompt/question for each day, and the way the pages are designed, you will answer that same question on the same date each of the 5 years, so you can see how your response will change, perhaps, over time, so if journaling has been something you want to do, but it has seemed daunting, this is a great way to start with that daily question. I got mine and chose to start using it on my birthday so that I would be accurately tracking the next 5 years of my life and there was the option to put a custom message on the cover so I opted to go with “Lisa-60 to 65.” I cannot wait to write in it each day.
I’ve started going on walks through the neighborhood many mornings with our neighbor who has a Pug, and I go with our Pug, Coleman. One morning it struck me how much life has changed already since retiring last month: Here I was in the middle of the morning, walking on a sunny, Fall day, and I couldn’t help but think what I would have been doing in the past at this time of the morning at the office. Already, this morning walk seemed so normal and that *other life* seems to be fading away when it comes to considering what is “normal.”
The biggest thing to consider now in my morning routine is “do I eat breakfast early, am I even hungry, or will The Fisherman want to get up and go out to breakfast somewhere?” Yes, that’s about the extent of major decisions these days, and I’m realizing how much I like that. It’s a step beyond that realization that, when you’re an adult, you can eat cake whenever you want. In this case now, it’s do I want cake for breakfast? Well maybe I do. When will breakfast be? Not until 11 a.m.? That’s okay too!
Observations on getting used to being one of those gray-haired retired people 