Kathysretirementblog

Retirement is a journey, not a destination...

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The End

This is bittersweet for me as I’ve come to know many of you through my blog.  You’ve communicated how I’ve helped and inspired you over the years as well as offering sound advice.  However, as I prepare to enter 2025 I’m leaving some things behind including Kathysretirementblog.  I thought it fitting to write my final blog post on this final day of 2024. Why have I made this decision?  Well, you…

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Permission

Thank you to everyone who sent encouragement, advice and ideas after my last post.  These are all things we can use at one time or another during our lives.  Another is permission. I decided to take some of your advice as well as my own.  Delving deep I realized so much of what I was feeling had gripped me shortly after retiring.  Remember Robert Achley?  He’s the researcher who defined the…

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Still Here

I know some of you have been wondering where I am.  Thank you for the caring messages.  To answer your questions, I’m fine yet also wondering where I am.   On the first day of spring I began moving into my new house, my car to near overflowing with boxes, excitement fluttering like a dancing butterfly around my heart.  The fact that spring is a time of renewal, re-birth, new beginnings did not…

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A Gift

Recently, a long time follower gifted me with a book.  Knowing I was widowed in 2022, she messaged me and asked if she could send me Hope For Widows – Reflections on Mourning, Living, and Change by Marilyn Nutter.  Having read several books on loss, mourning and starting anew, although I was firmly planted in the starting over phase of my journey, I was interested in reading this book, not only…

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Remembering Martin

As the one year anniversary of Martin’s death approaches, my heart weighs heavy with sorrow.  It’s been a strange year, one of deep persistent sadness coupled with immutable joy.  I’ve learned that sadness and joy are not mutually exclusive.  They are but two different emotions entwined around my heart in a meandering dance of mourning and moving forward with living.  Anything on two…

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You, Inc.

Somewhere along the zig-zag of my working years, the idea of marketing ones’ self to create your personal brand and get ahead in the workplace arose on the business how-to horizon.  Dubbed ‘You, Inc.’ the concept hinged on the entrepreneurial notion that we are a personal business. Remembering the lessons from my almost going-down-in-flames work experience I shunned the idea only to take it up in…

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Books

The third Thursday of every month the book club I belong to meets at our community center.  This month’s read is In Every Mirror She’s Black by author Lola Akinmade Akerstrom, her debut novel.  A story about three black women, each with a dissimilar background from various countries, coming to live in Sweden.  As always, I’m interested in what my fellow book club members have to say about the…

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How Much Is Enough?

On my return from Italy flying high over the north Atlantic there was a list of movies and podcasts offered by United to while away the passengers’ time during the nine hour flight.  I chose a podcast by a woman I’d never heard of – Dr. Laurie Santos.  What caught my eye was the word ‘happiness’ in the title of her podcasts from The Happiness Lab (https://www.drlauriesantos.com/).  I listened to…

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Nutrition For The Ages

According to the National Institute on Aging (https://www.nia.nih.gov) we need fewer calories as we age, but require a healthy diet to age well.  It seems to me we always need a healthy diet regardless of age.  So, I looked into the aging well end of it meaning the type of diet necessary to meet that goal.  My concerns centered around muscle loss, vitamin needs, maintaining cognitive function and…

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And So It Begins

And so it begins. Finally!  Last Sunday, a drizzly chilly day in the mid-60’s when normally Michigan temperatures would be approaching that of hell’s front porch, I located the site for my house.  Last winter the house locale was staked at the front of my property close to the road.  I was never happy with that site.  Today, the intention was to find a spot, which I loved. In spring of 2021 my…

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Pumping Iron

I started pumping iron again in preparation for my trip to Italy.  I thought that dragging a suitcase even on a pair of wheels may be more than I could handle.  Then, there was lifting my carry-on bag into an overhead bin.  During my past travels I always did entirely carry-on, but that was in my younger days.  There was always the chance of another passenger or an attendant helping, but I…

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A Life Of My Choosing

As mentioned in a previous post I’ve been journaling my thoughts about what I want to do in my future.  Titled “A Life of My Choosing” I was filling more than a few pages with what I wanted, needed, envisioned, imagined.  I kept my journal at the ready on the coffee table, so whenever an idea worth considering pushed its way into my consciousness, I could easily retrieve my book of blank pages…

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Inspiration

Accompanied by granddaughter Sophie and her friend I visited Frederik Meijer Gardens and Sculpture Park in search of inspiration for the garden at my new house.  Located about forty five minutes away in Grand Rapids, Michigan I’m a member.  My membership allows me to visit throughout the year viewing the gardens during each season as I pursue ideas for my much, much, much smaller version of this…

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Transformations

After visiting three kitchen showrooms, looking at countless paint colors, wood stains, styles and price points, drawers, sizes and inserts, last week I made a decision on the kitchen cabinets and countertops for my new house.  There were also countless hours spent online looking at trends for all of the above and deciding if I want to be trendy or go my own way.  I settled somewhere in between. …

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Enchanting Tuscany

Ordering lunch in Lucca Two weeks ago I sat in the Botanical Garden of Lucca savoring my last afternoon in enchanting Tuscany.  I was alone on that day as all my fellow tour members had flown out of Pisa early.  Sitting on a bench under a hundreds year old maple I reflected on my trip to Italy.  Part of me was looking forward to going home; part of me wanted to stay. As a first time traveler to…

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Moving Forward

I’m writing this one on the fly.  A short one at that. Now on the cusp of May, April was a whirlwind, kicking up dust everywhere, pushing me into my future.  And, there’s still so much to do.  I feel overwhelmed, yet exhilarated to be moving forward.  After putting my house on the market, it is under contract with the closing looming just ahead, the inspections and appraisal but an April…

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Rules

During the last 20 years a lot has been written, reported, spoken about being our authentic selves.  When the idea of living authentically first entered my head space, I was working.  I wondered then how that might be looked upon in our rule based society where fitting in was a job requirement for most of corporate America.  Different ideas were often met with, “but that’s the way we’ve always…

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