Well, I'm not actually elderly, am I? 69 years old. It's kind of funny to think about it. When I was young, I certainly regarding 60 as the start of 'old.' I mean, women retired at the age of 60 and men retired at the age of 65. I'm way past that now. I can see and feel my body changing in ways that aren't going to change back—grey hair, saggy jawline, crepe paper skin, age spots, etc—but somehow, while those kinds of changes are scary as hell to the young, they're not all that scary now. The big focus becomes staying healthy, staying mobile enough to enjoy walking and keeping active, and retaining faculties like sight and hearing, if possible. Keeping teeth in relatively good condition. For as long as possible. So far, so good, for me anyway. I'm not on any prescription drugs, and have no life-threatening conditions that I know about. I can still hear just fine, and my eyesight is very manageable (I've worn glasses since I was two, so it's never been perfect.) But I'm aware of the fact that this state of 'ok' won't last for ever. My life will now be measured out in a decade or two. Whatever I still want to do, I need to do now. I think there are three things young people should keep in mind. 1) Do NOT punish your body with bad habits. And I mean DON'T. Don't drink alcohol to excess, or regularly—because you can't stop. Don't smoke at all. Don't eat crap and nothing but crap day in and day out. Don't get sunburned or obsessed with a tan. Don't get fat. Be aware of the joint damage some kinds of exercise will do to you—which will hamstring your activities in later life. This stuff WILL catch up with you as you get older. I'm living with a husband who is four years older than me, who had mouth cancer three years ago, due to his habit of downing several pints of Guinness a day over a long period. He now has no teeth, which had to be removed during treatment. Thankfully the cancer was all removed via the surgery, but that's his life rather blighted and his ability to eat the foods he used to love curtailed. And because of several decades of heavy smoking (although he quit nearly 20 years ago), he now has both arteries in his legs blocked, and he struggles to walk more than about 50 yards at a time. The specialist told us, "the damage was done a long time ago." His habits caught up with him, for sure. I also know people who are a lot younger than me who have been very fat for a long time, and now have heavy-duty diabetes, joint problems, you name it. This stuff catches up with you. I also know a guy who is three years younger than me (an old boyfriend), who has had to have both knees and hips replaced due to a lifetime of high exercise, biking, running and punishing walking tours, etc. He's in marvellous shape otherwise, but the body-punishing activity took its toll. He wishes he had paid more attention to what he was doing to his body, while having these intense adventures. 2) Do not build a life filled with regrets—especially regrets for things you didn't do that you should have done. Do them now. Don't leave everything till 'tomorrow.' Do it now. If you want adventure, don't wait till you're too old to enjoy it. And you will get to the point where carrying a backpack and sleeping in a sleeping bag on a mat in a tent just won't seem attractive at all. So do these things while you're young. 3) Do what you can to make your older years financially secure. Learn to live within your means, and put something by for later. If you have a low-paying job and no prospects of a better one (or no desire to leave a job you love just because you can make more money doing something else) then realise that's what your life will be like and plan accordingly. Don't overspend and get into debt.
I have about five months a year off, and I am not looking forward to retirement. Doing the same things I do now, but with less money and a failing body? No thanks, there are alternatives when the time comes.
Because I'm qualified to do very little other than teach English. For example, I don't speak Japanese well enough to work at a convenient store or in a McDonald's, even if they'd hire a gaijin pushing fifty. (Spoiler: They wouldn't). I try and get as many part-time short-term hours through my various employers as I can, but there aren't always gigs available. And like I said, the goal is avoiding retirement, not doing anything to prolong it.
Ahh I see. I thought you were saying you just didn’t want to retire at a point of infirmity. Well, I wouldn’t have thought there is an upper age limit on teaching so perhaps you can just keep doing that
Nah, too much time off is just incredibly boring. I was back home and visited my mom and stepdad. They're both quite active, but between trips here and there they were watching some public broadcasting children's show because they don't have cable (long story, they live in the boonies) and it was what was on.... Mom's slowing down, heart attack, stroke in her past, stepdad's family history indicates the chip on his palm will turn red in the next couple years and... Mandatory retirement for teachers is 65 here.
I don't know how old you are, or how close to retirement you are, but SURELY there are things out there that interest you besides work? However, I do know people whose entire life was centred around a career, and once the career ends, they feel like they don't know what to do with themselves. So it can happen. I count myself lucky, in that I didn't have a career, but simply various 'jobs.' Things I enjoyed doing, and paid the bills (although my bills weren't high.) But the best thing about a good job is that you don't carry it home with you. You go, do the work, and then go home. It's also flexible, providing you build a good work record. You can quit a job and move elsewhere and get another one. Jobs paid for me to enjoy my time off. A career might well have taken up more of my time than I would have wanted it to. The short time I spent teaching convinced me that wasn't a career I wanted after all. I'd say take steps to develop new interests now. Don't count on your body failing you. You might well end up with a couple of decades when you feel perfectly fine, and would like to do something new. Are you planning to stay in Japan after you retire?
In my recurring nightmare I am the last member of the Velvet Underground trapped in a retirement home with bearded geezers in their lycra, and cycling helmets for their wheelchairs, and the nutritional planners, and maybe a couple of mortgage monkeys. One morning I wake up and rampage with my eye-liner all over their faces, and then Special Forces chase me in my zimmer, helicopter me away to New Zealand for bungee experience re-programming.
Oh, I wish that was my nightmare. Mine usually revolve me either being verbally abused, or the captain of a sinking ocean liner and everyone’s gonna die and it’s all my fault.
Every time you type something, the Improbability Drive kicks in, and we become all multi-dimensional. You are my first man-crush.
When I'm on the bridge of my oil-liner dream I'm only smoking my pipe approaching Honolulu. Hi @Guy - feel free, man - I love you, also
I actually came here to tell @Iain off for COMPLAINING ABOUT HAVING 5 MONTHS HOLIDAY. 5 Months - to write the horror of ELT novella, c'mon..? I remember the teachers in Brighton - 1 - the 'actor' with his multi-platformed/stimulating lesson plan trapped in the box room with BO and bored witless teenagers, backpacks - God, I pitied him. The other teacher, with her endless patience of 'good people,' projection - it was agony. Then, the flashback to Bratislava, our first ever teaching assignments, pre-lesson plans - and the sweat dripping down Oli's face, his terror, blackboard emblazoned FUCK, fuck you, fuck off and the voice from the back row - 'Fuck you, teacher...' I ran, he stayed actually, & made a life of it. VERBAL diarrhea[sp??] in flood
Do it in Lycra @Some Guy, inconveniently torn Lycra, for added speed-edge and to rile Mat a tad more And seconded @Iain Aschendale owing to time-envy, the advice of @mat gives of using your 5 month hiatus for, err, grandus opus (parus) is bob on. It has to be snatched by your writing hand. < Semi exclamation mark there.
Too late. I'm already in my lycra Grinch hoodie-footsie jammies, drawing plans for high speed casters and afterburners.
I suddenly want to go to @Some Guy and @matwoolf ’s weeding. I’ll hire someone to cart my giant tank over to the ceremony.
All I ever wanted was to be a slave, put in sleep mode each night, and euthanized at the end of my usefulness. Is that too much to ask? Spoiler: Fabricant boobs
Since when did weeding have a ceremony? (OK, I'm mostly quoting this for posterity if this is a typo, because now I'm fighting not to burst out laughing)
