Retirement?

I met my husband 16 years ago. To this day he is hardest working man I have ever met. His work was never just what needed to get done in the office or in a meeting with others, it extended to his relentless thoughtful hours even while we were supposed to be unwinding on vacation or the weekend. Long, long hot showers were his M.O. when he needed to figure something out that he couldn’t immediately solve. The never ending amount of paper napkins he used for complex lists while we were on the road or out to dinner were a norm for us.

We planned vacations around ‘proposal season’ because one year, before I really understood his work ethic and devotion, he spent the week in our hotel room and sometimes in the bathroom working until the wee hours of the morning. He was not with us in Puerto Rico that year. Never again.

I spent most of my young adult life raising children and being home for them but when we went into a business of our own in 2011 I jumped on board. Soon after, in 2016 as a full time VP of Human Resources. My work week began to look like Rick’s. I didn’t take hot showers to solve my issues; I went to the gym or a long walk with the dog. I had to maintain the same level of work ethic as Rick to keep up with our growing business. I was comfortable with my expertise as VP of HR. I was taking the job home with me on weekends and vacations too. I would even put off going to the hospital until payroll was finished, and our employees could continue to count on us.

I bring all this up because we officially retired in mid December of 2024. The timing was unintended. We planned on another 5-8 years before we would close up shop but here we are the last week in September of 2025 living a 3 minute walk from the Sea of Cortez in Mazatlán Mexico in full retirement mode.

Now that we have spontaneously entered a new phase in our lives that just so happens to coincide with our bankruptcy, and losing our home in Maryland, the idea of retirement is on our minds. When we first got down here we were too stressed and devastated because of our loss to be thinking about what retirement would look like. I was adjusting to a new country and trying feverishly to adjust to the language difference and culture. Retirement was a word we used to tell people "why" we were here. It was a label we were comfortable in without really defining what it meant for us. That is our challenge today.

Napping is something we have the luxury to do now, whenever we feel the urge. Nothing in our world is pressing, urgent or requires immediate addressing. We walk on the beach, come back and lay down for 30 minutes. We go shopping, have lunch and come home to lay down for an hour. We nap. I hated it at first because it takes me a long time to settle and relax. It takes me over an hour to fall asleep at night while he is snoring within minutes. Napping was something I did only when I was sick and even then I fought the urge because there was always something more important that needed to be done. Now I have come to realize that if I take a short cat nap (with my cat) I sleep better at night. My mother always said, ‘sleep begets sleep’ meaning if you need a nap, it will foster a good night sleep later. She was right.

Rick and I have to figure out what retirement looks like for us. We have to figure if we want to really retire. I feel like I have so much more to give and in a sense, I feel like I just got started living. I am not sure I want to retire. Rick is way to motivated and hardworking to stay settled for a walk and a nap a day. But on the other hand, there is so much joy I get seeing him slow down and enjoy life now. All he has to do is exactly whatever he wants to do every day. We have a few doors that need to be completely closed before we make any definite plans for our future but at least we have the time to figure it out on our terms, on our time line.