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Showing posts with the label Attitude

Good Riddance

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  Like every new year, January started off with so much promise. After it did its best to impede my ability to breathe let alone exercise by knocking me down with a never-ending head cold and then spent most days tossing rainwater from the sky, I can't say I'm sorry to see its departure. Of course there were the good bits, like my nephew's wedding and our week away in the Lake District, but generally speaking  I confess I'm just glad it's gone. Restored and revitalised, I want to get out and attack life again. However, I've read so much of late written by people decrying the month of January that I can't help wondering if I'm simply living in an echo chamber. After all its hardly fair to blame a period of 31 days banded together under no more than the name of a month for either my woes or the weather. I may have felt that my role as an explorer of retirement was temporarily suspended but I still made headway with some serious decluttering, totally emptyi

Ashamed

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  It isn't so long since I told you in a blog post that I've been trying to avoid embracing the stereotypical  bucket list but have now begun to ponder on whether or not some kind of schedule is actually needed as I continue my exploration of Planet Retirement. At Christmas, however, somebody saved me the effort of pulling together my own spreadsheet by gifting me a Bucket List map . Now I previously felt quite strongly that not only did I not want to devise a inventory of places to visit but also that worse than this would be a list of experiences and destinations that somebody else had collated for general distribution. Just search Bucket List online and you'll know what I mean. In this instance, however, I was sufficiently intrigued to open the map and here I hang my head in shame. Billed as "1,000 priceless places to go and things to know" in Britain, I confess that I would be lucky to be familiar with half of them. In fact there are vast swathes of our relat

Money Matters

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  We had our regular annual review with our Financial Advisor this week. The investments that sustain our pension funds remain stagnant as we were already aware, but the good news is that, regardless, he recommends spending them on exploring Planet Retirement. Money matters but so does fulfilment. Obviously, first Covid and then this year the requirement for our presence to resolve the leaking oil issue, have both intervened to curtail our travels and experiences. Consequently, he echoed our concern that we don't want to miss out for too long, ending up in frail health and unable to realise lifetime ambitions.  We are so conscious of this and whilst vague plans are frustrated at present, it's good to have ratification from a third party. How easy it must be in retirement to slip into sitting at home in splendid isolation adopting the attitude that venturing out is only hassle. There may be a time in the future when we have to embrace that restricted lifestyle but for the moment

The Last Resort

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  The Eldest and Dilly completed the purchase of their first home in August but have continued to live elsewhere whilst they restore and decorate to their satisfaction. Yesterday I visited a niece who has only just moved back into her house after a period of 6 months, again to allow refurbishment to take place. It all makes Mister E's and my desire to remain in our home whilst the floors are drilled out, despite knowing that the facilities we have access to will be reduced, appear a little bizarre.  Are we stalwarts from another age? Has retirement rendered us incapable of coping with change? Are we simply showing early signs of cognitive decline? Have we entered an era of indolence? I guess it's hard to explain our thought processes, especially to those younger family members who have willingly left their homes vacant and sought to avoid disturbance and potential misery by basing themselves elsewhere. To be honest, I'm not sure I can even explain our reasoning to myself. W

It's Black Out There

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  A little after 4pm and it was so black outside that we had to put the lights on. Storm Debi has been making itself known all day with heavy rain and a strong wind. In fact the weather was so disgusting that after a brief foray for Yoga and Pilates classes I was glad to get home and hunker down. Contending with foul conditions on top of everything else only adds to the torment and tension. I've always said that one of the benefits of retirement has been an ability to follow the seasons and live life accordingly but I'm not so sure about relating to or synchronising with these short, dark, depressing days.  When I was last able to get out into the garden for a limited tidy up in readiness for what feels like a fast approaching winter, I noticed that we appear to be hosting a hedgehog's nest behind some shrubbery. It made me wonder whether hibernation might actually be an appropriate way to harmonise with the coming months. It's been a pattern of our retirement to try to

Progress of Sorts

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  Reverting to our headache of an oil leak , there was finally progress this week. Firstly we had confirmation that the loss adjuster has approved the strategy for the installation of a new waterpipe as well as the clean up operation. Secondly, but perhaps more ominously, the loss adjuster's surveyor visited primarily to take photographs in case the proposed works cause cracking or other damage He didn't simply confine himself to the areas where the digging out will take place inside and out, but also photographed the rest of our downstairs including the rooms that were decorated only a few months ago. Thank goodness we have had the foresight to hold back on replacing the soft furnishings and lighting, although we have been hoping to escape with dust rather than fractures to the walls. Resilience and optimism remain high even if we struggle to gather clouds with silver linings. It's not how we would have planned this stage of retirement  but we have to appreciate what we do

Dem Bones

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  Of late, suffering from the anguish of various aches and pains, I've been reminded of the lyrics from Dem Bones. With a pain from the hip to the knee, I seem to have had more than an implicit understanding that the knee bone is connected to the thigh bone and the thigh bone to the hip bone. Of course, in my case the cause has been primarily muscular but it still hasn't prevented those lyrics going round and round in my head.  My knees suffer from degeneration and arthritis mainly as a consequence, I suppose, of  numerous meniscus tears. There's a long history there with incidents going back as far as my twenties with disco-dancing, skiing and even wind-surfing. As somebody recently said to me, "Well at least you had lots of fun damaging them!" Frankly, I'm not sure that was necessarily case; certainly not the time my knee gave way jumping down from the airport shuttle bus on the way to the Alps and I arrived in the resort already hopping on one leg and never

A Close Escape

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  What is it about water that entices us? Like all living things we need it to survive but how often have you read claims about its healing powers and the sense of well-being that it brings? The health claims extend to a myriad of wellness spas, not to mention the explosion in popularity of wild swimming. I cannot claim that going in search of running water is part of our strategy to build resilience . Indeed a brief trip last week might be better described as an escape from the issues that are besetting us. However, it's amazing how spending the night in a small hotel less than 40 miles away really satisfied that desire for peace and contentment and not just because we had tap water that we could actually drink and clean our teeth with!   After meeting a friend at Barnard Castle for the day, Mister E and I headed onwards up into the heart of Teesdale. We were blessed with benign conditions and as well as clean drinking water, soaked up the sight, sound and majesty of not one but t

Building Resilience

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    Life has a habit of throwing misfortune our way. Retirement is no exception to that rule and indeed as we age we are more likely to encounter and face the demise of loved ones, health issues and increasing frailty of body and even mind. There are also those day to day issues that we might find harder to deal with, not to mention the unexpected shocks and surprises ready to leap out when we least expect them. The main advantage we have in retirement is a lifetime of experience in dealing with adverse circumstances. We are now in the advantageous position of building on that experience and developing still further our resilience.  Action for Happiness identifies resilience as one of the 10 keys to a happy life. Resilience doesn't mean that we are no longer impacted by awful situations but instead that we can overcome both the crisis and the stress and anxiety it brings to us, enabling us to move on positively, build on our fortitude and learn from the ordeal. Sinc

Tingling

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   A few weeks ago I bought a singing bowl whilst visiting a Nepalese craft fair. There's a certain skill to inducing a sound but once perfected the effect is a harmonious reverberation that lingers for several minutes. Sitting cross-legged which is never easy with my unstable right knee, the bowl induces a feeling of calm and self-compassion.  It's another stopping place on my path of discovery in the world of retirement. So much so that two weekends ago I attended a Sound and Meditation workshop which left me tingling with the vibrations for 24 hours afterwards. Buoyed by the experience, last night I went to a soundbath in a village church some 15 miles away. Lying down in the darkness of the aisle, atop a yoga mat and huddled in layers and a blanket, I closed my eyes and let the oscillations take over. The sound, generated by various singing bowls, bells,  rattles  and  gongs , was complemented by the acoustics of the stone building and I pulsed from within. Sound baths are

Chilled to the Bone

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  I can't say that I generally feel the cold. Indeed Mister E and I are happy to keep our house at a maximum temperature of 18 to 19 degrees celsius. It's just as well bearing in mind that we have had no oil supply to run the central-heating boiler for several weeks. That really didn't matter when we were being blessed with summer weather but the recent tilt into autumn has certainly not gone unnoticed. Whilst an inability to warm the bathroom radiators to dry towels, along with a lack of heat in the utility room for airing clothes has been a nuisance, it's hardly been a great bugbear. Gradually, however, there's been an increasing awareness of the chilly evenings and I've found myself reaching for a fleece to put on. With some heavy rain and no sunshine, the effect has become pronounced. So much so that, travelling to London on Saturday, I was really aware of arthritic inflammation and pain in my left hand. Whilst Mister E drove, I found myself rubbing the swol

Bitter Sweet

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  It is said that when life gives you lemons, you should make lemonade. Embrace positivity and turn your misfortune into a beneficial and perhaps even enjoyable experience. I thought I'd come up with something similar within the constraints of my greenhouse recently. Somebody earlier in the year suggested that I grow cucamelons. I confess that I found the prospect of growing a cross between a melon and a cucumber rather exciting, duly sowed the seeds and nurtured the seedlings that followed. There was no hint on the seed packet as to how large the fruit grew and I think, understandably, I was expecting something perhaps mango sized.  When the plants became overcome by tiny fruit, at best 2 centimetres in length, I reached out to colleagues in the village gardening club for guidance. The consensus was that this was the limit of their size and that they go well as an addition to cocktails as well as being eaten as a sweet canap é . Reader, to my mind, they can best be described as an

The Pits

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    Yesterday was the pits. At least that was what the email I received implied.   "I shall be arriving at 10 am to start digging trial pits," wrote the contamination expert. I'm not sure quite what I was expecting; some kind of lunar landscape interspersed with deep craters perhaps. Oh well if we haven't been able to get away and fly to the moon or indeed anywhere, creating the effect in your back garden might just have the same impact and without all the hassle of airport check-ins. In the end, however, the work was far less intrusive. Fear the worst and hope for the best they say.  Directly attributable to a month or more of detection work by Mister E and me, as well as too much time spent on hands and knees sniffing in strange corners, I'm pleased to say that we were able to direct the expert and his shovel to within a couple of feet of striking oil. It wasn't quite a spout bursting from the core of the earth but, drilling down and scraping away, he found

Appy Goddess

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 I don't know how anybody else copes with domestic chores but I find them a real grind . When I was working I generally paid somebody to assist with the cleaning and ironing but even then tidying up in readiness for their visit was a burden in itself. In retirement I chose to relieve myself of that load by endeavouring to keep on top of the inevitable crumbs, dust and muck personally. I can't say I'm successful in doing so. Although after 9 years of retirement I am at least more accomplished in that sphere than when I set out. Adapting from a career that called out for an element of perfectionism to a dust and do mentality has not been easy. If anything is going to force us to downsize it will inevitably be the hours of my time spent on mundane household tasks, only to have to repeat them again a week or two later. What is it about dirt that it reappears as soon as you turn your head? Last week, however, I decided to try a new technique and downloaded a couple of cleaning a

Planking for Victory

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  This weekend marks 5 weeks of living on bottled water. Not the most auspicious of anniversaries, coinciding as it has with Plastic Free July and ruining all attempts on my part to live more sustainably. So the stress runs on, but we are building our resilience.  In my case, I have found that throwing myself into exercise classes and some heavy gardening certainly helps and undoubtedly has me falling asleep even before I get into bed. Last weekend the Village Gardening Club co-ordinated a tour of members' gardens. Rain had forced me to abandon any effort to weed and I confess that my flower beds, with some in an ongoing state of renovation, were an embarrassment. I devote my time in early summer to the vegetable patch and then never find a weather window to sort the rest of the garden; it's usually too wet, too windy or too hot making the clay soil seal like concrete. However, shamed by the success of others and helped by ideal conditions, this past week Mister E and I have fi

Tiring and Tying

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  I'm not sure why but I do love my garden. However, toiling for hours to produce fresh produce just at the time it is widely available in the shops and consequently relatively cheap, surely requires some explanation. I think it is that mixture of nature and nurture, not in the sense of the great psychology debate but from the perspective of getting up close and dirty with the first, whilst deriving pleasure and reward from the actual process of rearing all those seedlings and cuttings. Experimentation and creativity abound; the economics of production are irrelevant. However, there is no doubt that it can be back-breaking and tiring. Since retiring, I have concentrated on trying to reduce some of the more physical aspects of digging and weeding. Consequently, I now have a system for adding compost and turning the soil immediately each bed has been harvested, covering it with a weed suppression fabric until it is time for planting again. In the flowerbeds too, I have begun to use b