by Lois Winston
“Can we forget about face lifts for just a second?” I pleaded. “I’m really worried about Jim, and you’re the only ones I can talk to about it. I need help. I think he’s losing his mind.”
“You’re always complaining about Jim,” Claire said. “Every time we get together, you have something new to add to his ongoing list of sins. What’s he doing now? Still getting up at five in the morning to watch The Weather Channel and obsess about when the next major storm will disrupt his commute to the city?”
“Let me guess,” said Mary Alice. “I bet he’s into his manic coupon- clipping phase again. What was it you called it, Carol? Obsessive Coupon Disorder?”
“Very funny.” I was getting more and more aggravated. “This time it’s serious. Jim’s behavior is becoming weirder and weirder. He’s impossible to deal with.” I paused, then raised my voice again to be sure they heard me.
“He’s driving me nuts. I think he needs to see a shrink.” Unfortunately, when the word “shrink” popped out of my mouth, it was at one of those quiet times that can happen in very noisy places. Now, everyone in the restaurant was staring at our table.
“Don’t look now,” said Nancy, “but Linda Burns just walked in the door.”
Great. The one person in town who loved to lord it over everyone about her perfect life, her perfect family and her perfect career as a college professor.
“Oh, God, do you think she heard what I said about Jim? That’s all I need.”
“Well, she’s seen us all sitting here so we have to be nice,” replied Claire. She gave Linda a friendly wave, and the rest of us pasted false smiles on our faces.
“I haven’t seen you in ages, Linda,” Claire said. “Can you join us for lunch?”
Nancy’s mouth dropped open in shock.
“Thanks, but I can’t. I have just enough time to pick up a takeout meal in between classes. Plus, I have office hours this afternoon. So many students depend on me for advice. Even some who don’t take my classes.” Linda checked her watch. “I must get back to campus. Enjoy your leisurely lunch. You’re fortunate to have so much spare time. Ta for now.”
“She is such a pain in the you-know-what,” said Mary Alice, once Linda was mercifully gone. “‘Enjoy your leisurely lunch!’ She just couldn’t resist a chance to stick it to us. Claire, don’t you ever invite her to have lunch with us again.”
“You know” Nancy said, “the only time Linda was even remotely human was when her cocker spaniel was sick a few years ago. She and Bruce nursed that dog for months before they had to have it put down. It was like the dog was their child.”
“That’s because they had that nutty idea about starting a new dog breed,” Mary Alice reminded us. “They were going to breed their cocker spaniel to a poodle, and call it a ‘cockerdoodle.’ Then Bruce found out there already was a cocker spaniel/poodle mix, the cockapoo, so they gave up on that idea. You know it’s all about money with them. Money and status.”
“I heard a rumor that Linda’s going to be named chairman of the college history department this fall,” added Claire. “I hate to say it, but if we think she’s obnoxious now, she’ll be even more unbearable then.”
“Look,” I said desperately, “can we get back to Jim, please? Nobody else but people our age can understand what I’m going through.”
“Actually,” teased Nancy, “I believe I’m almost a year younger than you are, Carol.”
It’s true that Nancy is nine months younger than I am, but because of the arbitrary cutoff dates which determined when a child was eligible to start school back in the fifties, we had ended up in the same class. I had other things on my mind today, however, so I let her comment pass.
“Well, you certainly have our attention now,” said Nancy with a laugh. “Anytime I remind you that I’m younger than you are, you never let me get away with it. What’s going on?”
“Okay,” I whispered. “Come a little closer to me. I don’t want to have to say this too loud.” And have everybody in the restaurant staring at us again.
“Jim’s obsessed about retirement. He talks about it all the time. He even bought himself a retirement countdown clock. He’s figured out the earliest date he can retire, and programmed the clock to keep track of the time remaining until his big day. It’s on our nightstand, ticking away like a time bomb.
“I guess what I’m looking for from all of you is a reality check,” I continued. “Have your husbands ever been as consumed as Jim is with retirement? Do they obsess about it, even during those intimate moments we all have? Oh, God, I’m sorry, Mary Alice.” My friend Mary Alice had been a widow for more than fifteen years. “I didn’t mean to offend you.”
“You didn’t offend me, Carol,” responded Mary Alice. “I’m actually starting to think about taking early retirement myself.”
“You’re kidding!” said Nancy. “What would you do if you stopped nursing? Wouldn’t you be bored?”
In response to the “empty nest” syndrome Nancy went through after her daughter left for college, she’d begun a career as a local Realtor. I think her success in business surprised even her. I know it surprised the rest of us.
“Well, I’d still need to make some money,” admitted Mary Alice. “I couldn’t completely retire from nursing. But the everyday hospital stress is really beginning to get to me. And the hours are so long. I went into nursing years ago because I wanted to help people. Nowadays, I seem to spend most of my time at the hospital doing mounds of paperwork. The time I get to spend with patients is very limited. It’s so frustrating. I was thinking I could sign on with a nurses’ registry and maybe do some private duty cases.”
“That’s a great idea, Mary Alice,” I said supportively. “But could we get back to Jim for a second?”
“Hi, I’m Sally. I’ll be your waitress for today. May I take your order?” Our waitress had finally arrived, and the lunchtime crowd was starting to thin out. “Sorry it took me so long to get to you.”
“I’ll order for everybody,” I said. “We’ll all have the Caesar salad with chicken, no anchovies, dressing on the side. And iced tea with extra lemon. Be sure the lemons are cut in wedges, not slices. Okay with everybody? Fine. Now, can we get back to Jim?”
“Carol, you really do have our undivided attention now and thanks for placing the order. Does that mean you’re picking up the check, too?”
“Very funny, Nancy. All right. Claire, you’re our role model in this,” I said. “When Larry was first thinking about retirement, did he get, well, nutty about the idea? It’s been three years for you guys, right?”
“Larry is so easy-going,” said Claire with a smile. “He doesn’t stress about anything. We’ve always been pretty much in sync with one another.
Not that we haven’t had our share of arguments over the years. But when it comes to the really important stuff, we usually agree. I don’t remember him getting worried about retirement. But remember, I left my teaching job a year before he started thinking about retiring himself. I sometimes kid him that he retired because he saw how much fun I was having. And he still has a license to practice law, so he keeps busy taking on a few cases every now and then.”
“You know, Carol, this restaurant is a perfect example of someone who reinvented her life when she retired,” said Nancy. “Remember when Maria was Miss Lesco, and she taught all our kids in sixth grade? When she retired from teaching, she re-did her kitchen and started offering take-out meals from her home. We all thought that she’d never make a go of it. But one thing led to another and she eventually opened this restaurant. It’s been a huge success for her. Retirement doesn’t have to mean you stop being productive. Maybe it means you finally get to do the things you really want to do. It sure worked for Maria.”
“Yeah, Carol,” added Claire. “Remember all those back-to-school nights and parent-teacher conferences we went to over the years? I used to be petrified of Maria back then. She seemed so demanding and cold. Never tried to coddle the kids, that’s for su
re. But she was a damn good teacher. Who could know that underneath that starched exterior was an artistic soul yearning to express itself through food?”
She turned in her chair and managed to catch Maria’s eye. As usual, Maria was front and center in her open kitchen, a huge area which had been expanded during the restaurant’s renovations a few years ago so guests could watch the food being prepped and cooked. Food prep was a major source of entertainment these days, and Maria, smart enough to sense the trend, had positioned her work area so she was the visible star of her own show.
“So what exactly are you worried about, Carol?” asked Mary Alice, returning to what was, I felt, the main subject of our luncheon conversation.
“You all know how Jim’s hated his job at the agency ever since the new boss was brought in, right?” Jim was a senior account executive at Gibson Gillespie Public Relations Agency in New York City, an easy train ride from our home in Fairport, Connecticut. The agency founder had died last year and his widow, Cherie, who had inherited ownership of the agency along with everything else in the estate, had brought in a thirty-six-year-old whiz kid, Mack Whitman, to run the operation.
“Every night Jim comes home with more complaints about Mack,” I continued. “How he conducts staff meetings and does yoga exercises at the same time. Or how he has no real vision for the agency. Jim says that all Mack’s doing is pumping up his personal expense account while the agency is floundering. I think what really scares him, though, is that everybody who’s been hired since Mack came on board is under thirty-five. Jim’s beginning to feel like an old man, and he talks about leaving his job all the time. But then I ask him what he’d do if he left, and he has no answer. You know that his whole life has been that job. He has no hobbies or interests at all. What’s he going to do if he retires, stay home all day and drive me crazy?”
“Bingo,” said Nancy, aiming an imaginary gun at my head. “That’s the real problem. You’ve got this nice little life here in Fairport, with a home office setup you can use to do occasional freelance work. Your kids are grown and out of the house, and you have a few volunteer activities to make you feel worthwhile. You get to go out to lunch with friends, and go shopping whenever you feel like it. Between seven a.m. when Jim leaves for New York and seven p.m. when he comes home, you’re free as a bird to do whatever you want. Your only real responsibility is to be sure to let the dogs out a couple of times a day. You don’t want Jim underfoot rocking your boat.”
I sat back in my chair. I was stunned that Nancy could be so harsh.
“Did anybody read the Sunday Times Magazine last weekend?” asked Mary Alice. “It had a huge feature on retirement, because so many baby boomers are retiring now. There’s a whole new industry to deal with it. Not the financial stuff, the lifestyle-change stuff. Retirement coaching, I think it’s called. It was really interesting.”
“Hey, Carol,” Nancy said. “Maybe that’s what you and Jim need. A re-tirement coach.”
“Don’t be ridiculous,” I said, still smarting from Nancy’s comments. “You know Jim would never go to see someone like that.”
“Oh, come on,” Claire retorted. “You know you can get Jim to do anything you want. All you have to do is make him think it was his idea. Remember how you wanted to take that trip to Europe, and you knew Jim would never go for it because he wouldn’t want to spend the money? You never directly brought the subject up with him. You called me and told me all about it, knowing full well that he was in the next room and would overhear our conversation. Next thing you know, he was starting to think about it, too. Why don’t you go home after lunch and go online and see what you can find about retirement coaches? It’s worth a shot.
“Oh, great, here’s our food at last. I’m starving.”
I don’t remember what else we talked about at lunch. I was itching to get home, turn on my computer and Google retirement coaches.
TWO
Q: When is a retiree’s bedtime?
A: Three hours after he falls asleep on the couch.
We didn’t leave the restaurant until about two forty-five. It took forever to get the check from our waitress, and nobody wanted to split the bill evenly since Mary Alice hadn’t ordered dessert. When Claire pulled out her calculator to figure out what each one of us owed, I snatched up the bill and said, “My treat.” Jeez. My whole life was a stake here. Who cared about a few measly dollars one way or the other?
Usually, I love driving around our town, especially on our street, Old Fairport Turnpike, a graceful road filled with stately homes, many of which date back to the American Revolution. Fairport, Connecticut, is a very old town, and Jim and I live in the historic district, where several of the houses were burned by the British in a brief visit during that war. To have burn marks on the floor of an antique home like ours is considered a primo selling point, according to Nancy.
When I’d left for lunch more than three hours before, I’d closed and latched the gate on the picket fence that surrounds our property. Old Fairport Turnpike is a busy street in town, and some people have actually had the nerve to use our driveway as a turnaround. I hate that, so I always lock the gate.
Of course, because the gate was old, like our white colonial house, and I was in such a hurry to get inside, I had trouble getting it open. Ditto the kitchen door, which sticks no matter what the weather is. Part of the “charm” of an antique house. That and crooked door frames, low ceilings and uneven floors.
My two English cocker spaniels, Lucy and Ethel, raced up to greet me.
“Hi girls.” I reached down to give them each a quick pat. “You’ll never guess what happened at lunch today. I may have discovered a solution to our latest problems with Jim. I’ll tell you all about it after you go outside for a quick run.”
I admit it’s crazy to talk to my dogs all the time the way I do, but they’re good listeners and I can trust them to keep a secret. They always agree with me, too. Too bad a handful of kibble, fresh water and some dog biscuits weren’t enough to produce unconditional love from humans.
The red light on my telephone blinked at me accusingly. I had one message and, of course, it was from Jim. I could tell by the tone of his voice that something was up. “Carol,” he barked into the phone, “why are you never home when I want to talk to you? I was going to leave a message on your cell phone, but then I figured you didn’t have the damn thing on.”
He had me there. I thought my cell phone was a nuisance, and I rarely turned it on. Those folks who drove their cars or walked down the street or did their grocery shopping with a phone plastered to their head, like every call was a life-and-death situation, were ridiculous, as far as I was concerned.
I heard the sound of Jim shifting some papers in the background.
“I didn’t mean to yell,” he continued. “I’ve got exciting news to tell you. It’ll have to wait until I get home tonight, since I don’t know where you are. Don’t try to call me back. I’ll be in meetings for the rest of the afternoon. See you later.”
Exciting news, huh? That could mean anything. But he did sound upbeat, once he got over the fact that I wasn’t home. I’d told Jim this morning, before he flew out the door to catch his train, that I was going out for lunch today, but of course, he didn’t listen. I refused to speculate about Jim’s news. I’d find out soon enough.
“Come on, girls,” I said to the dogs, back from performing their necessary outdoor duties, “we’ve got work to do.” I tossed them each a dog biscuit to reward them for a job well done. They followed me into my home office and flopped at my feet. When the cheery computer voice said, “Welcome! You’ve got mail,” for once I didn’t immediately rush to check my email messages.
I looked at my blank computer screen and tried to remember exactly what phrase Mary Alice had used. My short-term memory, sadly, isn’t what it used to be. Neither is most of my body, but let’s not get into that now.
I typed in “Retirement” and got more than two thousand possible websites I could che
ck out. Then I tried “Retirement Planning” and got websites that were all about financial planning issues. Not what I was looking for. I cursed myself for not writing the phrase down.
“How about ‘Baby Boomers and Retirement’?” I asked Lucy and Ethel. They wagged their tails in agreement. Nope, no help there either. I didn’t need to know the number of baby boomers there were in the U.S., nor did I need any more sites about financial planning.
I looked at the clock on my desk. It was already close to four o’clock and Jim was usually home by five thirty these days. Sometimes, even earlier. I had no time to waste, and I certainly didn’t want him coming in while I was online and asking me what I was looking for. When he was around, I had no privacy at all.
“Wait a minute,” I said to the dogs. “I think Mary Alice said the key words are retirement coaches. Let’s try that one and see what happens. Bingo!”
In no time I had websites on healthy aging (an oxymoron if I ever heard one), lifestyle changes, retirement lifestyle coaching, lifelong learning, and on and on. How could I choose the right one and check out it out before Jim got home?
Then I scrolled down to a site which read: “Re-tirement Survival Center, dedicated to helping Baby Boomers make the transition to the best part of their lives.” Hmm, I liked the sound of that one, though I didn’t understand why “retirement” was hyphenated. A double click of my mouse and I was gazing into the face of Dr. Davis Rhodes, founder and director of the Center.
Briefly I scanned his bio. A Ph.D. in lifestyle counseling, whatever that meant. Originally from California. Author of the book, Re-tirement’s Not For Sissies: A Baby Boomer’s Guide To Making The Most of The Best of Your Life. There was that hyphen again.
I clicked on “Mission.” His approach certainly was unique. “In my book, I break down the word ‘retire’ into re-tire, just like rotating tires on a car. If your tires are a little worn, you don’t throw them away, you rotate them to get the most out of them,” he explained. “When you re-tire, you are rotating your personal tires and looking at your own life differently, determining how to get the most out of what promises to be the very best part of your life.” Interesting. I wondered if Jim would go for it.