Life Is Good

I have been remiss in posting ... I've had thoughts for entries, such as writing about spraying for poison ivy and how that could be a metaphor about consciously avoiding what is unpleasant, which is far easier to do in retirement. But, I didn't get anything with that train of thought. Maybe my muse retired or went on vacation.

I've been busy with my volunteer activities, notably the event planning and execution I wrote about in "Exercising New Muscles." But, today, I'm going to act like a retired person and go to the mountains with my husband and our neighbors. This weekend, I'll act retired again and go to San Francisco to visit our older daughter and friends.

Life is good, as the t-shirts say.

Exercising New Muscles

I relented and got a massage this week. I have a pain in my neck. Seriously, it’s a real pain in my real neck.

As for the source, I can’t tell whether it’s caused by so many previously unused muscles getting a workout from my personal trainer (see “Tale of Two Body Shops,” Nov. 7, 2013) or if it’s stress from the workout my hitherto unknown muscles, or abilities, are getting from my volunteer work, which has expanded to include event planning.

Whatever the cause, while I was getting my neck kneaded and listening to James Taylor (great massage music) I realized how much I had underestimated the work that goes into event planning. I should tell Linda Baranovics and Virginia Krohn how little I realized how much they did to pull off major conferences.

Where are these capable women? Would they like to come to North Carolina and pitch in?

Now, I’ve ghosted speeches for conference speakers and written introductions and remarks for panelists. I’ve publicized meetings before and after the sessions. I even wrote one FAA administrator’s closing remarks while the conference was underway so her comments could reflect the topics and tone of the meeting.

But, planning a conference…that’s a whole other set of skills.

When I sat in my government office daydreaming about retirement, my fantasies were about traveling with my husband to see new places and old friends. Event planning never crossed my mind, but the organization I now head – Democratic Women of Catawba County – is putting on panel discussion on “The NC War on Women: Is it real?” We want women voters in our county to be informed about the issues that are so important to them – educational quality, jobs and wages, and access to health care.

For one, our state legislature declined the expansion of Medicaid offered by the Affordable Care Act.  According to the NC Justice Center, about one-sixth of our county’s residents were eligible for Medicaid last December – up 27 percent since December 2007. More than one-third of our residents are low income and nearly one-fifth live in poverty.

In short, life could be better here. A lot.

What’s an able-bodied retiree to do?

Pitch in.

I knew volunteering would be a part of retirement – one can’t travel all the time and I am blessed with an abundance of energy. I just didn’t know it would involve locating venues and finding speakers.

So, where do you start? First, you need a team. Check. Great women are helping. Next, a location. Check.  Then, you need a moderator. Check, we have an excellent one. And, of course, you need expert speakers – the bigger the name the better.

Wouldn’t it be great to have Sen. Elizabeth Warren speak about economic issues?

Okay, maybe next year when we’re more established. Okay, a girl can dream.

Since I am so new here, I have been like the little bird in the P.D. Eastman children’s book who asks everyone he meets, “Are you my mother?” Instead of asking dogs, cows, and cars, I’m asking everyone whether they are a speaker, know a speaker, or know anyone who might know speakers.

Actually, the quest has been a bit more targeted. There are some really remarkable organizations and helpful people here in the Tar Heel state.

The good news is the speaker slate is coming together. The better news is that our event does not include meals and music.  That degree of difficulty is far in the future.

Can you imagine what my neck would feel like if we were putting on, say, a gala, with awards, speakers, and entertainment?

No, not going there. That would definitely be the time to hit the road and visit my mother.

Back in the Saddle

Maybe it’s like riding a bicycle.  You don’t easily forget what you did for years. I’ve now been retired 10 months. Yikes. That’s the longest I’ve not worked since, well, since I can remember.

I knew I missed work – doing work that matters, the camaraderie of colleagues, and the feeling you have with creative people working together that the whole can really exceed the sum of the participants.

With Keith Holloway during an NTSB board meeting.

That wasn’t just a feeling. It happened a lot, especially in my last job with the remarkable communications team at the National Transportation Safety Board.

Enjoying work is rare. 

It wasn’t always that way during my 40 years in the full-time workforce. And, enjoying work is not the norm. An article on “Why You Hate Work"    in the June 1, 2014, Sunday Review section  of The New York Times cites 30 percent of employees in America feel engaged.

Employee engagement was trendy ten years ago when one of my bosses brought in the Gallup organization to conduct its Q12® employee-engagement survey.  My pilot and engineer colleagues (mostly ISTJs on the Myers-Briggs Type Indicator) were shocked to be asked whether they had a best friend at work. I was a bit unsettled, too, but once I left that job and found a best friend at work I better understood the question.

Yes, doing work that matters makes a difference, as does having a supportive supervisor, work-life balance, a best friend, and also being valued – monetarily and for your contributions.

That’s what mattered a lot to me as a writer, being valued for my unique contributions and being able to make them. And, that’s what I wonder about in retirement. Do I still have it? After nearly a year away from work, am I still able to contribute something useful to the conversation, to the project, to the product?

I got “it” back this week with my client that I brought with me into retirement. She had set up a conference call with a graphic designer, a web developer, herself, and me, the content provider. Our task:  brainstorm for the client’s new, actually first, website. It was one of those great brainstorming sessions with ideas, wisecracks, more wisecracks, better ideas, and getting more done in one hour than you expected could be accomplished in an initial meeting.

It was fun.

That’s what I miss about work. I don’t miss big egos, self-importance, make-work, “administrivia” (electronic time cards, leave requests, weekly reports, etc.), dry cleaning bills, the alarm clock, and the lack of time. I do miss collaborating with smart and creative people and getting my batteries charged by high-energy people. My last boss was a potent power source. When she was away I always felt as if I needed to go plug in somewhere, like a cellphone, to get recharged.

Now, in retirement I need alternate ways and people to charge my batteries. I am finding my way through new friends and physical activity and volunteer work. But, this week with my favorite (okay, only) client I got a big charge from some bright people. It was like getting a fix at a recharging station for my client's assignment and for my volunteer work.

That’s what they call a “win-win” in the working world. Now I just call it fun.

Families, Tribes, Whatever ... We All Need Them

Dedicated to Brian C. Kevic

When I was in my mid-twenties I read A Different Woman by Jane Howard. It really affected me. Now I barely remember it, but it was the first (the only?) time I wrote a fan letter to an author. Somewhere I still have the South Carolina picture postcard from Jane Howard wishing me well.

Wishing me well. Years later, I can look back and know that I did well, in part from something I learned from A Different Woman. Forty years later what I remember from Jane Howard is learning the Yiddish word “mishpocha.” According to one definition mishpocha is an “entire family network or relatives by blood or marriage (and sometimes close friends).” The term stuck with me then and stays with me today. But, when I read the book I was new to Washington, DC, and very much alone and on my own.

A West Coast transplant, I needed people who were more than friends or as good friend Louise Malone would say, I needed an “anchor.” Long before I got into aviation, I knew I couldn’t fly solo. I needed people, people who could substitute or who were nearly family.

On the surface, I was independent and self sufficient, but I needed that feeling of belonging. You know, the saying about family being people who have to take you in. I wanted to be taken in. I think Louise saw through my many excuses, reasons, artifices for why I needed taking in. But she took me without question.

I was fortunate. I found not one but two Maryland mishpochas. I had invites to family gatherings, holiday meals, birthdays, vacations and more. I contributed in my way. I took baby pictures, wedding photos, schlepped a projector and 16mm movies to the mountains, and became famous for my southern fried chicken (secret: buttermilk) and my pecan pie (secret: talk it up).

I had surrogate siblings, parent figures, cousins and more. With no nieces or nephews from my siblings, as my mishpocha sisters and brothers married and started families, I got to be an honorary aunt.

That is indeed an honor.

All the while, part of me knew I was always navigating a firm and fine line between being guest and family, but, boy, did my heart soar when weeks before her death one mishpocha matriarch introduced me as daughter.

Forty years in to learning the word, mishpochas are on my mind. Last week, I visited the 93-year-old matriarch and patriarch of one of my near clans. This week, an almost nephew from the other clan died suddenly. I was on the to-call list.

I grieve the loss of a gentle man who I well remember as the sweet boy in my early photographs of family gatherings in the cabin near the Appalachian Trail.  I still miss his father’s hearty laugh and fondness for my pecan pie.

Mishpochas have enriched my life. After marrying and having children of our own, mishpochas gave our daughters near cousins, almost aunts, Dutch and non-Dutch uncles, and a feeling of community and belonging that is so missing from our modern fractured and fragmented lives.

As Jane Howard put it, “Call it a clan, call it a network, call it a tribe, call it a family:  Whatever you call it, whoever you are, you need one.”

Yes, you do. Yes, I do. Thank you, Maryland mishpochas.