You might need to get out more
by Doug Brodie
What financial independence is really like: how others have retired
Steve picked up a new guitar.
Ok, so Wembley is probably not on the agenda anymore, but time is now to run through ‘Old man take a look at my life…’, it’s for you to hum along to and pick away on the strings. Maybe, a little maybe, after a few bottles of bravado wine over dinner with mates …. very old mates … I’ll challenge them to “Everyone must know at least just one song”.
Betsy is 69
Practice makes perfect, so it happens to help if you live where she does in California.
For the rest of us who live in St Albans, or Clapham, or Stockport, grandparenthood can revert us back to bedtime books, and with the time available now all those knitting creations we thought that looked great but we never got round to:
Tilly is knitting wonders
Tilly is three grandchildren into being a grandmother and is rarely seen without a knitting bag by her side.
Having rattled off the obligatory new born hats and mitts, the last grandchild was presented (at two weeks old) with a blanket that is a perfect reproduction of Piet Mondrian’s Red, Yellow, Blue and Black.
Lawrence sold the family home
Then he bought a plot of land and built their own eco-house.
Everything from digging out trenches to connecting to the local water system, to drafting, calculating and designing internal air currents, heat recovery from the showers etc, to electrical and communication diagrams to creating custom furniture and stairs from oak he bought, designed, cut and installed.
Last year’s heating bill was around £140, for the year.
Martin bought a vineyard
Martin was a Big4 accountant who worked in venture capital, was CFO in a £1.5bn flotation, who has run across Jordan for a holiday and has retired to Greece where instead of buying a house he bought a vineyard. .
Jack rediscovered sailing
Jack worked at a city bank, retired early and has decided to get back into the catamaran sailing he used to do when he was growing up in Cape Town, only this time it’s in Vassiliki.
Derek is refurbing
Jack’s chum Derek – who didn’t work at a city bank – has taken a similar path but his entails buying an older Hobie cat and learning the skills to rebuild and refurbish it, after all, the wind doesn’t blow every day.
Bruce got on his bike
He lives in Scotland so the North Coast 500 was a fairly obvious siren call. Since retiring he’s on his bike every day, fit as that butcher’s dog, slimmer and lighter than he and his wife have been since the years BC (before children), and with a full time retirement occupation of fettling the various bikes and bike parts – which of course necessitates a full fitted out cycle workshop.
Jessie and Stephen went back to uni
Jessie and Stephen don’t know each other, one lives in London and the other in Guildford, one shoots as a hobby and the other does hard core cycling trips (think Hardknott Pass), however both retired to start post grad degrees in History of Art.
Going back to university obviously means you get to be a student again, with a student card, student discounts and obviously access to the student union, you’re probably not required to attend full moon parties or the latest save the [bears/planet/whales/Wales?/children] protests and chain yourself to the Downing Street railings (though that’s up to you I guess). How about learning Arabic? Or astrology? Or genetics?
Keith returned to cricket
Our Jim is treasurer of the Gloucestershire Exiles cricket team, he arranged a fund raiser in February that was held at Lords. When we arrived there (remember, I’m a Luddite Scot), we were given a tour of the building (the Pavilion) by Keith who displayed a truly encyclopaedic knowledge of every player who had passed through the changing rooms, the chair the Queen sat on and what Ian Botham would have at the bar.
At the end of the tour Keith wrapped up in saying that he had returned to do this one tour as a favour as he had now retired. He is 86. Keith retired from his ‘normal’ job when he was 60, being a mad cricket supporter he then volunteered as a Lord’s guide for the next 26 years, and only stopped because of family responsibilities.
For the last 26 years that has been his complete, fulfilled retirement. A life well lived.