When you stop to think about it, you can break down your life into chunks-youth, work life, and everything else after that.
I don't remember starting my youth. I just became aware one day that I existed. There were rules, and I was breaking them. School was challenging yet things came to me with relative ease. I never had much money only to realize I had everything I needed. I guess my largest obstacle was finding my soul mate and lo and behold she arrived two months after I started to work. It may sound like I am simplifying things, but this is a blog-not a book.
At the age of twenty-one I started to really work for a living. I always had jobs, but that was just for mad money. This time it was for real. I needed to pay my own way. There wasn't a lifeline back to Mom and Dad when I was short a few bucks. It was stressful to learn a career, pay the bills, and be madly in love all at the same time. Then, before I can say "Jack Sprat", I'm married with three kids. Guys are built to take on things one at a time. That's at least four things! Once again, I'm simplifying, but that's another book.
Fast forward to today. I'm retiring this afternoon. I have handed off all of my work to others, it's 3PM, and I have two more hours to go. Come 5 o'clock, I will turn in my car keys and credit cards, but I'll hold onto my cell until it stops ringing. What now? What in the Sam Hill am I going to do with the last chunk of my life? I have some ideas like mentoring some of the kids who find it unnecessary to finish school, aka...life chunk numero uno. I will need to change my perspective from "Leave it to Beaver" to "South Park". It's a big shift from the Beav and Wally breaking a window to Kenny getting killed every week.
Should be interesting. And, it's only the beginning.
