A year ago this week, I drove away from a much-loved job into a new life of being retired.
When I said so yesterday to my husband, he said, “It’s been a year already? That’s gone by fast.” I agreed, but added, “Also very slowly.” He knew what I meant. The travel part of the year sped by delightfully; the Covid-19 part of the year limped along with lots of cheery, energetic, we-can-do-this lectures to myself.
It began with a bang. My last day of teaching was the end of the spring semester, a Friday in mid-June. All week, my wonderful students had helped me ferry boxes of books and files downstairs to my car. The evening before, I’d met many of them for conferences on their final papers, ending with affectionate and grateful words on both sides. Then the day itself rolled around. Their papers were due at noon, and goodbyes make me self-conscious, so I figured I’d eat lunch and sneak out the door while students were heading to their afternoon exams.
Instead, when I slipped downstairs to toss the last papers into my book-bag, I found my colleagues and students gathered in the front foyer to say goodbye. They gave me hugs, I stammered out my last good wishes for them, and then I stumbled off to my car. And as I drove out the gate and looked in the rear-view mirror, they poured out onto the front porch and waved goodbye. I drove away with teary eyes and a giddy grin.
Later, there was a formal goodbye party. Students gave speeches, parents gave speeches, and twenty years of alumni showed up to give speeches. (Some of them even brought along spouses and kids.) There were presents and cake and wonderful stories – all because I was lucky enough to teach at a school that values human care and connection as much as it values intellectual passion and discipline.
Nonetheless, when I woke up the next day, I was retired. (Retired! Me?!! Really?!?)
The summer didn’t feel any different. It was just summer—flowers, books, birds, gardening, and fresh sea air. In September, though, we returned home just long enough to pack up again. We flew to Florence, settled into a rented apartment, and instead of teaching classes, we took them – in Italian. We spent six fabulous weeks getting to know Florence’s streets, art museums, restaurants, and shops. (Not to mention the grocery stores and garbage bins.) Then we flew home, and suddenly it was November.
We landed with a bit of a thud. November in New England means shorter days, fallen leaves, and rain drizzling down. It can be bleak. But since I was returning to a pleasant house and a delightful circle of friends, I sat myself down with good hope, ready to figure out what really being retired was going to look like for me. I lazed about a bit, but I also read books about retirement, blogged about them, signed up for three spring classes, and bought theater tickets for a late March trip to London. I started making plans to teach again, too. It would be part-time, for no pay, but still real teaching: getting a group of thoughtful people into a room to talk over a challenging work of literature together. (In other words: heaven.)
Then Covid-19 shut it all down. Trips got canceled, classes got canceled, dinners with friends got canceled. And since then, life’s been very quiet. Not bad, you understand — just quiet. A little disorienting, too – definitely not what I expected life to be like during my first year of retirement. (I was thinking travel — and lots of it.)
So here’s how I’d grade my first year of retirement. An “A” for the first half, a “B” for the second (a “B-” according to the numbers, but such a good effort). And for next year? Despite some gloomy forecasts, I have high hopes that it will go even better.
I was fortunate to attend your formal goodbye party. Being not in the least biased, I can say it was the warmest outpouring of public gratitude I have ever seen. The students, the staff, and the alumni all knew what you had given them, and they showed it. It was a total love fest. One speaker, a former student now in college, “complained” that you had failed, as you promised, to prepare him properly for college, because he was not ready for how BORING his college English classes would be compared to yours! Those kids were so lucky to have had you for their teacher.
As much as I enjoyed my teaching at Smith for thirty-two years, early in my career I did several years of high school teaching while my first husband completed his internship and residency. And that found very satisfying and rewarding; the students really were a source of joy. Over the years of our friendship when during our gazillion walks, you and I swapped stories about our classroom experiences and particular students and their struggles and triumphs, I realized what an important role you played in the lives of many of these young people and how satisfying you found that work, and from time to time I wondered whether I might not be doing more good in the world if I chose to go back to high school teaching. But I reminded myself that you taught at a very special, unusual high school. I’ll never know of course, but even now, three years into retirement, I am still in touch with many students who write asking for letters of recommendation for grad school programs or share news of a new exciting job at a foreign embassy or Christmas cards or even to thank me for what they learned in my class, and I ‘ve come to conclude that teaching, unless done really badly, is inevitably doing good in the world. The inscription on the gates to the college I attended was “Having light we pass it on to others.” And so we did. Time to relax and chill. Surely the opportunity to travel again will come eventually.
Lovely thoughts — thanks!
I finally found your blog! Of course I read the most recent one first.
I wish I had been to your retirement party. It sounds perfect. You are approaching retirement more thoughtfully than most. People have plans for what they want to do with their free time, but you seem to be trying to figure out what it all means, which is more important. Finding the right balance of fun and usefulness seems the best way to approach it. But that’s not easy. Retirement seems so far away most of our lives but when it comes we see that it’s really a short amount of time. Ending a job which is as fulfilling as yours leaves a large space to fill, not necessarily in time, but in meaning. I know you will find it.
Glad you’re here!