One Small Step for Mankind, One Huge Step for Me

With the last piece of paper folded and sealed into the envelope, I stepped up to the window at the post office, purchased the appropriate postage and filled in the return receipt, and handed over my retirement application for mailing to Sacramento.

If I completed the paperwork correctly, I'm offically retired on June 13, even though I put down my last day as June 15, and my contract is valid through June 30.

Whatever.

There are odd reactions to my retirement, from both colleagues and students. Fellow teachers are envious, often voicing the reality that if they could, they, too, would leave the profession. And all of them tell me exactly how long they have until they, too, retire.

I referred a colleague to a job possibility in another state, and he emailed me back: they also need you on their staff! He says the at-risk student population is right up my alley, and I should relocate and share myself with a new student population. He thinks it's criminal that I'm retiring as he says I'm the best teacher in my department. He's happily married and not gay, so he's not hitting on me ... just paying me a compliment.

Another colleague is worried that I will forget them: the old out of sight, out of mind sydrome. Perhaps, but because I don't have many friendships, they are deep friendships, and my friends will always be part of my life. Wherever I am, regardless of what I am doing.

Some of the vultures have circled, wanting to pick the bones from my files and supply stashes. One colleague proudly crowed that she gets my room and wants to come upstairs to check it out so she can see what she has to work with! Well, goody-goody for her: I may just leave staples in the wall up near the ceiling and let her stand on a chair to remove them.

The kids don't like the bareness as I strip the walls, empty the bookcases, and dismantle all my little displays of personal pictures and encouraging words. The kids keep telling me I don't have to work so hard because I'm retiring, but I remind them that I do the job all the way, every day, and I expect the same of them.

Darn.

It's bittersweet to come to the time of one's life when what you've always done is going to change, and you don't know what you're going to do. There will be some downtime as I reorient, but that's welcomed after all the years I've spent with so much to do and so little time to do it.

25 days and counting