To Retire or Not to...

According to Merriam Webster’s Dictionary, retirement, (re-tire-ment) is defined thusly as “the act or retiring or the state of being retired; the removal or withdrawal from service, office or business; the portion of a person’s life during which a person is retired; and finally, withdrawal into privacy or seclusion.”

The word denotes sadness and dismay. Certainly not what most of us conjure in our minds when we contemplate “retirement”. For anyone I’ve ever known, retirement always signified the end of work and labor and the beginning of living life to its fullest with no constraints, with no one to answer to, with no time clock to punch or boss to take orders from. It certainly never suggested a “withdrawal into privacy or seclusion”.

So, how did this inept word come to define what most of us dream of as our panacea? Well, friends, it seems “retirement” is from the French "retirer," which means to withdraw. Now you know.

I suggest that besides revolting against the term “seniors” we also need to join together to find a more suitable term that better defines our change from work to carefree fun. We will not become withdrawn and retire from the world. Instead we will have the luxury of following our bliss, of defining our own time filling it with all that pleasures our hearts, our soul and our brains.

We Baby Boomers are going to be the largest addition to this segment of our population. We have all the intelligence, all the desire and all the tenacity to help shape the world and make our mark. Together we are powerful and elite and exceptionally smart and if we join together we can make a difference. We can leave this world a better place. We can, and we should, instill in the youth all the history that they won’t find in their history books...and there is so much more we can share - and we should.

We have so very much to offer. We are an exceptional group - and the group is growing. We are Baby Boomers and we’re proud of it. And yes, we are beginning to show the imperfections of this process called aging, but we are also going to show the world that we’ll do it with grace and good humor. We’ll laugh because the alternative is just plain unacceptable… So, tune in next time when I devote my page to “Double Chins”.