So, with one of those reminders of mortality entering my orbit, I’ve been thinking a lot about what I want in retirement, what I’ll need for that, and what of that whole thing I can and can’t do now.

The biggest thing? Time. I’m exhausted and I’m very tired of renting my brain for 40+ hours a week. And I’m lucky, I only have to take care of myself, not anyone else.

I already have my ideal retirement day in mind.

• Up between 8-830. (This is when I usually wake up naturally on a weekend, and feeling pretty good.)
• Feed cat(s), get coffee and a bit of breakfast, and go run errands and get that knocked out right off the bat.
• Walk or yoga for an hour
• Work in the garden for an hour
• Tend to the house for an hour
• Get cleaned up and then lunch! Summer, pack a lunch and go to the pool! Or maybe go have a fancy sit down lunch with a glass of wine at a restaurant every now and again.
• So, by now it’s around 2PM. Short nap! Hobbies! Sew! Knit! Beading! Reading! Drawing! Go take that damn ceramics class!
• Dinner!
• Chill and figure out what errands need to be run the next day, read, watch baseball, whatever, then bed.

No rushing around, just enjoying things at a reasonable pace on a freaking good night’s sleep.

This was my day today instead – and it was a *light* day at work and generally one of the more chill days I’ve had.

Got up around 6:20, got my laptop setup*, went downstairs for coffee, fed the cat, did the Quicken downloads, and got caught up on the news.

7AM, log on to work. First half hour, check Teams and email, go over my to-do list and see what may be newly ready for testing. Then it’s off to the races. Testing all morning, two thankfully short meetings, manage to get in some 5-10 minute breaks here and there – refill coffee, get the kitchen sink emptied, make sure things are clear for the roombas – exciting stuff!

Lunch at 2, go for a 40 minute walk (gorgeous day for it) and a quick lunch – yay for Chinese leftovers. I always take my lunch very late – I like just having an hour to go when I come back. Why? IDK.

Back at it at 3PM, finished off the testing of my last bug for the day, woohoo! Log off exactly on time at 4PM – a rarity it seems anymore. Put laptop away on the shelf.

The plan was to then go either walk or do yoga for 20 minutes – trying to get in an hour a day of some kind of exercise. But the cat wanted to have a post-work cuddle (she hears that laptop get put away and wants her time!) so we had a nice little snooze. Tended to the cat box, emptied the trash can in my bedroom, got all that out to the bins. Notice that we need to get more cat litter very soon and promptly forget.

5PM, still beautiful out, so out the door for another walk – twice around the block in 26 minutes. Felt fantastic. Got home, grabbed the mail and brought it in, and then started laundry, cause we’re running out of clean kitchen towels. Got a basket emptied and put away (why is that the hardest thing?), tossed all the towels down the chute and got that going. Realized at that point that a) there are a fuckton of linens waiting to be washed, and b) I only have one pair of clean summer-weight pants available. So, back to a load of laundry a day for a few days since I’d not really been paying attention to what I’d been throwing down the laundry chute with reckless abandon.** Tomorrow, regular clothes, then back to linens…

Grabbed an icy cold Coke, realized the top rack of the dishwasher was full, got that started.*** Sorted out the mail and packages, and sat down and started writing this, by then it was around 6:10PM.

Realized I still need to water the plants and give the kitchen a quick once over to knock those off the list – stand back up to do it immediately, cause I know I am about to be down for the count for the rest of the evening. As I’m watering the plants, I wonder when I’m going to get around to doing the repotting that is far overdue, but also notice one of the African Violets is going to bloom, yay! Remember to set an alarm to go move the laundry from the washer to the dryer.

Back to writing. Stop to remind the cat that she does in fact have food to eat in the kitchen.

Go back for another Coke, notice the Coke box in kitchen is empty and there is a six pack of beer with 1 left, put the beer in the fridge, grab both containers and get them to the recycling. Move new full Coke box from dining room to kitchen. Then remember again I need to put cat litter on the grocery list – that gets entered, and I’m wondering if this can hold until Friday when I’m off, or if it will be a lunch run tomorrow – or could I get to it before work? Realized I still do not have a Coke. Back to kitchen, decide maybe a Gatorade is better for the moment. Back to writing again.

By now the Orioles game is on – Go O’s! – and the alarm for the laundry has sounded. Go downstairs and get the towels in the dryer, set another alarm because sometimes I hear the buzzer and sometimes I don’t.

At this point, I still need to eat dinner, take a shower (should have done that before the laundry, wasn’t thinking about the fact that I’d started a hot water wash until it was too late) and get the towels all put away when that’s done. Fortunately not overwhelming, which is good, cause it’s 7:30 and I’m toast.

And all I’ve got in me beyond that is lounging on the couch and watching the O’s & Padres.

And today was an easy day for me – very little to do around the house, just the basics, and work was not insane. I will be happy to leave this behind someday.

ETA: 8:37PM – I’ve gotten a shower, eaten, and the clean towels have just now been put away. My day is officially done.

*When the day is over, I actually put my laptop away on a shelf – it’s a good mental signal that the workday is over.
**I have “laundry check” on my daily list. I tend to only look at my laundry basket in my room to see if it’s full, and keep forgetting to go look at the basket in the basement.
***Yep, if either rack is full it gets run – otherwise thing languish in the sink. Best decision we’ve made in this house, LOL.