Waiting for Upcycle Days

This blog is written by Lee Gale Gruen to help Baby Boomers, seniors, retirees, and those soon to retire find joy, excitement, and satisfaction in life after retirement. Her public lecture on this subject is titled: “Reinventing Yourself in Your Retirement.” Her memoir, Adventures with Dad: A Father and Daughter’s Journey Through a Senior Acting Class, is available by clicking here Amazon.com. Click here for her website: http://AdventuresWithDadTheBook.com

CHITCHAT:  Check out my interview on November 20, 2018 (top few paragraphs) in an article in Moneyish.com, a Dow Jones Media Group Publication:  https://www.marketwatch.com/story/why-nearly-3-in-4-women-say-70-is-the-new-50—-but-far-fewer-men-do-2018-11-20  (Correction:  I was a probation officer in Los Angeles, not San Francisco.)

Now, on to my blog:

Life is cyclical.  It’s like a wave with peaks and valleys.  The peaks–the good times–are exciting and exhilarating.  But they can never be sustained.  Life intervenes to drop us into the valleys–the bad times.  It happens to all of us.

No, that guy at work, the neighbor down the block, the classmate at school for whom things always seem to go right are not imbued with some fairy godmother granting their  every wish.  They just do a better job of covering up their valleys than others do.  Don’t ever think that only your life sucks and everyone else’s is wonderful.  It doesn’t work like that.  We all ride the cycles of life.

So, how do we weather those valleys; how do we survive?  One way is to keep looking toward that metaphorical horizon for signs of the next peak peeking over as you slog your way through.  It’s hard and takes constant vigilance to maintain a positive attitude.

It is easy to become discouraged and impatient hoping for things to turn around.  There is not an assured time line.  We can’t know when the peaks will happen, when the valleys will happen, and how long the span between them.  We have no choice but to wait it out.  How we do the waiting is up to us.

We can become depressed, we can rail, we can act out.  Or, we can try to use the lull positively as we wait for it to pass.  Get to work on that story you always wanted to write. Learn that new skill you always wanted to master.  Reach out and connect with those people and places you never had the time to do before.  Take up jogging, walking, gardening, tennis, knitting, gourd carving, whatever.  Even the down spells can have little seeds of positivity embedded in them.

Remember, without the valleys, you can’t appreciate the peaks.

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Photo credit: joncutrer on Visual Hunt / CC BY

The Boot

This blog is written by Lee Gale Gruen to help Baby Boomers, seniors, retirees, and those soon to retire find joy, excitement, and satisfaction in life after retirement. Her public lecture on this subject is titled: “Reinventing Yourself in Your Retirement.” Her memoir, Adventures with Dad: A Father and Daughter’s Journey Through a Senior Acting Class, is available by clicking here Amazon.com. Click here for her website: http://AdventuresWithDadTheBook.com

Now, on to my blog:

Almost forty years ago, a wartime drama film, “Das Boot,” was released to movie theaters. It took place on a German submarine during WWII.  Das Boot actually translates from German as: the boat.  However, in my case, I am interpreting the literal English meaning: the boot–you know, for a foot.

Yes, the boot has come into my life. Although I don’t anticipate a submarine attack from my particular one, its arrival has similarities. It was stealthy, unexpected, and out of nowhere.

It started a few weeks ago when I was returning a rental car at the airport.  While walking to the pickup area to catch my Uber ride, I failed to see that my narrow sidewalk–with rental cars whizzing by on each side–took one step down.  Yep, one step down is how I went–horizontally!  Long story short, I broke my fifth metatarsal bone in not one but two places.  Hence, “the boot.”

That minor misstep has cut me down.  The boot, upon which I am dependent to get around along with an attendant cane, has ruled my life for several weeks now. It dictates where I go, how fast I go, and how often I go.  Lacing up the six, mean looking Velcro straps of the contraption alone wears me out.  However, I must do so several times a day for foot icing, showering, and sleeping.

Friends from out of town visited for a get-together we had planned months earlier.  I had to alter my plans to go out and about with them and to travel for a few days after they stayed in my home.  I knew I couldn’t do the walking, hiking, hill climbing, stair stepping, metro riding, etc., so I begrudgingly opted to stay put as they departed.

So many unforeseen mishaps change our plans, routines, trajectories.  Most people have had their own version of “the boot.”  It commands your undivided attention while everything else is put on hold.

How do we survive a case of “the boot”?  It’s not easy; it clips your wings.  However, we must survive and carry on.  I’m doing a lot of staying in/sitting down stuff:  busy work that has been on hold for months, phone calling, clearing out my overloaded email box, mending clothes…  Actually, it feels good to get a handle on mundane things that have been relegated to the back burner and gotten out of hand.

Try to make the best of your downtime.  What other choice do you have?  And remember, be careful–it’s dangerous out there, folks–sigh!

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Please forward my blog to anyone who might be interested and post it on your Facebook, Twitter and other social media. To reprint any material, contact me for permission at:  gowergulch@yahoo.com. If you want to be automatically notified when I post a new blog, click on the “Follow” button in the upper right corner of this page and fill in the information. To read my other blog posts, scroll down on this page or click on “Recent Posts” or “Archives” under the Follow button. To opt out of receiving this blog, contact me at the aforementioned email address, let me know, and I’ll remove you from the list.