It’s wonderful to be released from the day job and I do relish the freedom to for the most part do as I want. However some aspects of freedom never occurred to me before I had it. The thing which most often occurs to me is that I’m not exactly sure what day it is because I have no timetable! I have plenty of activities, mostly to do with reading and writing but other things as well, and meeting friends which tie me in to a particular date, time and location, but for much of the time I can rise when I choose, eat when I’m hungry, have drinks whenever I like, go out or stay in, retire as late as I want without any worry about an early start the next day (although, actually, that was never much of a worry, I could always stay up late and get up early the next day with no trouble!)
Now I find myself wondering if it’s Tuesday or Thursday, or maybe it’s neither but Wednesday, and trying to relate to whether the milkman came (it must be Tuesday, Thursday or Saturday) whether we have a paper today (no paper then it’s Sunday) whether it’s quiz night (must be Tuesday) whether the dog has gone to doggy playschool (he goes Tuesday and Friday) Husband has far more outside activities, ukulele group Monday, rock band Tuesday, ukulele again on a Wednesday in the summer, shanty band on a Thursday afternoon in the summer and Sunday every week, plus every other week he has art classes, some he teaches, some he goes to. My daughter works shifts, six days at work at differing times, four days off, so I haven’t even got a regular normal pattern for a week with her.
I like this freedom, I like being able to do pretty much as I like – it’s like being on holiday all the time! There are other considerations of course, the chief one being financial, but most of the things I most like doing don’t involve vast expense. I guess I’m lucky to feel like this, and to have so much too engage and interest me. There are many people who struggle without a regular, timetabled routine; my aunty and uncle, once retired, always had breakfast at eight, lunch at noon, following the pattern from when they worked. They had dinner at 5:30, and went to bed after the news at 10;30. My dad on the other hand would wake as soon as it was light, would breakfast when the rest of us got up and after he retired he would have lunch when he was peckish, and dinner when he was ready. He would stay up till late, watching TV and reading the newspaper and go to bed when he was ready, whatever the clock said.
Thinking about how different people are, I can hear my mother-in-law saying, ‘we’re all little individuals’! So true!
Lois Elsden 
It is interest to see how retirement affects different people. I generally know better now what day or especially what date it is, then when I was working. I did books, so I was always entering any date other than the current one, and I did tenders and project management with all kinds of deadlines and delivery dates to keep track of. I never had a clue what date it was. Days of the week were almost as bad.
LikeLiked by 1 person
I feel so liberated! I enjoyed the work I did, but so happy to be free of it. I’m so absent-minded I don’t think I could have done the job you did, you must have had to really concentrate and pay attention to every detail!
LikeLiked by 1 person
I loved it but the stress was through the roof. One bad mistake could destroy the company and that definately wasn’t what I wanted to happen. On the other hand, one really good sale could make the year. 😁
LikeLiked by 1 person
Sounds like a rollercoaster of emotions!
LikeLiked by 1 person
It was intense but I didn’t realize how much of a toll it took until after I retired. It took a while but I am feeling so much better now. So glad you are enjoying your retired lifestyle. 💞
LikeLiked by 1 person
Yes, it must have taken a while to unwind from that very controlled and precise way of doing everything with such a lot resting on the work you did.
LikeLiked by 1 person
A friend once told me that retirement is like trying to live on half of what you couldn”t live on before. So far OK but our union bargained away our cost of living indexing and am starting to feel it but like they say that you never see a Brinks truck following a hearse to the cemetery.
LikeLiked by 1 person
Yes, same here, cost of everything is going up, especially fuel and heating.
LikeLike