I had a moment this weekend when I remembered what I wanted my life to be like. We had gone to the home improvement store to pick up supplies for the catio we intended to work on this weekend. I was waiting on a quart of outdoor paint to be tinted when it struck me: this is the small-town, Middle America slow life I was looking for. All around me, families, couples and individuals were milling through the store looking for their supplies for the weekend. It was a Saturday morning in spring, the weather was going to be mild and the day stretched out before all of us – not quite lazily but not super busy either. Life, just clicking along at a reasonable pace. Sigh. That’s the dream.
In the end, we had a good weekend. We made progress on the catio, the house got deep cleaned and we were able to both watch some basketball and go out to dinner. Not bad. Not bad at all.
Fast forward 48 hours and we are back to our version of reality. For my hubby, the past 12 months have been really busy at work and he expects it will continue for at least the next 6-8 months. For me? I’m back to working just about what I was working at my old firm. That, too, should continue for the next 4-5 months. The upshot here? We are going to be busy professionally.
In my bid to slow life down, I genuinely haven’t been that successful as of late. We enter spring and summer – our busiest times of the year – with busy professional dockets. On the homefront, we need to replace our very large deck, plant and grow our very large gardens and I still need to maintain a two-acre yard on our six-acre property. We also have firewood to chunk, split and stack (it’s still in logs) and we have a list of about 35 other small projects to do.
Yep, it’s gonna be busy.
So, what gives? When does life slow down? (Hint: it’s not after the wedding. We’ve finally figured that out. 😊)
The truth is that early retirement does beckon for both of us. About four years ago, we made a decision to essentially “give up the body” for the next 5-6 years so that we could both go to a very part-time work schedule by the time we turned 60. We would have to work hard, save like crazy and put off a ton of pleasure, but we would get there. At this point? We’re still hopefully only a couple of years away from that goal. The good news? We will make it. The bad news? It’s just going to stay busy for awhile.
However, to stave off the Monday Blues, today I need to take a few minutes to visualize what life will look like in the hopefully not-too-distant future.
First, I think we both want to work a little bit. Not only will the money come in handy, but it will keep us intellectually stimulated. I can’t completely speak for my hubby but I think we’re both thinking about 12-16 hours a week. Enough to get our brains actively engaged and to make a substantive contribution (because who would want us otherwise) but slow enough that every day has the opportunity to pursue life outside of work. If we can thread that needle, life will open up for both of us. Let me explain.
In the past four years while my hubby has been busy at work, I’ve taken over the lion’s share of the house and yard responsibilities because I was working part-time. That just helped to balance out the work between us. In our future state? I can envision better balance where we both contribute based on our capacity. Big project at either of our future work? The other person takes over. Special project at home? We both pitch in. Regardless, our current capacity is about .5 FTE human to run our lives (sometimes shrinking to .25 FTE human, depending on how busy I get). In “new state”, I’m hoping for 1.25-1.5 FTE capacity between the two of us. That’s a huge leap forward.
Then, there is the conclusion of renovations. This year, we have to do the deck. There is nothing else that can be done. The deck itself is still structurally sound but it’s status is rapidly deteriorating. It’s needed to be replaced since we got married. I’m not lying when I say it’s time. But, through a systematic process of relentless incrementalism, we have knocked off 93 of 130 “small projects” off our list AND finished the upstairs floors, doors and trim project. When we get the deck done, we will have only one other large project to do ourselves – our main bathroom. The small project list should also be whittled way down and we may actually be at a point where we are no longer slaves to our house.
So, what will we do with our 1.25-1.5 FTE capacity if we’re not constantly working or working on the house? Honestly, some of it will be the routine stuff. It takes at least four hours to mow and trim our yard and from May through early July, I am currently mowing twice a week. It takes an hour to super vacuum this house. I do that once a week. In the garden, planting takes days to prepare rows, plant and water. Weeding the onions alone can take about 3-4 hours. So, it’s not like we are going to be sitting around staring at each other. With our chosen lifestyle, we have enough home and yard work to do to keep us each busy at least 10-12 hours a week.
But do the math and you see the miracle of early retirement: 12-16 hours of work; 10-12 hours of at-home work. At best, it’s 22 hours; at worst 28 hours. The rest of the time? Well, we are going to have to finally get a life. Man, that’s going to be awesome.
This is where the real daydreams come in. As retirees, there are certain things I look forward to. Last year, I bought my first mountain bike so that my hubby (and my sisters) and I could go mountain biking. I enjoy it, it gets me out in nature and it’s great exercise. We also love to hike and have talked about getting into the kind of shape where we could do all of the high peaks in the Adirondacks. Beyond that? We will finally have a remodeled home and yard where it won’t be embarrassing to have people over. It will take some time, but we are going to have to start rebuilding friendships and making new friends. Lastly, we have dreamed of doing both some travel and some vacationing. (Travel is where you go, are active and learn; vacationing is where you go, relax and eat/drink.) The theory behind both is that it is time for just us. Now, that sounds fabulous.
And finally, I look forward in the future to more of those Saturday morning home improvement store runs. With the house (hopefully) done, it won’t be about a big, multi-week project on our list, but it would likely be more simple: painting a piece of outdoor furniture, a fix for lawn tractor, cedar mulch for the garden… . You get the drift. Seeing a neighbor or friend at the store will be a great chance to say a quick hello or make plans for a dinner out. Perhaps that home improvement store stop was on the way home from breakfast out (one of my favorite treats on a Saturday that we very rarely do). Maybe we don’t really have much we need to do that day and the home improvement trip was more to think about a potential project than to actually execute. Maybe I just want to buy a pot of flowers.
And just maybe I’m not in such a rush to check out. Maybe I deliberately choose the slow lane to let those in a hurry get through faster. I hope I’m self-aware enough to let others go in front of me.
And maybe, just maybe, the sun is shining, my house is clean and my weekend beckons without a schedule to complete. I mean, a girl can dream can’t she?
The Yuppie Homesteader 