Comments on: Catching yourself out

By: Abdur Rahman

Abdur Rahman — Fri, 23 May 2008 09:16:49 +0000

Peace Tess,

An honest and amusing post. I found your last line particularly amusing – a very understated sense of humour.

Abdur Rahman

By: Tess

Tess — Thu, 22 May 2008 08:55:24 +0000

SS, this is great advice on retirement. And I’m so glad you’ve marked yours by doing your “first time” things like surfing.

By: Sunrise Sister

Sunrise Sister — Thu, 22 May 2008 04:20:21 +0000

I’m waaaay late on a comment here but what wonderful responses from the readers. I certainly lived in the 8:00-8:00 crowd for decades – the work ethic just never let me leave and I used to marvel at those who came in at 8:45 and left at 4:45 – couldn’t believe they got their work done, got paid, kept their jobs, etc. and though I don’t really regret that experience, now that I’m retired it is an unbelievable blessing NOT to have to live that life. I still see it here, even in a small town. The time I find myself getting impatient is when a volunteer team cannot get themselves together with a letter, or a project, or a task by such and such a date deadline….I get TOOOO impatient. I need to watch that. Anyway, loved your post and the comments it provoked. Most of all, I have some advice – please prepare for your retirement folks. Don’t wait until it’s too late to never retire because you never thought it would come. Being prepared is an amazing gift one can give to onself.

xoxo

By: Tess

Tess — Mon, 19 May 2008 07:55:24 +0000

I enjoyed reading all your comments and am glad this struck a chord. It’s interesting but when I started part-time working at the beginning of the year, I was very strict with myself about not coming in early or leaving late on the days I do work. In other words the whole exercise was to be a brand new start.
But I’ve definitely noticed over the past six weeks or so that I’m becoming more and more unlikely to leave when working hours are officially over, at 6 p.m.
The pressures are never overt, and no-one ever says anything, but two thirds of the team are always still there when I stroll out, and it makes that walk to the door feel like an eternity.
Ah well, at least I am being absolutely uncompromising in not even glancing at my Blackberry during my non-working days.
Green Witch: I’m with you on the expenses – not so much wine for me, but the bought lunches, sometimes breakfast too, and often a take-out evening meal. It’s hell on health as well as the wallet.
Andy, good for you. I really agree with your final sentence. Hope you enjoy the cider and straw chewing!
Christine, your ‘vacation’ comment made me smile. Oh yes, NYC. I once strongly considered a job there, but I’m glad I didn’t go. I love Manhattan unreasonably and feel so at home there, but I think it would have made me too speedy in every sense.
So I think we’re all agreed: Bumpkins Rule!

By: Abbey of the Arts

Abbey of the Arts — Mon, 19 May 2008 02:37:40 +0000

Tess, your post made me smile. When I was in NYC recently I found myself immediately reverting to my old pedestrian-in-a-hurry ways, getting way too impatient in crowds with the poor tourists who want to slowly meander down Manhattan streets while I had important places to go (on my vacation of course)!

By: Endlessly Restless

Endlessly Restless — Sun, 18 May 2008 18:37:39 +0000

I’ve seen both sides of this as well (workaholic and balanced life – I’ve never worked in ‘the City!).

From my experience the first step towards a cure is recognising the problem – live every other form of addictive behaviour, I guess.

I’m currently enjoying a better balance in my life – I don’t even mind the commuting to/from work too much (1 hour each way). I admire the ‘bumpkin’, 5p.m. is a very late finish for me nowadays – I start early and finish early (mostly).

By: Andy

Andy — Sat, 17 May 2008 09:08:29 +0000

I am a country bumpkin, quite literally as I live in the country – Somerset in the UK. If one subscribes to the stereotype we all chew straw and drink cider here! I work in management and am often under pressure to sacrifice my unpaid lunch break or work late. I used to do this, but working additional hours doesn’t affect the salary, it is what it is. I’ve turned over a new leaf and I don’t do this as often as I once did. I work to live and I don’t live to work I have a life outside of work that is becoming increasingly important to me and at the end of the day a job is just that – a job. If I don’t turn in the organisation is not going to fail. If I leave, it won’t collapse. So I take my lunch break now and I aim to leave on time. To live at work is to miss out on what life is really about.

By: Barbara

Barbara — Sat, 17 May 2008 05:43:16 +0000

I echo H.M.’s appreciation for your honest self-awareness and confess to being quite the workaholic myself. I live and work in a society with Gallic sensibilities and less of the Protestant work ethic drive I acquired in my USA childhood. I am a City worker who never quite adjusted to the mores of Quebec. Bred in the bone workaholic, that’s me. Considering the price you can pay, it hardly seems worth it, when you look back.

By: towanda

towanda — Fri, 16 May 2008 23:57:13 +0000

(((tess)))

By: H.M.

H.M. — Fri, 16 May 2008 21:23:34 +0000

Ouch. I admire your willingness for honest self-examination. And I certainly do relate to this. I wish I didn’t, but I do. Thanks for this good reminder to practice what we preach, and of the work that always remains to be done within us.