I got an e-mail yesterday that brought a tear to my eye, though it’s a story we have heard over and over. The woman who wrote it said that she and her husband planned to start fulltiming three years ago when they both turned 62, but somebody convinced them that they really needed to continue working until they hit 65 because the difference in their Social Security would be $100 a month.
She said that after a lot of discussion they both reluctantly made the decision to do that, figuring that extra $1,200 a year would be nice to have. It would pay for a few little extras as they traveled. She said they finally retired in May of this year and pulled out of their driveway for the last time on July 5th. A few days after Thanksgiving her husband began complaining of stomach pains that grew worse over the next two weeks, and in mid-December he was diagnosed with stage four stomach cancer. The prognosis is three months at best.
Her words to me were, “Nick for years we read your words over and over ‘Do it now, don’t wait.’ But we were both in very good health and thought we had plenty of time. I know logically that this could have happened to us at anytime but emotionally I keep thinking that for $3,600 we sold three years of living the dream we had waited for so long to have. I’d give you that money for just one more month.”
I’m going to say it one more time (well, actually I’ll probably say it a hundred more times at least). Folks, don’t wait too long to live your dream, whether it’s fulltime RVing, sailing around the world, hiking the Appalachian Trail or just sitting in an open meadow watching the daylight fade away and a million stars coming out overhead. Nobody on their deathbed ever said, “I wish I had worked more overtime,” and hearses don’t have luggage racks.
Terry needed some special premium natural yarn for a couple of weaving projects she’s been planning and the place she ordered it from online dropped the ball, first placing it on backorder and then sending the wrong stuff when it finally did arrive. So yesterday we drove about 30 miles north to a shop in Ocala, hoping they would have what she needed. No such luck, so I checked on Google and found a place on the north side of Gainesville that looked promising. We called, and after the woman told Terry some of the items they stock, we decided to go check it out. What the heck? It was only another 36 miles.
The shop is called Yarnworks and as soon as we stepped in the door Terry got a big smile on her face and said, “This feels good.” They had a small but excellent selection of natural fibers and a huge selection of silk, wool, Merino and alpaca blended yarns, along with more regular items like Pima Cotton and even some acrylic yarns. Not to mention supplies for knitting, crocheting, needle felting; you name it and they had it. I told Terry to stock up because they had a lot of yarns she likes to work with that are not always easy to find on the road.
Who says you have to go to Arizona for great sunsets? I took this one from I-75 a few miles south of Ocala on our way home. Nice!
Have you entered our latest Free Drawing yet? This week’s prize is an audiobook of Mountain Angel, the first book in my friend Suzie O’Connell’s excellent Northstar Angels romance series. To enter, all you have to do is click on the Free Drawing link or the tab at the top of this page and enter your name in the comments section at the bottom of that page (not this one). Only one entry per person per drawing please, and you must enter with your real name. To prevent spam or multiple entries, the names of cartoon or movie characters are not allowed. The winner will be drawn Sunday evening.
To live a happy life, I really believe that you have to be able to laugh at yourself. If you agree, I think you’ll enjoy a book I’m currently reading called Midlife Cabernet: Life, Love & Laughter after Fifty. I knew author Elaine Ambrose was my kind of people when she said her bra size is 42 long. Trust me, you should get this book. You will LOVE it!
And if you like science fiction, my friend Stephen Arseneault’s OMEGA Exile is now free. It’s the first book in his excellent Omega series, which has earned Stephen a legion of loyal fans.
Thought For The Day – I used to be a people person, but people ruined that for me.
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