An Epiphany

I had an epiphany the other day. Unemployment is the new retirement.* Think about it. Ponder the deepness of my thought.

Now, past generations had pensions from their companies to provide them income in their retirement years. Gone. Social Security was always standby monetary security (it is in the name, afterall). Social Security will be gone sooner, rather than later. 401ks are a good idea, if your employer puts in contributions (mine stopped several years ago) and the stock market doesn’t take any giant nosedives. Oh, right.

So, from the unscientific examples above, you will see that people will have to continue working longer. This will cause them to miss out on those “Golden Years”, of providing free daycare to their grandkids, going on casino trips, and spending winters in warmer climates.

But, think about it. Retirement was at the end of your life! You had to WORK for 65 years (or 66, or 67,…) to get there. I don’t know about you, but 8 hours a day seems like a long time to me, let alone 8 x 5 x 52 x 65! And you could be in bad shape physically or mentally by then, and not be able to enjoy retirement. Or, the worse, YOU COULD BE DEAD BY THEN!

Now, think about this. In this economy, it seems as though everyone gets a year (or more!) to be unemployed. Hopefully congress keeps passing bills to keep the unemployment beneftis coming as well (fingers-crossed). This has become my current state of affairs. And I swear I am truthfully doing a dilligent job hunt. But I am also going to enjoy my time off. While I am young. While I am healthy. While I can watch my son master the art of crawling and buy him cute things at garage sales. I want to reconnect with my husband again. I want to shop at Ikea with my asbestos friend. I want to take a breath. I was at my last job for 12 years. In another 12 years I will be 47. Whoa. See, I need to take a breath.

I realize I should be worried. But I just am not. I had little control over my company liquidating and laying me off. While I look for my dream job or my next job to pay the bills, I am going to enjoy a little of my retirement now.

*NOTE: funnygurl2 is not a moneyologist and you should always make all money and life decisions for yourself.