intertext

Today I let the powers that be know that I intend to retire sometime towards the end of August.

I've been thinking about this for some time, but didn't think I'd be able to afford it. Then my aunt died and left me some money - not a fortune, but a nice little nest-egg. Plus I didn't plunge all the equity from my old house into my present mortgage, so I had some capital invested from that as well. I consulted my financial advisor and she gave me full blessing to go ahead with whatever I wanted to do.

When push came to shove, it was surprisingly difficult to make the announcement. I have a lot invested in this job, and have been doing it for more than 25 years. It feels odd to be thinking about not doing it permanently, for all I'm always falling over myself with relief when end of term comes every year.

I don't really worry that I won't have an identity outside of work - I've always put a lot of energy into things other than work, like photography, my dog(s), gardening, and so on. And I look forward very much to having the leisure to do more of those things.

I'll even still be working for another year, because we have this rather splendid thing called a "post-retirement contract" where you retire then get hired back on a 50% contract. You thus collect a 50% salary, but you have started earning your pension, so in effect you are working half-time for a full-time salary, or possibly a bit more.

Even so, it feels a bit like being at the brink of a precipice, or stepping into a future that I'm a bit unsure of. A bit like leaving home when young - leaving the secure nest of employment to be self-sufficient. Although I have sufficient funds, I won't be rich. I do have one great security, though, my house, which has appreciated considerably in value since I bought it and which I could sell in a heartbeat if I needed to. Not that I want to be in that position, but I'll be ok if my physical infirmities become too great and I need something smaller and more convenient.

I'm not making it widely public at work, although I have obviously told the Chair of the department and the Dean. I don't want a fuss, and my feelings about the English department are ... complicated, for various reasons. They'll know when it's official, and next year when I'm on the post-retirement contract.

And I'm still working on my PhD! That was always a personal thing more than anything for my "career" so it doesn't matter if I'm still actually employed or not. Although - and I'll say this here that I wouldn't say publicly - if something came up in Children's Lit somewhere that I could apply for once I finish or am a bit closer to finishing, I might. Much as I've loved teaching at the college, there would still be something shiny about teaching in my own area. And I can see myself continuing to do research and to write.

So there we are. I'm blogging about it so it must be true.

Oh, the coolness. Google has released a new version of Google Earth that includes Google Sky. You can switch to a "sky" view that shows you the stars, the constellations, all kinds of astronomical goodies. There are "Hubble Showcases" that zoom you into details of phenomena captured by the Hubble telescope. It's wonderful.

In another life, I'd be an astronomer. I would have been one, except that my father convinced me that Girls were Useless at Math. It's not true, but he couldn't have stood the competition. English Literature was okay for Girls, but Math wasn't. This is not to say that I'm not perfectly happy to be an English prof, but I dream of the stars.