Beginning Of The End

 At the end of a pretty typical week at school, I wound up having a discussion with my principal about retirement. It didn't start that way. We were initially just chatting about the day that was. Who had a good day. Who got into trouble at recess. What was going to happen in the coming week. Somewhere in there I mentioned the relative challenge of being over sixty and keeping up with the kids at PE. 

"How much longer do you think you'll want to keep doing that?" she asked. 

I took the opportunity to be glib: "Can I have the weekend to think about it?"

We both laughed, a little, but then settled in to what amounted to a more adult discussion. "Really. How long until you retire?"

And this is where I struggled a bit, since my stock answer has always been that they would have to eventually carry me out of the place kicking and screaming. And there have been so many times that for one reason or another I figured that my career path would be altered by forces outside my own control. I have alternately expected to teach forever and to have someone with a clipboard appear at my classroom door and lead me away to old teachers farm where I could live out my golden years grazing on donuts and telling stories about the time we had a five hour lockdown at our school. 

But to pick a time when I could feel good about the work that I have done and head off into whatever that sunset turns out to be? How could I imagine such a thing? 

So I made something up. "Three years?"

My principal made a worried face. "Three years?"

So I said, "How about four?"

She seemed to like that much better. "I want to do this another five, so that would work."

Work. That's the thing. I don't have a lot of experience not working. I worry that I would end up being one of those very ancient souls who continue to show up as a substitute long past their prime, just working to stay busy and bring in enough money for cat food. All that math that seems so incomprehensible to me and wondering how I could possibly fill the hours I spend at school currently gives me pause. 

But four years made my principal happy. And that's good enough for me to start thinking about ending.