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River: Penultimate
2012-03-29 10:20 pm![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
mdlbearI have finished my penultimate day at Ricoh Innovations. Yesterday I was grieving. Today was more... I don't know. It was exhausting, but there was a certain lightness after boxing up and handing off my notebooks, and putting the last three boxes of accumulated files -- 19 years worth -- into the recycle bin and the secure destruction bin.
I ran out of space in the shredder bin just as I was finishing the second box of files. Then I remembered the ones in the desk's file drawer. Then the man came in and emptied the bin, and I finished my task...
... and did my last backup. Yes, very odd.
The signs are auspicious. The Spring equinox, with the sun rising higher in the sky with each passing day. The weather going from cold and wet to sunny and almost warm. Green hillsides, and leaf-buds. A renter for the house, found on the very day we mentioned that we were looking for one.
I'm not saying it's all going to be easy. We'll have to use a lot less money, and fit into a lot less space. It'll be great if I find a job right away, but I'm 65 years old and have to assume that I might not. It won't change our plans.
As of Saturday I'll be retiring for the first time. Maybe not for more than a couple months, this time, but it's the new steady-state for a bear who is no longer middle-aged. I'll be back. Maybe not for another five years, but maybe sooner.
We'll be moving to an apartment in or near Shorline, WA sometime this summer. Leaving a house we've lived in for over three decades. That we've gotten comfortably stale in. Getting rid of or storing most of half a lifetime's accumulation of stuff. The Buddha had a point -- you get too attached to stuff, and it weighs you down. Time to lighten up. Time to get moving.
Maybe it sounds like I'm trying to talk myself out of a depression, and maybe I am. But I'm also trying to say that I'm basically okay. It'll work. It's an ending, sure, but only the end of a chapter. I'm looking forward to the next one.
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Date: 2012-03-30 05:50 am (UTC)no subject
Date: 2012-03-30 06:49 am (UTC)Moving is hard at the best of times. I am sorry for the aggravation you have in store as you sort and pack and make decisions about decades of belongings and *things*, sorting and choosing and, well - the general headache of moving.
I've gotta say, I'm glad that I get to benefit from your choice of where to relocate, though - if you guys are in Washington, then just maybe you might find a way to pop up North of the Border for a Vancouver filk at some point in the future.
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Date: 2012-03-30 09:39 am (UTC)*hugs*
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Date: 2012-03-30 10:24 am (UTC)Times of change are always stressful. May this change be a good one in the long run!
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Date: 2012-03-30 11:03 am (UTC)no subject
Date: 2012-03-30 12:37 pm (UTC)And, Steve, speaking as someone who made an ill-advised move, remember that there is time to go back if there's a need. You still own your house in San Jose, and you've lived in it a long time. If the move starts feeling like a horrible mistake--listen to the feeling. This place--it isn't Silicon Valley or even LA. The urban culture is insular, the government has been conservative for a long time, and the software anarchist ethos was never strong here. A lot of the companies are shaped by Microsoft's management attitude, which is hard on even healthy young people. Take care of yourself.
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Date: 2012-03-30 03:25 pm (UTC)Good luck!
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Date: 2012-03-30 03:33 pm (UTC)no subject
Date: 2012-03-30 03:35 pm (UTC)I just hit five years in this Apartment yesterday, and I'm starting to think it might be time to think about moving again, just for the re-evaluation and fresh start. But on the other hand, I like this apartment, and I'm not sure I'm up for a move right now.
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Date: 2012-03-30 10:32 pm (UTC)Enjoy the Sound area!
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