On Retirements

About On Retirements

This book of essays on Retirements was written over a period of 18 years, partly in response to the dearth of writings about both retirements and aging in general, and partly in response to the effects of modern times on some of us who have longer memories of a less crowded and less acquisitive world. Retirement is a special time of unique hopes, and a time of new disappointments, just as all life before it has been. But in retirement the growing intimations of mortality that one experiences increasingly colour the hopes and disappointments that retirees feel. They colour as well the responses retirees make to the new challenges they face. Throughout these essays I try to suggest that, faced with such challenges, retirement may be a time to become serious about being playful. And vice versa. Retirement is a time for us to take some deep breaths, and to withhold judgements, and to rest in the moment. And in particular, retirement is a time for reading.

You can preview On Retirements by visiting the “Browse the book” page listed to the right under Pages.

The Prologue in this book is another form of introduction to it. You can read the Prologue now by selecting the “Prologue” page listed to the right under Pages.