January 20, 2025 4:25 PM
One week in
In the first week of my sabbatical, I made sure to squeeze in as much as I possibly could. I only had two months, and I wanted to make the most of it. But this is different. I have as much time as I want, so I'm taking things more slowly.
So how does it feel to be retired?
It's a little weird to hear it out loud. When I first decided that I wanted to retire early, I told lots of people. It seemed like such a cool thing to do, but it also seemed so far away. I had big dreams! It's easy to tell people that you have big dreams. Even if they don't understand, they just shrug it off and figure your plans will change over time.
Now that it's real, I just tell people that I'm taking a break from working. It's still true! I just don't know how long the break will be. A year? A few years? Forever? I don't know, and that's okay.
So to answer the question, I don't think it's fully sunk in. I still feel anxious about money. I am very diligently tracking all of my spending. I think I will keep doing that at least through the end of the year.
But there's also a new sense of calm. I still think about the next seven meals that I'm going to have, but I'm no longer so worried about it. I have time to cook. I don't have to worry about making sure that I have something that's easy for me to heat up for lunch the next day because I need to wedge it into my busy workday.
Dan and I went to a DDR tournament this past weekend, and it was snowing quite a lot on Sunday. In the past, the snow would have been something that would probably make me anxious. What if we got stranded at Penn State?
Well, I suppose that wouldn't be so bad. I took Dan's hand and we walked in the snow to get some lunch and it was nice to just enjoy the scenery and the people around us.