At 59 years and 4 months I am one month older than my mother got to be, and I am churning around in my fuck it moment. I retired four years ago from an incredible job as an air traffic controller in the D.C. area and have been “living the life” in a beautiful Active Adult communities in the Shenandoah Valley. No doubt I am fortunate to be able to retire young and have a good pension. I have good friends, as well as plenty of free time to read and write and cook - the things I wanted to do more of.
And yet.
I feel like I have been following a predetermined path. Marriage, kids, job, retirement, grandchildren (soon!) and then, what? Death? Even with my great job, which I loved, I was following in my father’s footsteps. Come to think of it, retiring young is also following in his footsteps. His world, after my mother died so young, just got smaller and smaller as he waited to join her. It took twenty-two years and at the end he never left his recliner.
Fuck it. I am not doing that. Despite the fact that many people would love my life I am breaking free and going back to work. Next week I have an interview to be a 911 operator. I need to keep expanding my world, and while I have tried new things these past four years, none of those things matter to me. Being the voice that brings calm to someone in distress - that has always mattered to me. My children, my students, and my friends will attest to my ability in that.
So fuck the good life. I am heading back into the trenches.
At 47, my “fuck it” moment came seven years ago. I had worked for two state universities for a decade and a half and thought I would surely retire at 62ish with that state retirement. It was safe, right? Then a headhunter called me out of the blue, I did some interviews and left government work to go back into a corporate environment--a company that sells, services, and rents heavy equipment. So here I was taking a job in what seemed a more “conservative” environment with lots of male employees. I worked in IT security, which is a predominantly male field. What was I thinking?! I must be nuts.
I said “fuck it” to a comfortable and a (supposedly) broader thinking environment and walked into the best job I have ever had. I make more than double what I did working for that university (where I was, I will add, grossly underpaid compared to my male colleagues), have more flexibility, and am well-respected by many--including all those men I thought would pat me on the head and tell me to be a good girl and type this report or refill that printer or make some coffee please.
My job has allowed me time to handle some family crises I’ve encounter this year and to renovate an old building in a rural community in Mississippi (where we were able to move because I can work remotely). We’re running that building as an event venue now, but I want to open it eventually in the afternoons for teens to have a place to gather, study, read, play games, etc.
My move four years ago to where we live now was another big “fuck it” moment when I realized I hated suburban life. People thought we were nuts, but we’re living our best life!
As a reader who was here when you lived in NYC, this is a real joy to read and remember these moments you have shared in the past.
My pivotal fuck it moment was when I did the math and realized I was truly making shit at my job and I could create a work life that gave me the similar income while also a better quality of life. This all snowballed in peak lockdowns of 2020 and being micromanaged and overworked at a corporate hell hole with a ladder I wanted to burn down. I quit that October to work fully for myself as an artist (it was the boldest move to date) and moved in November from Ohio to NC, and life as really only improved in the last 2 years. For now my fiance is the one making all the money and I bring in enough to pay my bills and save a little, things may flip eventually but the quality of life for us both is phenomenal.
My life feels much more my own the further away I get from the traditional path and rewriting my own terms of success and joy and life.
The moment in 2001 when I decided to thru hike the Appalachian Trail after years of school, working, putting everyone's needs above mine, dealing with anxiety/depression from childhood trauma, and knowing life had to change or I wouldn't survive.
I think my “fuck-it” moment came at the end of a four-year burn down. We had sold a controlling stake in the company we built to a private equity company, and I hoped to stay along for the ride until we had a brilliant period of growth and then a second sale into glory ... Alas, it was instead four years of pain that ended in a fire sale to our biggest competitor. We entertained the idea that I would stay on, but I knew it was time to start again with something I loved. So I said “fuck it” and will never go back into the corporate grind again.
Haha, this is a fantastic read. Neil Gaiman??? Do you keep in touch with him?
My "oh fuck it moment" has been ongoing for over 50 years, morphing into a lifetime.
I went out with a former classmate last night. I hadn't seen her since leaving my hometown in 1975. (I never acknowledged this hometown until recently when I was forced to, after moving close by, and marrying my (long ago then seasonal) sweetheart two years ago this month.)
She reminisced about our school days. Have you ever reminisced with someone you don't know? I remembered snippets from back then, certainly no details, few classmates, and no teachers names. Apparently I had "oh fuck it moments" that were memorable to everyone except me.
They are ongoing. And will likely never stop until I find my place in life. I'm not optimistic this will ever happen, especially at 64. But Grandma Moses and Col Sanders did so after 50. So there is still hope. Looking forward to your next chapter. It's amazing learning about your past and what brought you to today. These are life lessons that should be shared by those forging paths when we are young. Imagine what we might have avoided along the way. I was fortunate to have a mother who encouraged me to do my own thing and the rest would work itself out. She was mostly right.
In the early 70s, Henderson Street was still dirt road. We could go intoa booth at the record shop there and listen to an album. Integration was slowly making inroads — the Whites Only /Blacks Only signs were removed but the outlines were still visible above the bathrooms in the post office. I worked at Carolina Cafeteria on Franklin Street until I got a job teaching English. My son's first job was at Sutton's Drugstore. We listened to James Taylor at the Cat's Cradle.
Although I left twenty-two years ago, there are many days when I'm still goin' to Carolina in my mind.
I think it’s interesting in retrospect what “happens to us” that forces a change vs. what we perceive to be our choice. Both instances have thrown me in crazy directions! Going to Spain with my cousins on a whim was my biggest moment and I’m so glad I did.
This is so good. I was around for the dating by numbers phase, in NYC, and am loving this play by play.
My fuck it moment - I've got 2.
1) walking out on my ex husband at 25 (for so very many reasons), realizing life isn't a fairytale, no one is perfect, including me, and I was gonna work hard to make a great life for myself. Great friends, great family, traveled a ton, built a career. The relationship did bring me to my favorite city Austin, where I still live.
2) 34, awful breakup, realize the cult-like job isn't cult-like in a cool way, but in an insane" why do I work here, I keep missing big family events" sort of way. Got a new job within 4 weeks to tread water and regroup. 5 months later got fantastic job (work/life balance, great money, great people, so much opportunity). Allowed me to be a better friend and finally date better. 6 years later, married and expecting our first kiddo :)
in a real nice moment of karma, my last manager at cult-like job who was the worst workaholic and demeaning tendencies which ran me out - they got a position at my New Job, but were shortly thereafter fired for gross misconduct. Karma's a bitch
At 59 years and 4 months I am one month older than my mother got to be, and I am churning around in my fuck it moment. I retired four years ago from an incredible job as an air traffic controller in the D.C. area and have been “living the life” in a beautiful Active Adult communities in the Shenandoah Valley. No doubt I am fortunate to be able to retire young and have a good pension. I have good friends, as well as plenty of free time to read and write and cook - the things I wanted to do more of.
And yet.
I feel like I have been following a predetermined path. Marriage, kids, job, retirement, grandchildren (soon!) and then, what? Death? Even with my great job, which I loved, I was following in my father’s footsteps. Come to think of it, retiring young is also following in his footsteps. His world, after my mother died so young, just got smaller and smaller as he waited to join her. It took twenty-two years and at the end he never left his recliner.
Fuck it. I am not doing that. Despite the fact that many people would love my life I am breaking free and going back to work. Next week I have an interview to be a 911 operator. I need to keep expanding my world, and while I have tried new things these past four years, none of those things matter to me. Being the voice that brings calm to someone in distress - that has always mattered to me. My children, my students, and my friends will attest to my ability in that.
So fuck the good life. I am heading back into the trenches.
I confess when I saw the length of this and that it included a rundown of your career, I thought, "Hmm, I might not be so keen on this.
But I was wrong. Neil Gaiman nailed it when he mentioned you.
At 47, my “fuck it” moment came seven years ago. I had worked for two state universities for a decade and a half and thought I would surely retire at 62ish with that state retirement. It was safe, right? Then a headhunter called me out of the blue, I did some interviews and left government work to go back into a corporate environment--a company that sells, services, and rents heavy equipment. So here I was taking a job in what seemed a more “conservative” environment with lots of male employees. I worked in IT security, which is a predominantly male field. What was I thinking?! I must be nuts.
I said “fuck it” to a comfortable and a (supposedly) broader thinking environment and walked into the best job I have ever had. I make more than double what I did working for that university (where I was, I will add, grossly underpaid compared to my male colleagues), have more flexibility, and am well-respected by many--including all those men I thought would pat me on the head and tell me to be a good girl and type this report or refill that printer or make some coffee please.
My job has allowed me time to handle some family crises I’ve encounter this year and to renovate an old building in a rural community in Mississippi (where we were able to move because I can work remotely). We’re running that building as an event venue now, but I want to open it eventually in the afternoons for teens to have a place to gather, study, read, play games, etc.
My move four years ago to where we live now was another big “fuck it” moment when I realized I hated suburban life. People thought we were nuts, but we’re living our best life!
As a reader who was here when you lived in NYC, this is a real joy to read and remember these moments you have shared in the past.
My pivotal fuck it moment was when I did the math and realized I was truly making shit at my job and I could create a work life that gave me the similar income while also a better quality of life. This all snowballed in peak lockdowns of 2020 and being micromanaged and overworked at a corporate hell hole with a ladder I wanted to burn down. I quit that October to work fully for myself as an artist (it was the boldest move to date) and moved in November from Ohio to NC, and life as really only improved in the last 2 years. For now my fiance is the one making all the money and I bring in enough to pay my bills and save a little, things may flip eventually but the quality of life for us both is phenomenal.
My life feels much more my own the further away I get from the traditional path and rewriting my own terms of success and joy and life.
The moment in 2001 when I decided to thru hike the Appalachian Trail after years of school, working, putting everyone's needs above mine, dealing with anxiety/depression from childhood trauma, and knowing life had to change or I wouldn't survive.
I think my “fuck-it” moment came at the end of a four-year burn down. We had sold a controlling stake in the company we built to a private equity company, and I hoped to stay along for the ride until we had a brilliant period of growth and then a second sale into glory ... Alas, it was instead four years of pain that ended in a fire sale to our biggest competitor. We entertained the idea that I would stay on, but I knew it was time to start again with something I loved. So I said “fuck it” and will never go back into the corporate grind again.
Just came across this, and as a college student trying to figure out a "direction" it's so comforting to see how life will develop on its own.
Haha, this is a fantastic read. Neil Gaiman??? Do you keep in touch with him?
My "oh fuck it moment" has been ongoing for over 50 years, morphing into a lifetime.
I went out with a former classmate last night. I hadn't seen her since leaving my hometown in 1975. (I never acknowledged this hometown until recently when I was forced to, after moving close by, and marrying my (long ago then seasonal) sweetheart two years ago this month.)
She reminisced about our school days. Have you ever reminisced with someone you don't know? I remembered snippets from back then, certainly no details, few classmates, and no teachers names. Apparently I had "oh fuck it moments" that were memorable to everyone except me.
They are ongoing. And will likely never stop until I find my place in life. I'm not optimistic this will ever happen, especially at 64. But Grandma Moses and Col Sanders did so after 50. So there is still hope. Looking forward to your next chapter. It's amazing learning about your past and what brought you to today. These are life lessons that should be shared by those forging paths when we are young. Imagine what we might have avoided along the way. I was fortunate to have a mother who encouraged me to do my own thing and the rest would work itself out. She was mostly right.
In the early 70s, Henderson Street was still dirt road. We could go intoa booth at the record shop there and listen to an album. Integration was slowly making inroads — the Whites Only /Blacks Only signs were removed but the outlines were still visible above the bathrooms in the post office. I worked at Carolina Cafeteria on Franklin Street until I got a job teaching English. My son's first job was at Sutton's Drugstore. We listened to James Taylor at the Cat's Cradle.
Although I left twenty-two years ago, there are many days when I'm still goin' to Carolina in my mind.
!!! Whew and I love this view of your history.
Dang! That is only part of it? You've really lived! Can't wait for part 2.
Awesome story so far, I'm completely hooked! Writing is such a fascinating journey. Excited to see the rest of the path for you
A belated note to say I really enjoyed this & look forward to the rest. I’ll share my fuck it moment privately with you sometime!
I think it’s interesting in retrospect what “happens to us” that forces a change vs. what we perceive to be our choice. Both instances have thrown me in crazy directions! Going to Spain with my cousins on a whim was my biggest moment and I’m so glad I did.
This is so good. I was around for the dating by numbers phase, in NYC, and am loving this play by play.
My fuck it moment - I've got 2.
1) walking out on my ex husband at 25 (for so very many reasons), realizing life isn't a fairytale, no one is perfect, including me, and I was gonna work hard to make a great life for myself. Great friends, great family, traveled a ton, built a career. The relationship did bring me to my favorite city Austin, where I still live.
2) 34, awful breakup, realize the cult-like job isn't cult-like in a cool way, but in an insane" why do I work here, I keep missing big family events" sort of way. Got a new job within 4 weeks to tread water and regroup. 5 months later got fantastic job (work/life balance, great money, great people, so much opportunity). Allowed me to be a better friend and finally date better. 6 years later, married and expecting our first kiddo :)
in a real nice moment of karma, my last manager at cult-like job who was the worst workaholic and demeaning tendencies which ran me out - they got a position at my New Job, but were shortly thereafter fired for gross misconduct. Karma's a bitch
Watching you become who you are is so fucking cool.