When you read My life story – Page 1, you already know that I was a senior manager at the company where I worked for the past two decades. I worked for a director, who was nice enough. But I really felt that the job she had, really should have been mine. She had only been with the firm ten years and did not have the breadth of experience I had. I do not know how she got the job. It really doesn’t matter. She was one of the few old company workers who was not getting a package, since she was not over fifty. She worked for one of the new Vice Presidents at the new firm.

At the time I retired, looking at what I was going to do in retirement, I knew certain things about me. I am not a person who can sit in a lawn chair and watch the grass grow. Even though I was retired, I wanted to do something; to be an active participant in life. I’ve done lots of volunteer work and although it was interesting at the time, it was not fulfilling to me. There are some people who are good at it and then there are folks like me. I’ve done the Habitat for Humanity, volunteered for the Red Cross, donated over 10 gallons of whole blood for the local blood bank, was the company chairperson for the Race for the Cure, and lots of other things. But none of them really lit a fire under me.

When I left the 9 to 5 life and retired, I decided I was going to go down a different road. I wanted to try my hand at different things, I wanted to do different things, I wanted to meet different people. Maybe I would get into sales. I wasn’t really comfortable with sales, but since I was exploring and had a good retirement income behind me, I put that on my list of possibilities.

I had invested in a start-up Internet Service Provider (ISP) in the middle nineties, and have given some thought to doing something internet based, like marketing or something. That went on my list of possibilities.

I’ve always had a hankering to write for a living, and that’s what I’m doing with this blog. But I wanted to write advertising letters, or sales letters, or write public relations letters, write fund raising letters asking people for money or write whatever was paying well at the time, when I needed a few dollars, or something to fill the gap. The thought of writing for a living has always seemed romantic, and I had that on my list of job possibilities.

This past December, around December 15th, three months after I left the 9 to 5 job and retired, I got a call around 9:30 AM. It was snowing outside, and I remembered how I hated to go to work on those kinds of days. People here don’t know how to drive when the streets are dry and add water and or snow to the mix, and it’s a real mess. I don’t know what happened to mandatory driver’s education to get your driver’s license, but that’s one program that needs to get put back into action.

Anyway, I got a call at 9:30 AM. The caller ID on my phone showed that the call was coming from my old firm. They hadn’t gotten around to changing the name on the phone bill to the new firm’s name, I guess. It was my old director’s VP. We did the usual small talk and then he got down to it. My old boss was no longer there. She couldn’t get on board with the new team, the new policies, the new direction, the new this and the new that.

Since it had been over 90 days since I retired, I think that was some magic time period they had to wait, would I be interested in coming back to work at the new firm in her place? To be honest, I couldn’t believe my ears. I asked how many managers were in the department? (There was no change.) I asked if I would be able to keep my old seniority for vacation time? (Yes.) What about my existing 401k retirement plan – would it be bridged? (Yes.) What about the monthly pension check I was receiving? (If I came back, the pension from the old firm would stop and I would be covered under the new pension plan.) Could they fax me the new pension plan details? (Here there was some hedging back and forth, and we left it at they would get something over to me by the end of the week.) Would I be able to telecommute on days like today? (We’ll see.)

What about salary? (The pay for this position under the new firm was exactly what I had been making as a Senior Manager at the old firm.) When I heard that, I had made up my mind, but I said, I would have to wait and see what the new pension plan looked like.

Then I threw him a curve ball. I told him how I noticed that the director didn’t really have enough work to justify a full time position, but they needed someone to oversee the operations. Would they consider a consultant to take the duties on a part time basis? (We might.)

I didn’t go back to the 9 to 5. I am on an executive consulting contract and get calls every month or month and a half. Why didn’t I take the carrot and go back to work? The pay as a director was exactly what I was making as a Sr. Manager. So there was a pay cut, but no one really knew, except for me. The pension plan was the absolute pits. I would never been able to make what I was getting now. With my existing plan I get a Cost Of Living Adjustment (COLA) every year to keep up with inflation. My health insurance plan as a retiree was about 50% of what it would have cost me as an employee at the new company. Well, you get the idea. It just didn’t add up for me.

For Taking Early Retirement (TER), I hope you are enjoying a great retirement or are close to that day!

Jeremiah John

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