Take a seat.
Retirement is one of the most significant transitions a person can make — and one of the least prepared for. Not financially. Financially, most people have been nudged, advised, and occasionally alarmed into some degree of readiness. What tends to arrive unannounced are the other questions: who you are when the work stops, why you get up, what your body actually needs from you now, who you want around you, and what you still want to do with the time that remains.
The Commentaries gathered here are twenty-one introductory pieces, each one an honest overview of a subject that retirement brings into focus. They are written for people approaching retirement who want to think carefully about what they are moving toward, and equally for people already in retirement who would like to understand it a little better, or live it a little more fully, than they currently do.
Each Commentary opens a door. It does not attempt to furnish the entire room. Several topics — the hallmarks of ageing among them — will receive deeper and more detailed treatment in future Commentaries as the series grows. These twenty-one are the foundation layer. What is built on it will follow.
Commentaries are added regularly. Not every topic will speak to every reader — and that is entirely as it should be. Come back when something catches your eye.
Jack Lack’s Listening Chair is always here, as is your welcome.