Sometime in my early sixties thoughts switched to retirement. As part of that process, one takes the look over the shoulder to see the accomplishments of a lifetime. For me, it was the moment of looking myself in the eye to know that I had earned my respect.
So many things in life aren’t as big a deal as we make them out to be, but liking who you are at the end of your career is important. It’s not a number thing like he who dies with the most toys wins; they’re just toys. I’d rather have integrity than more money, but no mistake I wanted to earn a comfortable living and worked hard.
Over the years there’s always bad times, but I plucked along relentlessly. Earning a big salary may be its own reward, but spending years doing something I didn’t like never made me happy, so I followed the rule of love what you do.
Dogs have perfected the art of presence; in silence, they look at us and perhaps wag their tail with no obvious judgment. Since childhood, I have loved dogs; thank you, God.
After jobs and businesses I enjoyed, the last thirty years of my career I worked with dogs; what could be better? I played with dogs for a living until I ran a dog business that played with dogs, which is almost as much fun but paid better.
Nobody wants to leave a thriving business, but age ain’t easy, so you contemplate and consider before rebelliously declaring,
“I have another good ten years in me, maybe more.”
But the property and the business appraised at a tidy sum, so best think about it; it made so much sense to quit in time to enjoy life. My husband suffered from chronic pain, so he voted to go; we put it on the market and buyers came, but nobody could get a loan.
Bankers lead the news each evening, they called it, the “Great Recession.” Too big to fail, that was the slogan, followed by bailout and lay off.
My modest dog business didn’t count for shit when regular clients can’t afford daycare for the kids and dog, so the dog lived in the yard all day and other clients, I carried. My clients, my neighbors were upside down, as they called it, meaning they owed more than the property was worth. I wasn’t in that boat, but found myself working way harder for a lot less; it was an ugly time, I picked to absolutely need to rest.
We're beaten and broken over time, so when we’re done there’s no debating. I hated to give up everything when we were covering for banking crooks by decree of GWB and company because they caused my pain. Who gives a f---, right?
Greedy bankers invented new products to sell for more than it was worth, oops. We, the people, had to pay; I had to pay when I needed my lifetime payout, another oops.
The Dodd-Frank Act became law to prevent these same greedy bankers we bailed out less than ten years ago from doing the same thing to us again.
I am disgusted by a legislature that would consider repeal of Dodd-Frank. Does the abuse of the people need to become a real ass whipping before we say, “No.”
People in power talked around the problem until I felt dizzy, but superb performances from a stellar cast in The Big Short and Margin Call shine a light on the bad behavior of reputable robbers/bankers. These movies are the modern day equivalent of Redford and Hoffman getting the goods on Nixon.
What is my generation supposed to say to the next?
“Every generation gets its ass beat by government whores with fat wallets of big business money, shut your mouth and take it.”
Please, don’t.
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