Retirement River

Wow, it's been almost a year since my last post - what's happening with that!  As summer break approaches once more, it's about to become my endless summer, forever on break, for this year I'm retiring from the life of a hard working nursing instructor.  What a challenge this could be.  After taking a "Transitions" class twice, and never really deciding what to do next, I'm taking the transition plunge. 

Reflecting on this decision, I compared it to scouting a river rapid.  One day, on the Arkansas River, a group of us were scouting a particularly ominous looking rapid.  As I stood there, on the bank of the river, balancing on the steep rocks  lining the bank, I decided there's only so long you can scout a rapid - eventually you must take the raft through it.  You can scout a rapid for an hour or ten minutes - it doesn't usually matter in the end.  On that day, I looked at my trip co-leader, and said, "Let's do it", and he was in agreement - time to go for it.  We loaded up the group and headed into the rapid.  At one point during the turbulent trip most of the others in the boat thought I was going out of the raft into the river.  Funny though, I never felt that way at all through the rapid.  I felt anchored, ready and secure in my spot and never felt as if I was about to be ejected. 

While retirement will present challenges, I'm ready to transition, no matter what it may mean.  It's time to conquer another rapid and it doesn't matter if it takes ten minutes, twelve months, or five years to consider the transition - it is now.