Fun Is Different Now

On this last day of February as March roars in like a lion, you may be thinking of summer and spring fun.

You can probably remember being a child when the most important thing in the world was having fun.  Well, there are some remarkable similarities between your retired life and those carefree days of childhood.  For one thing, when you were a child, you didn’t work for a living, you felt secure that you had what you need.  Hopefully, in your retirement you did a good job preparing for retirement so you have some carefree days to enjoy now too.

Another similarity that your children may have pointed out to you is that, like it was when you were a child, you occasionally did things that you were not allowed to do.  But now it seems to be our children would like to be telling us what is ok for us to do or not do.  But every so often, you have to throw caution to the wind and go ahead and party late into the night, go parasailing or go to a rock concert.  It is always fun and usually a great time when you are willing to take a chance.

But fun is different now than it was when you were a child.  Now there is nothing better perhaps than spending a day trying to improve your golf game.  A long rainy afternoon with a good book is just the thing and it will be a day of fun you will remember for a long time because this is what it means to be retired.  Some other ways to have fun that are notably different from childhood or even when you were a working adult might include…

·       A day sorting yarn for a big knitting project or laying out the fabric to make artistic quilts to sell for a charitable cause can also be a day of girl talk, giggling and gossip that seems almost like the sleepover scene from Grease as much as it is a gathering of mature women enjoying the afternoon together.

·       Getting together with the boys and going out to help build a shed gives you the chance to play with tools, mess around with building materials and remember what great fun it is to just build something.

·       A bus tour to Branson or some other exciting nearby attraction takes on a whole new sense of adventure when it’s the big day when they change the lunch menu at the cafeteria downstairs.

·       Going to a high school or college football/or hockey game used to seem like a nuisance when you had to attend to watch your child play third-string centre or your child cheer and hope they don’t break their collarbone.  But now when you get to go, even if you don’t know a soul on either team, being in that exciting setting is the kind of good clean fun you look forward to for weeks and think back on for months.

Just as the fun is different now, so are the toys.  Now, enjoying an afternoon stuffing envelope for the church is as much a fun as a game of playing chess as long as you can do it with your friends and chat and share stores as you play.  Now, going to a military base to look at their archives is more than just mildly interesting.  It’s a trip through your own past and if you can enjoy that with others who served their country so you can honour them.

Yes, we have fun differently now and it is different then young people .  But anyone who thinks for a minute that we never have fun are as far off from the truth as they can be.  Because we have laid down the cares of career and raising children, we can really relax and let the fun of each day sneak up on us.  By putting ourselves in the mindset, that life is still a great adventure, just about anything we do can become a source of joy and fun.  But even though fun is different now, life is still worth living because it is tremendously fun.