A
Aging Pilot
Guest
I'm posting this here anonymously only because there are people on here that likely know me outside the forum and I don't want the topic to somehow come back and bite me down the road as some sort of sign of depression and could use some advice. For those of you in the second half of your life (think mid 40's or later), how did you cope with realizing that most of your major life milestones are already over? Our only daughter is heading off to college next year and most of my life up to this point has been looking forward to and working towards major life milestones (graduating college, getting married, buying a house, getting a masters degree, having and raising a kid, etc). I have no complaints about life so far but always thought that after getting the kid off to college that retirement would be the next major milestone to look forward to.
I thought I would spend retirement somewhere other than where we currently live while exploring and doing new things in a new area that we couldn't do while working full time. I was under the impression that would be the next major life milestone to work towards but my wife seems to have other thoughts as we start to talk more about retirement. We currently own a house that is way too big for two people but it is on a few acres and we spent considerable time and effort over the years on clearing land, building a barn, large greenhouse gardens, raising few horses, goats, dogs, etc. I enjoyed hobby farming as a family and all the horse competitions and events with my daughter and wouldn't change any of it but I now realize that my wife has formed a firm attachment to the house and has no desire to ever sell it or live somewhere new when we retire. I can't stand the snow and cold winters here and don't see how I am going to be able to keep up with all the chores a small farm requires as I get older. Having a small farm will also make it very difficult and expensive to travel in retirement as you need to hire someone to take care of the animals and the property every time you want to go somewhere for more than a day.
To tie this back to flying, 10 years ago I also gave up flying an airplane I spent almost a decade building for all the typical reasons (money was tight at times, family and life took up alot of free time, and the consequences my wife and daughter would have to live with if something bad happened all because I engaged in a risky hobby became much more real). I had thought that maybe after my daughter was done with college that building another airplane or getting the one in my garage flying again and using it to explore the country could be something to look forward to but those risks are still too real for my wife and although she isn't forbidding it, she has expressed that she would be much happier if I chose not to take it up as a hobby again. I am struggling to come up with something to look forward to in the future and just envision every day between now and when I die of old age being exactly the same, in the same place, doing the same things. Although I have traveled quite a bit for work I have always lived in the same 20 mile radius area my whole life and there doesn't seem to be any big life goals to work toward anymore if we are never going to live anywhere else. You pretty much have seen and done everything in the local area after living in the same location for 50 years. I don't really see this as your typical mid life crisis as I truely am happy with life right now. I just don't see anything big or exciting to work toward in the future and am struggling with it. I can't be the only one who has ever had this problem. For those of you currently in the same type of spot or those of you who are older and already retired, how did you deal with realizing you are getting older and your life goals may be dwindling without it causing you to get depressed thinking about it? How did you work though very different retirement plans with your spouse? How did you deal with the risks of flying vs the potential consequences to those you love?
I thought I would spend retirement somewhere other than where we currently live while exploring and doing new things in a new area that we couldn't do while working full time. I was under the impression that would be the next major life milestone to work towards but my wife seems to have other thoughts as we start to talk more about retirement. We currently own a house that is way too big for two people but it is on a few acres and we spent considerable time and effort over the years on clearing land, building a barn, large greenhouse gardens, raising few horses, goats, dogs, etc. I enjoyed hobby farming as a family and all the horse competitions and events with my daughter and wouldn't change any of it but I now realize that my wife has formed a firm attachment to the house and has no desire to ever sell it or live somewhere new when we retire. I can't stand the snow and cold winters here and don't see how I am going to be able to keep up with all the chores a small farm requires as I get older. Having a small farm will also make it very difficult and expensive to travel in retirement as you need to hire someone to take care of the animals and the property every time you want to go somewhere for more than a day.
To tie this back to flying, 10 years ago I also gave up flying an airplane I spent almost a decade building for all the typical reasons (money was tight at times, family and life took up alot of free time, and the consequences my wife and daughter would have to live with if something bad happened all because I engaged in a risky hobby became much more real). I had thought that maybe after my daughter was done with college that building another airplane or getting the one in my garage flying again and using it to explore the country could be something to look forward to but those risks are still too real for my wife and although she isn't forbidding it, she has expressed that she would be much happier if I chose not to take it up as a hobby again. I am struggling to come up with something to look forward to in the future and just envision every day between now and when I die of old age being exactly the same, in the same place, doing the same things. Although I have traveled quite a bit for work I have always lived in the same 20 mile radius area my whole life and there doesn't seem to be any big life goals to work toward anymore if we are never going to live anywhere else. You pretty much have seen and done everything in the local area after living in the same location for 50 years. I don't really see this as your typical mid life crisis as I truely am happy with life right now. I just don't see anything big or exciting to work toward in the future and am struggling with it. I can't be the only one who has ever had this problem. For those of you currently in the same type of spot or those of you who are older and already retired, how did you deal with realizing you are getting older and your life goals may be dwindling without it causing you to get depressed thinking about it? How did you work though very different retirement plans with your spouse? How did you deal with the risks of flying vs the potential consequences to those you love?