On June 6 at 2:45 in the afternoon I turned in my building keys, a lanyard and a laminated badge with a photo of me from 2009 that nobody should ever see. The principal hugged me, the custodian gave me a coffee mug, and I drove home on the same road I had driven for 24 years. That was eight days ago.
Leaving a school office in June is strange, because everybody leaves in June. The teachers pack up their rooms, the kids empty their lockers, and the whole building says see you in August. I said it too, out of habit, to a fourth grader holding a clay pot. Then I realized I would not be seeing her in August. Nobody was holding a spot for me.
That is the feeling part. Here is the practical part.
The first week, honestly
I slept until 6:40 on Monday, which for me is decadent. Greg was long gone, he leaves at 4:10, and the house was very still. I made coffee, sat at the kitchen table and did not know what to do with my hands. So I did what I always do. I made a list.
By Wednesday I had cleaned out the hall closet, returned two library books that were three weeks overdue (old habits die hard, apparently even for people who used to send overdue notices home with children), and pulled up half the garden.
The garden got smaller on purpose
We used to keep a big vegetable patch along the back fence, about 20 by 12 feet, back when there were four of us and a teenage boy who could eat a pound of green beans at one sitting. This year I shrank it to two raised beds, 4 by 8 each. Tomatoes, peppers, a row of bush beans and some basil. The rest is now grass, which Greg will mow and complain about.
The old garden cost us around $90 every spring in plants, seed and mulch, and a good deal more in water in July. The two beds cost $38 to plant this year. More to the point, I can weed them in 20 minutes with my knees on a foam pad instead of an hour bent over in the sun.
Things I am keeping an eye on this summer
Leaving work changed some bills right away and some that will change soon. I wrote them in the green notebook so I would stop lying awake doing arithmetic.
- Health insurance. My school plan ends June 30. On July 1, I go onto Greg's plan through his work, with a $100 a month spousal surcharge. We compared a marketplace plan in May before deciding.
- Electric. In May we switched our supply to a 12-month fixed rate at 8.9 cents per kWh. The utility's own price to compare was about 10.6 cents. On our summer usage, that difference should be around $15 to $20 a month.
- The city aggregation letter. It arrived last week, offering to put the whole town on one supplier unless we opted out. We already have our own fixed contract, so I mailed back the opt-out form. More on that later.
- My retirement system service. It is frozen where it is. I am not drawing anything yet, and I will not for a while.
Greg and I have also agreed I will look for some part-time work in the fall, nothing that needs me out of the house at 7 a.m. That is a decision for September.
What I plan to do with the rest of the summer
I am trying not to fill every hour, which is harder than it sounds for somebody who has run on a bell schedule since 2001. My rough plan:
Mornings for the house and the yard, before it gets humid. Afternoons for paperwork and this blog. A visit to Mom in Middletown every week, usually Wednesdays, since Thursdays are her card game and you do not interrupt the card game. A day trip or two. Caesar Creek is 25 minutes away and we have not been in three years.
Greg asked me yesterday if I was bored yet. I said no. He said, "Give it till the Fourth." We'll see.
When the school supply lists show up at Meijer in late July, I expect that will sting a little. I will buy a pack of pens for no reason and move on.
