2 March 2012
Pensioner. Today for the first time I felt like a
pensioner. Actually my first pension
check arrived on the 29th in my account, but there has been a month
of changes. I am no longer covered by
the ELCA Health Benefits Program, for two reasons. 1. They changed their name to Portico and 2.
Pensioners are covered by Marsh Services.
The work of managing the Part D coverage is farmed out, so that I now
have to present all new cards to my doctors as I begin my quarterly visits to
my friendly faced health professionals.
One small hiccup, my wife’s card hasn’t arrived, and the set that was
sent on February 6th hasn’t arrived.
It’s not just Lutherans who don’t like change, it’s the elderly…
Today I attended an educational
workshop on Social Media. Keith Anderson
did a marvelous job of addressing the myriad of expectations coming from nearly
60 participants. A year ago, I would be
leading a similar workshop at a synod gathering, but now I’m a pensioner, a
spectator. While I could have started
this reflection on the first of March, I waited until today the 2nd,
for it is the first anniversary of my new knees. It was a year ago that I had the surgery on
my left knee in a total knee replacement.
A week from today, I’ll have the anniversary for the second knee. The fun part is that I can walk now with some
degree of speed, stairs still slow me down, but in crowds, I can pass people
again. What a difference a year makes.
New invitations do come. An easy one to accept was to be one of the
volunteer chaplains for the Servant Year Volunteers who are serving a multitude
of agencies in the Philadelphia area. I’ve
served on the Board for several years as volunteers have come and gone. Yet there is a commitment by some of them to
be at a chapel service on Friday mornings, so for the last month I’ve been one
of two leaders at 8 am on Fridays to pray and set the tone for their work together.
A second invite came from Adult
Lutherans Organized for Action which is an inter-Lutheran organization focused
on ministries for persons 50 and older.
I’m one of several who have been asked to be a part of a Media Council
to use the new media for improved communication. Maybe my skills are not over the hill. Now the question is how to I keep from being
over committed, as I’m still teaching and have more than a full load of
independent study students. Maybe this
is why all my congregational retirees always said that they were busier in
retirement than they were while working.
Got to take another snapshot in a month…
2 comments:
Thanks for sharing your journey. I miss seeing you more often. We gotta do lunch sometime soon.
Congratulations on your retirement, Rich. My retirement date was July 1, 2011, and with all my month's of retirement under my belt: I can only say "It's wonderful!"
I do have a question - How did we get from Ohio Luther League and Witt and Hamma to retirement so quickly.
Hopefully, this finds you and Dawn and your children having the best times of your lives.
Lynn Dehnkamp Franke - the young'un from Steubenville and WV.
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