There it was again.
Just the other day, a client looked at me and asked the question I seem to be hearing with increasing regularity:
“So, when are you going to retire?”
Holy moly.
Do I look that bad?
Naturally, I immediately went to the nearest mirror to see whether something had happened since breakfast. Had decrepitude suddenly set in? Had my hair disappeared? Were my jowls now resting comfortably on my shoulders? Had those mysterious hairs that seem to grow from a man’s ears suddenly taken over my entire face?
Nope.
Pretty much the same guy who looked in the mirror yesterday.
So why does everybody keep asking me when I’m going to retire?
Apparently, somewhere along the way, society decided that there is an expiration date stamped on each of us. Reach a certain age and you’re supposed to clean out your desk, buy a rocking chair and spend the remainder of your life wondering what day of the week it is.
I wasn’t quite ready for that.
Still, I needed advice. And when you need trustworthy, unbiased counsel in today’s world—a relatively rare commodity—I knew exactly where to turn.
My grandson.
I asked him, “Do I look old and broken down?”
He looked at me and said, “You look perfect to me, Pop Pop.”
Finally. An expert opinion I could rely upon.
Then I asked him the bigger question.
“Do you think I should retire?”
He thought for a moment and, after I explained exactly what retirement meant, he looked at me and asked:
“Don’t you love what you do?”
There it was.
Out of the mouths of children.
How is it that a little kid can take a question adults can debate for hours and reduce it to eight words?
The answer is yes.
I do love what I do.
I enjoy sitting across the desk from my clients. I enjoy listening to their stories, understanding their problems and trying to figure out how I can help. I enjoy practicing law. I enjoy writing. I enjoy creating new ideas. And perhaps most importantly, I still wake up wanting to do all of it.
So exactly what does age have to do with that?
Our current president, Donald Trump, turned 80 this year and continues holding perhaps the most demanding job in the country. Ronald Reagan served as president well into his 70s. Winston Churchill was 65 when he became prime minister in 1940 and helped lead Britain through World War II.
None of them apparently received the memo explaining that older people were supposed to go home.
Maybe we need to rethink retirement.
There are certainly good reasons to retire. If you no longer enjoy your work, retire. If your health makes continuing difficult, retire. If there are other things you desperately want to do while you have the opportunity, by all means, go do them.
But retiring simply because the calendar says you’re supposed to?
I’m not convinced.
Perhaps the better questions are these:
Do you still love what you do?
Are you physically and mentally able to do it?
Does your work still give you purpose?
Do you still believe you have something worthwhile to contribute?
If the answers are yes, why should a number on your birth certificate decide otherwise?
Someday I may walk into my office and decide I’ve had enough. Someday I may discover that golf, travel, afternoon naps and arguing with the television are more appealing than going to work.
But not today.
Today, I still have clients to help, ideas to pursue, things to write—and apparently a grandson who thinks I look pretty good.
That’s good enough for me.
One final word of advice to the men of my generation:
Whatever else you decide about retirement, keep trimming those ear hairs.
Age may only be a number.
Ear hair is evidence.
Take it for what it is…it’s just as I see it.
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