Episode 19: A Voice for the Voiceless
L to R: Karen LaRue, Colleen Olinger, Randy Pair
Colleen Olinger and Randy Pair co-lead the Valles Caldera National Preserve Dendroglyph Survey team, a diverse group of volunteers in the Los Alamos, New Mexico area dedicated to identifying and documenting a unique local cultural heritage under the direction of the preserve’s scientific staff. The dendroglyphs are carvings in aspen trees left by Hispanic sheepherders who spent long solitary periods tending the flocks under the ‘partido’ system in the remote area in the 1920s - 1940s. “The carvings are a voice for the voiceless” reports Colleen. The team was honored for their work as Preserve America Stewards by the Advisory Council on Historic Preservation in 2010. The volunteers hike off trail in remote areas of the Preserve to locate and document the carvings, working against time, forest fires, and occasional damage by elk who chew up carvings on the aspen bark.
Craig Martin
Episode 18: From Pretty Pictures to Important Pictures
An invitation to talk to retired physician Paul Sokal about his fine art photography practice took a startling turn as he recounted the story of finding letters written to his father from one of his college classmates in 1936. Stashed away in a box of his father’s personal correspondence, that discovery launched Paul into an intense research project culminating in a screenplay based on the riveting and heroic life story of his father’s friend. Paul talks about how his twin passions for photography and writing have met in the art of creating screenplays.
Episode 17: A Journey I Did Not Want to Take Alone
Enid Eckstein spent her career as a union organizer and officer, primarily serving health care workers through the Service Employees International Union (SEIU). As she neared retirement in 2014, she reached out to 14 women and invited them to form a group to support each other through their retirement transitions. She wrote about her journey in the article “My Women-Only Retirement Support Group” published April 21, 2021 by NextAvenue.org. Seven years later, these retired friends still connect regularly. For her part, Enid continues to actively write and contribute to public policy development in the healthcare field, pointing out that “I retired from my job, but not my life’s work”.
My Women-Only Retirement Support Group: How it helped the 15 of us transition to a new life stage
Episode 16: Everybody Came Together and Bought My Bread
Left to Right: Todd Crane and Bill DeLoach. Photos by Mariah Tyler, Dallas Morning News.
Left to right, Bill DeLoach and Todd Crane. Photo by Mariah Tyler, Dallas Morning News.
Todd Crane and Bill DeLoach, partners in life and business, founded Crest Ridge Farms Bakery after Todd was furloughed and then laid off from his corporate job in accounting. Baking was always a hobby for Todd but friends who loved his yeast rolls exhorted him to market them. They started modestly by selling home baked bread at the local Farmers Market, developing a loyal following. Bill came out of retirement to help Todd run the business from their home under the Texas Cottage Food Law, and they now offer about 150 menu items, from sourdough bread to high-end pop tarts. They are touched by their neighborhood’s enthusiastic support. Reports Todd “I feel like I’m doing something that matters.”
Crest Ridge Farms favorites include sourdough bread and yeast dinner rolls.
Episode 15: The Books Are Just a Vehicle
Shannon Cerise and Jean McAulay founded the Multicultural Women’s Book Group in 2017 after an almost visceral reaction to a panel discussion on race hosted by the Dallas Morning News. They concluded that as white women they were “clueless” about how differently people of color navigate daily life compared to their own experiences. Believing that “relationship is where the change happens” they launched a member led book group comprised of women of varying ethnic, racial and religious backgrounds who gather monthly for fellowship, food and frank discussion prompted by fiction and non-fiction books on issues of social justice.
Back Row: Jean McAulay (fourth from left) and Shannon Cerise (fifth from left)
Additional Resources
Multicultural Women’s Book Club
Dallas Morning News: “Why Two Dallas Women Started a Female-Only Book Club About Diversity”
Episode 14: Coincidence or Providence
When Paul Higdon met seventeen-year-old John Maina in 2001 while touring an orphanage in the desperately poor Nairobi slum of Mathare, he could not have imagined the profound impact it would have on his life. Twelve years later, while serving as a volunteer on the Board of Directors of a successful Kenyan NGO, Paul was suddenly consumed with the notion of finding and reconnecting with John. His book “Hope and a Future: Life, Survival and Renewal on the Streets of an African Slum” tells John’s remarkable life story, as well as Paul’s improbable “coincidence or providence” journey to find him. Paul also speaks of his long runway transition from a career in banking to embracing retirement and urges retirees to find their passions and “step off the track”.
Additional Resources:
Hope and a Future: Life, Survival and Renewal on the Streets of an African Slum
Episode 13: The Things You Can Dream About
Retired engineer Bill Reed volunteers as an uncommon career guidance coach, introducing high school students in Denton, Texas to accomplished, high-profile professionals via a regular series of interactive Zoom interviews. The sessions focus on STEM careers and the guests range from astronauts to volcanologists. Bill particularly wants young women to pursue STEM careers and to gain confidence as they learn to introduce the speakers and develop probing interview questions. Bill exposes the students to an array of career possibilities and shows them “Here are the things you can dream about.” Bill believes that the world is a ‘magical place’ and with his wife Betty he has traveled to remote places around the globe to explore and recharge. When he’s at home Bill devotes time to his other favorite pastime. He has created and donated over 2,500 handmade ceramic bowls to Empty Bowls, a national movement by artists and crafts people that employs the ceramic arts to fight hunger.
Episode 12: We Were Called by Kauai
Kevin and Karen Hall performed with the Fort Worth Symphony Orchestra for over 40 years. They left behind a career as orchestral musicians, a job with a stress level ranked by researchers as somewhere between firefighting and air traffic control. Each of them experienced significant health issues in 2017, and upon recovery began the careful planning that would lead them to retire in Kauai, Hawaii. They sold their house, cars, and almost everything they owned. They are at peace letting go of their cherished “constant companions”, the bassoon and cello. Kevin and Karen are joyfully embracing the spirit of Aloha, where “we are part of everything, and everything is part of us.”
Photo credit Lawrence Jenkins
Episode 11: I Want to Have My Hands in the Dirt
Amanda Vanhoozier retired in 2017 from a career as an educator and developer of municipal compost programs, community gardens and farmers markets. In January 2018 she founded Bishop Hill Farm Flowers in Coppell, Texas, an organic flower farm named after her grandparents’ farm in Ohio. As a young woman she dreamed of growing and selling flowers, but self-doubt crept in and she moved on to other things. Amanda has now realized her dream. Leaving management roles and spreadsheets behind, she says “I want to have my hands in the dirt”. She runs the farm by herself with no mechanical tools, and plants, grows, harvests and markets beautiful flowers through her website and at the Coppell Farmers Market, just one block away from her farm.
Episode 10: Wrangling Ageless Authors
Larry Upshaw is the co-founder of Ageless Authors, an organization dedicated to promoting and publicizing the work of writers aged 65 and older. He speaks with enthusiasm and awe of the talented seniors from around the world who submit their works to Ageless Authors writing contests. Many of these writers are taking up their pens (literally) for the first time in their lives, often engaging tech savvy grandkids to help them submit their works online. Memoirs, fiction and poetry are judged by a cadre of professional writers and educators, and the winning and honorable mention pieces are published in Ageless Authors anthologies. Larry exhorts creative seniors everywhere to “Just keep writing!”.
Additional Resources: Ageless Authors
Episode 9: A Very Nice Balance
Until John McLean retired in 2014 from an executive management position in the aerospace industry, owning a dog had been a “theoretical abstraction”. John’s last day at work was a Friday, and on Saturday he and his wife brought home a 12-week old chocolate lab named Abby. Moving from theory to practice, John was surprised to learn that he has a passion for working with and fostering shelter animals. A marathoner, John regularly runs with his two dogs, Abby and Finn, and volunteers several times a week at the Pima Animal Care Center. Retirement has also freed him up to pursue a variety of other creative and fulfilling pursuits. He happily reports that “It’s just working out to be a very nice balance.”
Additional Resources:
Episode 8: The Payoff is Huge
Janie Cravens recounts her story of downsizing and relocating to a community that feeds her deep seated desire to live in a soul nourishing place of physical beauty. “I learned to dismantle a life in one place and rebuild it in another.” A clinical social worker, Janie gave herself the gift of a ‘Geezer Gap Year’ to slow down, explore and reflect during a methodical search for the perfect place to call home. She landed in Santa Fe, New Mexico. Once settled, she founded Open Heart Tours, a specialized tour company focused on exploring the beauty and cultural heritage of Oaxaca, Mexico while supporting local women owned businesses. Janie’s advise speaks volumes — “Take the risk because the payoff is huge.”
Additional Resources
Fundacion en Via: Mircofinance, Education, Responsible Tourism
Episode 7: We Want to Dispel the Fear
Breast cancer survivor Cynthia Lopez Jones experienced a career limiting injury at the age of 50 that caused her to retire from her profession as an anesthesiologist. Following her retirement she provided support and patient advocacy for both her father and husband as they battled cancer. She also became a Master Gardener, serving as president of the 400 member Dallas County Master Gardener Association. In 2018 Cynthia was diagnosed with breast cancer and underwent a double mastectomy. Today she is healthy and active and dedicated to pursuing a goal of providing support and advocacy to low income and Hispanic women with breast cancer. With her message of comfort in patients’ native language, her medical training and her personal story, she can help women see that “Cancer does not rob you of life as you knew it.”
Additional Resources:
Lakewood Elementary Master Gardener Project
Dallas County Master Gardeners
Episode 6: Solar Panels and the Best Seats in the House
Keven Ann Willey, a retired journalist, and Georges Badoux, a retired chef and restaurateur, talk about their 26,571 mile year long journey in a 17 ft. travel trailer around the perimeter of the United States. Equipped with solar panels that Georges installed on the roof and a 25 gallon water tank, they were freed from the tyranny of electrical and water hook ups, frequently avoiding the more costly and crowded RV parks and ‘boondocking’ in beautiful pastures, scenic parks and deserted beaches with all the comforts of home. They learned that “you don’t have to pay more to get the good seats”. Throughout it all Georges prepared 5 star meals on a tiny 2 burner stove. Keven and Georges chronicle their heartwarming story of encountering an immense diversity of people, cultures, foods and scenery, told with humor mixed with awe and beautiful photographs, at their website “Postcards from the Perimeter: A Year on the Edges of America.”
Additional Resources:
Episode 5: It Has to Come from Within You
Norm Diamond talks about a life changing leap from a career in medicine to a new vocation as a professional art photographer. He describes the surprising transferable skill set developed in over 30 years of practice as an interventional radiologist where “it’s all about the image”, and tells of how his projects, so distinct on the surface, all touch on themes of memory, loss, and mortality. Norm reflects on his transformative journey from an intensely stressful medical specialty requiring some emotional distance from his patients, to the discovery that art photography is not only a long held passion but the medium for reconnecting with himself.
Episode 4: Chickens and the Field of Possibility
In 2016 Shelly Kacergis traveled to Meru, Kenya on a life altering cultural exchange program. That trip led the commercial bank risk management executive to donate chickens to 20 Meru village women. As the women tended their flocks and sent their children to school with their earnings, back at work Shelly realized that she had been profoundly changed by the experience. She retired in 2017, aggressively ramped up her tennis game, cleaned out her closets, and went on the hunt for rewarding non-profit work, hoping to identify opportunities focused on economic empowerment for women. As the universe would have it, Shelly found that when she was able to let go and open herself up to “the field of possibility” things started to flow in and “without trying I have landed just the right thing.”
Additional Resources
Global Heart Journeys: globalheartjourneys.net
Amani Women Center: amaniwomencenter.org
Books for Africa: booksforafrica.org
Episode 3: Maybe I Just Owed It
A retired Director of Manufacturing for a multi-national corporation co-founded a 501 (c) (3) non-profit organization to serve impoverished children in Honduras. Peter Borg, pictured with Osman Hope shelter graduate and Honduras university student Esther, touches on familiar themes: coping with being “invited” to retire, the desire to give back and the discovery that the skills developed over the course of a career transfer completely to managing a non-profit organization, as well as the ever-present urge to remain productive and creative in retirement.
Additional Resources:
Osman Hope: osmanhope.org
Habitat for Humanity: www.habitat.org
Episode 2: Enjoy the World and Improve the World
A retired educator with a passion for nature seeks balance between enjoying the world and improving the world. Kristina Lindborg pushes herself out of her comfort zone and learns how to lobby her elected representatives in Washington D.C.
Additional Resources:
Citizens’ Climate Lobby: https://citizensclimatelobby.org
Interview with Mary Catherine Bateson: https://onbeing.org/programs
Episode 1: How Did you Do That?
Meet the Wassermans, who share their story of early retirement and the careful research and planning that led them to move to Granada, Spain. Jim and Jiab inform and entertain with regular updates at www.YourThirdLife.com. Their engaging blog is part spreadsheet analytics and part romantic adventure. Listen to the Wassermans as they relate how and why they chose the expat experience, and experience their passionate encouragement to “take your swing”.
Additional Resources:
UNESCO World Heritage Sites: whc.unesco.org
Expats Blog: An Experience Shared: www.expatsblog.com