After retiring following 52 years in the public service in 2017 it was a change of pace I was looking forward to: a mix of physical work on our property in Mount Marua, church leadership, Rotary and of course overseas travel in the mix. Within a couple of years that dream began to change as Mary and I downsized and moved into our new home in Silverstream; Mary retired March 2020 when Covid and subsequent lockdowns came along.
So the question is “do we have spare time”?? The short answer is ‘we don’t seem to have much.”
Post the lockdowns we re-evaluated the future ahead and purposed to spend more time with our family and many good friends around New Zealand. There have been challenges though: Mary is an active Justice of the Peace and is on a roster to help people at the Upper Hutt library as well as providing JP services at home – I find myself being her secretary answering phones and booking appointments for her. We are both involved in our local church, me on the leadership and Mary and I running a weekly home group for many years. We find the weekly commitments we have for church and Rotary for example have meant that is not so easy to schedule time away from home. Both Mary and I are avid readers, we love sitting in the afternoon sun with a book in hand. My current read is a publication authored by Andrew Lawler “Under Jerusalem” the buried history of the World’s most contested city. Most interesting!
We have just come back from our most recent “road trip” - four days in Napier and Hastings to catch up with family and friends. It was really great to have that face time with people we care for rather than using technology and getting a deeper understanding of what they have been through in recent months up there in “the Bay”. We are now planning our next road trip, which will probably be a quilting weekend at Horopito for Mary and her sisters. My job will be mowing lawns on the ride on mower, Yeah!