One Chapter Ends...

No art filled news this week, but the week became unexpectedly momentous for me. I officially handed in my resignation and will retire on the day of the summer Solstice, June 21. I knew that it would happen, I just hadn't been certain when it would happen, or how it would look when it happened. During a discussion with my most excellent 'boss lady' this week I knew that the moment had arrived. 

For some months I had been having inner dialogues with myself and dithering about the practicalities, the "what if's", the good, bad and indifferent considerations. How much notice to give, would it even matter how much notice I gave? Was I even sure that this was a change I wanted to make? Of course, I think that we all struggle with retirement, and I don't mean just on the financial "what-if" level. There are so many things to consider. We have our family family, our friends family and our work family. These connections are not severed willy nilly - at least not when one is of a more mature age  and has been in a job for quite a long time!

For me, being the hermit that I am, work was my "in the world" time. Now I will have to push myself to socialize more, but I'm thinking that this is something that I will choose to do more easily without the constant fatigue of the work week.

This morning a friend sent me a congratulations quote that says "the longer that you wait for the future the shorter it will be "(loesje). That really did have an impact on me! The only thing that I have ever wanted to do was to make art. My father refused to pay for art school and so, at age 16, I set off into the real world of rent and food and bills, and I had little time to worry about making art. I was more into 'making the bills' every month! It's amazing how much the monetary reality of life can change your prospective! I'm proud that I was successful in a more right minded business for so long, but it did, inevitably, drain my soul. Now, it's time for me to reclaim a bit of that artful longing that drove my youth.

This is my chance to 'be' the person that I had always hoped to be. I may not be famous, but I do hope to make a little extra money selling my felted bags and other small art works, but I will, once again, have the word 'possibility' in my vocabulary. My life will spread out before like a dew kissed wide green lawn on a summer morning; sparkling with possibilities and, I'm sure, a few moments of utter terror and my life rearranges itself. I feel like I have taken the first step onto a diving board and, as I approach the end of board, I hope to have the courage and the faith to simply leap off of the end in joy.