So exactly 2 years to the day that I started this thread (11/30/15), that being yesterday, I walked into the CEO's office and announced my retirement!!! This came as a complete shock to him (he's 68 years old - I'm now 61 2/3)...He accepted this and I'm going to help him with transitioning to my replacement. He moves rather fast, so I may end up still being in the class of 2017, but more likely I see this as some time in January 2018, and at the very worst early February (in fact, that would be my max for me). No one in the company knows yet - it will be announced in a week or so.
He still hinted to see if I'd be available at times if he reached out to me and I told him OK, but it has to be completely on my terms and very minimal (e.g. - in my mind no more than 3-4 days a month, if even that). I'm known for my skills in the industry by other firms so they may be reaching out to me also. But again, if I want to keep active I'm only looking to work a max of 10% -15% of the hours I used to.
There were a few circumstances in the past few months building up to this grand day yesterday. First - I was getting tired of regularly attending industry events in the evening and getting off my commuter train late at night to see my car as the only car still parked in this huge parking lot - very depressing. Second - I realized that the hours continued to significantly impact other things I like to do - in fact the weekends were spent being in recover mode just to regroup for the upcoming work week. Third - I finally hit the scale a few weeks ago and saw that my weight was at least 25 pounds more than it should be Fourth - My wife and I recently took a short vacation to visit my son who now lives on the West Coast (we are on the East coast) and I spent the time mostly in the hotel room with bronchitis and a touch of pneumonia, and I attribute this from being rundown. Fifth - our two kids live far away and have their own businesses - so we now don't see them much at all - and we'd like to change that and Sixth - I cut the chord with my gym about 9 months ago because I didn't have time - this has been the first time in my life where I'm not physically active and I used to be a marathoner and played lots of sports.
So, I'm a little nervous but excited. I'm also an adjunct professor (which I love) so I'll make a few bucks doing that every other semester. My wife sells RE - she's been doing this for more than 20 years - and she will continue for awhile.
Meanwhile, since the start of my thread, my NW now stands at $2.65M ($2.2M without the house). This is about 62% in equities - 38% in bonds/cash. So the extra bump up in the market and me drawing a salary over the last 2 years gives me some more wiggle room.
Okay, so I need all of your good morale support as I venture into the next phase in life.
Thanks to everyone on this site for their previous uplifting comments to help get me to this point.
After all the planning, that is of prime importance. The new position sounds interesting, but intense.
