Tired

Tired was Originally Posted on September 22, 2013 by lavarock

When you are retired hopefully you can sit back and relax. I don’t seem to be that kind of person. I didn’t choose retirement, it was thrust upon me before I was ready. My company, in a widely known “purging” let go tens of thousands of employees. I was to be one of them. I chose the early retirement rather than staying because I would have subsidized health care, could move to Hawaii soon and probably would not have been able to retain my job for much longer.

I was able to be hired by a contractor to work at a similar job in my company for a year, but at reduced pay.

The move to Hawaii happened as most of you know. Some friends and ex-employees thing that I moved here to become a coffee farmer. I did not. I wanted to live away from the wild weather and temperatures on the mainland, wanted some land and a place where there was just less strife. I found it in an affordable farm on the Big Island of Hawaii.

5 acres and a house, low water rates, high electric rates and high gasoline prices. Still, it is cheaper per month to live here than the Atlanta area.

I am at 900 foot elevation where it gets a bit nippy some nights, plummeting down to 65! Some say 65 is good sleeping weather, but this house has no insulation and really good airflow around and under it. During the day it goes up to perhaps 85 and we often have a nice trade wind of 15 mph.

I can see the Pacific from the house, about 3 miles away or so. I guess I could double check that on Google Earth, but does it really matter?

At the bottom of my street and hidden from my view from the house now by trees, is Kealakekua Bay where the Captain Cook Monument is. The first non Pacific Islands set foot here. The trivia is that Captain Cook brought his ship here but had his ships master leave the ship first. That ships master soon got his own ship and didn’t live in the shadow of being Cooks second in command or anything. The masters ship was the Bounty and Captain Blighe had his own problems near Pitcairn Island. As they say, THAT is another story.

Still, that bay is a great stop for visitors as often there are dolphin playing, there is a photo someone took of a whale and her baby there and it makes a nice place to take photos.

A few miles south is the Place of Refuge with hand-carved tikis, and a small national Park. From here you can explore tide pools, see turtles learn some Hawaiian history and bake in the sun. Yes just 3 or 4 miles from my house at the ocean edge, it can be sunny and hot, while at my house it is overcast and raining. This is not an isolated incidence. On this island we have micro climates. It can rain on one part of my property and not on another. If you drive a few miles the wetaher is different.

Up north on the island is the town of Waimea. Home to the Parker Ranch, there is a “wet” side of town and a “dry” side of town. You can pretty much draw a line in the road where that dividing line is and has to do with moist air and a ridge. Waimea town is only a few miles long.

Of the 13 world climate zones, we have 11 on an island the size of Connecticut. If I want to see the desert, it is a short drive away, right near the rain forest. We do get snow on the top of both volcanoes but only during part of the year. We have an active volcano spewing lava, but it is a few hour drive from me and not a concern. Our volcanoes don’t explode much (although I mention that with an ‘*’).

When you drive around our island you may see flashing lights on an emergency vehicle. They often don’t sound the sirens because people pull over automatically. People seem to get along together well and most of our crime is petty theft, but we do have a bit of major crime (just watch Dog the Bounty Hunter). Realize that he often does not come to our island but stays on Oahu (Honolulu).

I have Kaiser for healthcare. They have small offices on the islands and I think we have 3 or so on this one. Still, it is more cost effective for them to fly us to Honolulu for major tests and operations than to put MRIs or specialists in each clinic. Most people with Kaiser in the islands loves them. That is not always the case for a HMO on the mainland.

More-so than other places, many people move here and few leave. There are some families who decide to go back to the mainland, but I think it is less than people who just move around back there. Once most make the commitment to move here, they stay. In fact, another ex-employee of my old company is making the move in January. He got a good deal on a farm just a few miles up the road from mine. His place has some coffee and fruit trees and will be a nice final move location for him and his wife.

So there is lots to do both on the island and on my own farm. I have been mowing again (an ongoing procedure). I’m processing coffee and caring for the dogs. I sold one litter last year and may breed the girl this year, I have not decided yet. It does bring in a bit of income here, because people tend to pay more for Labradors raised here because of the added cost to fly in dogs from the mainland or Australia. I will tell you that if you are a good Vet, there is a spot here for you!

So although I am supposed to be retired now, I have lots of work to do and little enthusiasm to do it. Isn’t that what retirement is all about?