Dear LPG,

I have recently joined forces with the pensioners of the UK, and having enjoyed the luxury of being able to get up later in the mornings and being able to choose what I want to eat when I want to eat, I began to get a little bored.  It only took about six months for me to realise that these luxuries can be overrated and that I needed to do something a little more meaningful with the rest of my life.

I was surprised at how much time there is to think about things even if you did not pass this milestone as a person who lives on their own.  My lady wife retired about three years before me and she has managed to carve herself out a busy itinerary, so much so that I soon learned that feeling of being in the way and realised that I had to do a bit of carving of my own. 

I first thought that I would like to find a group of ‘younger’ pensioners of a similar age to myself but I quickly learned that all groups of ‘younger’ pensioners have a habit of ageing just like the rest of society’s friends and there will always be pensioners of all ages in them.

I recently got involved as a volunteer at a lunch club where my wife is not a member and I find that gives me a chance to talk objectively, which perhaps is one of the activities that I miss most when I remember work.  I think that the opportunity to talk to people about subjects far removed from your personal life has a really positive effect on your outlook, even if only because you then have something new to offer when you return home.  Perhaps one of the things that I found missing was being able to bring subjects to the table which my wife had not experienced with me when we settled down at the end of the day.

During one of those talks in the lunch club we started to discuss when you really become old.  One contributor to the conversation suggested, ’when you retire’ while another said ‘when you get to 75’.  Many other ideas were thrown into the ring as well, but then a wise (dare I say ‘old’) man gave a little speech that I will remember for a long while.  He said…

‘I don’t work anymore, I don’t get out as much as I used to, I see many of those people that I used to consider my close friends much less often, I have trouble working out what you are supposed to do with all the new-fangled gadgets that appear in telly adverts almost daily, I ache more than I used to, I am a bit bigger and slower than I used to be, I prefer my music a bit softer these days and when asked my age I now say a number that begins with a 7.  But, ladies and gentleman, I will concede to being older than many of the people at this club, and on this earth, but I refuse to be called ‘old’.

I have to say that I think that we all need to take a leaf out of his book no matter what number we say first when asked, ‘…and how old are you?’

PY, Forest Hill

LPG has found a few suggestions which may be of some use to likeminded newly-retired pensioners who are looking for a starting point when working out what to do with the rest of their life …

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