The irksome question I face regularly after retiring from job is: “How do you pass your time?” Folks keep advising me solicitously to “keep yourself busy”. The social myth that “unless you are busy, you are bored”, is deeply entrenched in our psyche. To quell the incessant quizzing, I am penning here a note of elucidation.
I had always nurtured a penchant for ‘writing’ ever since I passed out from university with a postgraduate degree in English literature. Despite paucity of time for writing during the service, I kept the literary flame lit by contributing to the in-house magazine. After retirement, I have devoted myself fully to writing — a vocation I had long kept in abeyance. Through writings which capture and reflect my experiences and perspectives, I am summing up my life.
Retiring at the age of 60 in 2019, I embarked upon an ambitious mission to write 60 stories. I increase the target by one for every year after 60. Now that my age is 64, the revised target is 64. I have already written more than 40 pieces averaging 500 words each — mostly autobiographical in anecdotal template. The backlog will be cleared in a couple of years when the number of published pieces will draw level with my current age. Thereafter, my goal would be one piece per month.
For a writer, writing is the easier part or in other words is less arduous than getting published. I have however never let frequent rejections dampen my morale. A note of regrets from the editor motivates me to improve my writing. To maximise readership, I upload published pieces on my social media handles and various WhatsApp groups. My acquaintances subsequently help amplify my writings. Without an audience, written composition is as good as unwritten.
One idea or the other keeps lurking in the mind of a writer. On a conducive day, I sit down and write a draft of around 800 words. Then over the next 10 days or so, I chisel the piece down to 500 words — the size that fits the appropriate columns I send my contributions to. Redundant text has to be removed; the piece has to be made coherent. It takes almost a fortnight for me to process a 500-word piece.
Besides the project of summing up my life, there are numerous domestic chores I happily attend to. Some bill or the other is always due. All the paraphernalia at home demands repair and maintenance off and on. Then there are social commitments I can’t excuse myself from citing “busy schedule in office”. I also devote at least one hour for the fitness of my body on exercise and walks. I browse social media and watch OTT in the idle time I am left with.
All in all, my life is busier than it was before the retirement. The key difference is now I am busy in activities I love doing.
chander59@icloud.com
