Month: June 2018

A few years back, quite a few, when I was in my thirties I played another guy in a singles tennis match.  He was maybe 19 years old and it was brutally hot and while I was clearly the better player I lost.  I lost because he was 19 and seemed impervious to the heat, while I was 35 and just got gassed out there on the 140 degree F concrete.  And that led me to take up a new discipline, running.

 

I started slowly running only as far as I could comfortably, maybe a quarter mile, and then walking until I felt I could run again.  I did that for a solid month on the streets around our house and by the end of the month I was running 2.5 miles continuously with no rest breaks.  I kept that up four times a week for the next few years, moving to town when the horseflies and deerflies became too intense.  In town I ran at a track where a running club also ran and they eventually adopted me into their group.

 

They scoffed at my short 2.5 mile runs and within a couple of weeks they had me running ten milers and eventually introduced me to marathons.  We had a great time road tripping to marathons all over the country and it really did help my tennis a little so I kept it up.  Today I want to tell a story about the single most moving thing I ever saw on a run, something that makes me misty eyed now, years later just to write about.  I did include a paragraph about this in a previous post but I thought it was worth revisiting in a little more detail so here it is.

 

The Marine Corps Marathon is held in the Washington DC area every year.  Some 30,000 people from 50 countries participate in the event and much of the organization and volunteer staffing is provided by service men and women.  It circles around DC and Arlington VA and takes in some historic sites and has a very patriotic feel to it that is unique among the marathons I’ve run.

 

As is common among large marathons there is a wheelchair class that starts prior to the runners and at some point if you are fast enough you will pass some of the competitors in that group.  And this is my story.

 

 As usual with any big race there is quite a lot of milling about and standing around before the start as everyone is herded into position.  But finally we were off and I settled into my mindless trance of thinking about anything but how far I had left to run.  I was looking at the scenery, the other runners, anything that kept me from obsessing about only being six miles into a twenty-six mile run!  I was not well trained, and that is a big mistake in long distance racing and therefore my attitude starting out was one of feeling sorry for myself and a little dread as to how much this was going to hurt and whether I could finish the course. But other than having a pretty sorry attitude I was doing OK.

 

Then up ahead in the distance I saw a…formation?  You see a lot of things in a marathon, people in costumes, people juggling while running and even people running barefoot sometimes but I had never seen this.  I was intrigued!  As I got closer I could see it was four marines clad in full battle gear running in formation with a wheelchair racer in the center.  While the four running marines all had big heavy packs on, two of them also had something else strapped to their backs but they were far in the distance and I could not make out what this unusual collection of men represented.

 

I was thrilled to have a target ahead of me and a puzzle to solve because with any luck I would be able to go a couple of miles figuring out what this meant and oblivious to the monotony and pain involved in the race.  Runners are faster than wheelchair racers so I steadily closed the distance until I was running right behind the Marines.  And I still have tremendous difficulty talking about this or even typing it right now because I was so swept with an emotional wave that has stayed with me for the ten years that have passed since this transpired.

 

The wheelchair racer was a Marine who had lost his legs in an IED attack in the Iraq War.  The four Marines were fellow members of his platoon and the two objects I had not been able to recognize strapped on their backs were his prosthetic legs.

 

Up to this point I had been lamenting my situation, poorly trained, already hurting six miles into the race, no chance at a personal best time.  Twenty more miles to go and my attitude was awful and childishly self-centered.  Poor poor me!  And yet here was this young man in his twenties, no legs, but proud to be representing his Corps and his country with nothing but his arms to propel him the extreme distance. He was resolute and focused and not whining like I was.  And here were his brothers carrying not only 40 pound packs but also…his legs.

 

I am not a crier. OK maybe if I’m watching a sad movie and I’m all alone I might, but if no one sees it, did it really happen?   But I cried, I ran and I cried because it hit me hard what he had lost.  He would never run again, he would struggle to do simple tasks in a world designed for fully mobile people and he was only in his twenties.  He had no doubt been as fit as the manly men running at his four corners in formation.  And those guys, running in so much gear and in military boots and carrying huge packs, and his legs, carrying his legs.   Running for him, for their brother, for the ideal that their service represents to them and to this country.  I just have no words for this, it was too real.

 

I was torn between admiration for these young men and shame over my weakness and pathetic lack of grit.  I quickly passed them and ran on the rest of the race.  And rather than a two mile distraction that experience became a ten year inspiration because since then, anytime I feel like I can’t finish, that my particular problem of the day is too hard, I think about that Marine, and his brothers in arms, and I shake my head in wonder at myself.  Of course, I can finish this, he did.  They did.

 

This community of people who are seeking to make sense of their finances, to escape regimented unfulfilling jobs, to travel, to be frugal, to live unconventionally but to fully live, remind me of those marines quite often.  There are so many who prove by example, like the wheelchair Marine racer, that no matter the mountain of debt towering over you there is hope and there is victory that you can grind your way through to if you have a plan and if you persevere.  And like the Marines running alongside there are so many here who will inspire and encourage you when you are tired and sore or maybe just need a good thump on the head because you are not facing reality.

 

I hope you see that this is not an exercise in equivalency.  What wounded warriors have given to this country is in a class of its own and we aren’t their equals in any shape or any form.  But using great people to make good examples does not cheapen their sacrifice.  We need extraordinary people to inspire us in life and that is all I am doing here, honoring them.  And to the many of you who have served this country, thank you for your service, we so appreciate it.

 

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Well, actually I only made $1917.50 and I made it yesterday but it just is not as catchy when I say it like that.  All around it was a very odd day.  I got up that morning feeling like I needed to do a little bit of work on my normal consulting side gigs but I was still kind of sleepy after breakfast so I decided to take a nap.  I usually sleep like a dead man but that previous night not so well.  One of the best things about life after leaving the 9 to 5 behind is my schedule is very flexible and I can be shamelessly lazy on short notice, so I hit the couch about the time my former coworkers were hitting their desks and got a little nap in.

 

It was already a strange day because my current volunteer work had intersected my former corporate job for the first time since I had retired.  My old company was holding an annual charity fund-raiser and the community college I volunteer at was participating.  The college offered tickets to my wife and I to the dinner celebration that night where I knew I would get to catch up with all my former coworkers, some of whom I had not seen in three years.  It sounded like fun!  Then it got weird, because I got a phone call after getting my nap in and was surprised to hear it was one of my former management team members.  They were in a bind, could not get the plant started up and the only expert they had on the problem areas was on vacation clear across the country.  It happened to be a niche area that I actually am kind of an expert in so I said, sure, I can come over and see if I can help.

 

The thing is, up until that phone call I had zero contact with my former plant since I left.  I left on great terms with retirement parties and dinners and hugs and jokes but when I left I left. In a small town the last thing a new facility General Manager needs is the former boss looking over her shoulder.  And my side gigs, while technical, weren’t really focused on solving chemical plant problems.  I had done a little work at one of their other plants down in Texas but I never thought they would want me to be active in my old plant because it might look like I was trying to come back to a full-time position which is not in my plans, ever again.  But the guy on the phone was my friend and he had a serious problem that I could probably fix so I said yes.  I got out my old work clothes and took that familiar 8-minute commute back to my old plant.

 

As I had expected everyone I bumped into when I walked into the offices was surprised and intrigued, immediately quizzing me about “Was I coming back?”  But soon I was immersed in the plant data and in interviewing operators and engineers about the problems they were facing.  Minutes turned into hours and before I knew it we had spent the whole day troubleshooting and the problems were solved and the plant was back to normal.  I charge $250 an hour for that kind of work but they felt like it was a bargain considering that the plant was making $100,000 a day more when I walked out than it was when I walked in.

 

I don’t market myself for this kind of work because it usually occurs on nights and weekends and involves sitting up all night at a bank of computer screens scratching your head over why things are not working right in addition to travel to a lot of remote plant sites.  Frankly not needing to ever earn another paycheck makes that kind of work unattractive.  I know it probably sounds crazy to avoid work that pays $250 an hour in this frugal and hard saving community but the simple fact is that if you have all you need then money ceases to have much incremental value.  I suppose I could earn it solely to give it away but that is not really very motivating to me right now.  I am not a kid any more and I am running out of time way faster than I will ever run out of money.  I think I’ll get enough calls from my old employer going forward to do one or two jobs like this a year and that’s plenty to keep my skills sharp.  And my other, steady, consulting will continue to generate the six figures that keeps my withdrawal rate at zero.

I got off “work” in time to go home and change for the party.  It was fun for my wife and me to see a lot of old friends we haven’t seen much of since I retired.  I was heavily quizzed about what retirement was like since many of my former coworkers are within two or three years of pulling the plug themselves.  Great I told them!  Some were puzzled by why I was still working at all and it is hard to explain. To many in this blogging community escaping the jobs they detest is their whole point of focus. I’m not sure I can answer that question yet, I am still a rookie at this retirement thing.   Who knows?  I might stop working altogether once I get it figured out.

But for now, it is fun to occasionally fly to the rescue like Iron Man, solve the problems, and fly off into the sunset.  And it is fun to get overpaid.  And it is fun to be the “expert” that everyone in the room turns to even if you know deep down inside that you are not that special.  It still feels special. And in a nice way it closes the gap on some questions I had about what my relationship was with a company I had spent over 30 years at.  I know how people blame current problems on the former boss who is not there anymore, they can become a convenient scapegoat since they have no voice to defend themselves.  Calling me back when they need help puts the stamp of approval back on me as having value in that company’s culture.  And that feels pretty good.  It does disappoint me a little that I felt I needed that, it is a slippery slope to base your own self esteem on the opinion of others.

All in all a pretty fun day and I just had to write about it to you, my anonymous friends.  I have had a plethora of fun days in the last three years and I highly recommend early retirement or if you can’t swing that, at least shoot for slightly early retirement like I did.  Preferably with a few side gigs.

 

What about you, would you ever go back to your former employer after you retire if a former coworker called you desperately needing your help?

 

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Have you ever thought back to how your life was totally changed by a single seminal event in your youth?  Maybe you can remember in excruciating detail what it was like when your parents sat you down as a kid and told you they were getting divorced.  Or maybe you were the quarterback on your high school football team and you threw the winning pass to clinch the state championship.  Possibly you knew at that instant, whether it was a moment of pain or joy, that you would never be the same person again because this was so major, so impactful, dare I say so HUGE that life would no longer follow the same path that brought you to this point. I’m not sure if this will resonate with most readers or only with a few but it does with me because I can trace the path of my entire adult life from one single moment with absolute clarity.

Now let me say, before I tell you the story, that I don’t claim to be Mr. Successful.  I’m not all that and a bag of chips.  I’m a reasonably accomplished financially independent side hustling guy with a great lifetime spouse, awesome grown kids and slightly early retirement from a career I thoroughly enjoyed.  That isn’t special to anyone but me but I consider it priceless because it has so completely exceeded the expectations I had of my future before that day…

You might be expecting me to hit you with a Hollywood crisis moment at this point.  An armed robbery and hostage situation, a 70 mile per hour bus roll over crash on the Interstate, a fall off of a 40 foot cliff or hitting a car head on while riding a bicycle.  All of those things did happen to me but the one that made the most difference was something you would miss if you were watching my life’s highlight reel.  It was the music minister at my church walking up to me and saying, “Steve, I’d like you to play a leading role in this musical play we are going to take on tour this summer.”

Really, a role in a church production?  Kind of underwhelming is it not?  Well, you’d have to have known me back then.  I was shy.  No that is simply not big enough, I was very, very horrendously shy.  I was not good at sports (except tennis, which hardly counted in Arkansas), I was not popular, my friends were not popular and my self image had me as being just a smart little nerd kid that kept quiet and stayed out of trouble.  I constantly day dreamed about being a cool kid, but felt deep down I never could be. I struggled to even make the simplest book review talk in school, I was terrified of being in front of my peers.  There is probably a clinical name for being that dysfunctional in front of others and whatever it is called I had a serious case of it.

And this was a big church, we had over 100 high school kids in the youth group including many of the most popular ones.  The four leads for the play were three popular guys and me.  I felt like I was in one of those kids puzzle books where the question is “Which one isn’t like the others?” and of course it was the shy nerdy kid who could not get a word out of his mouth in front of a group.

But I said yes.  I’m not sure where that courage to take what felt like an awful risk came from but I said yes. Even knowing and imagining in exquisite detail how I could flub up my lines or freeze with stage fright in front of thousands of people and forever solidify my place as a loser, I said yes.  I learned my lines and I learned that the popular guys were just like me, full of self doubt and scared of failing.  I saw them see me as an equal because I was every bit the actor they were and in fact was given the leading role in the production.

 And I was pretty good at it.  Amazingly everyone in the youth group started to see  me the way I had always wanted to see myself.  And from that summer on I never saw myself as inferior to anybody.  Sure I knew some people were better looking or had more extroverted personalities but there really wasn’t any social situation that I could not handle.  I felt like I could win, I was smart and I could step outside my comfort zone and be rewarded.

One thing after another started going my way. I met a popular and beautiful girl who loved me.  I picked a college major that fit me like a glove and I began to say yes to every opportunity I came across because I recognized that taking chances was the only way to grow and that deep down I was as good as everyone else in the room.  In fact I was just like everyone else in the room but because I could say yes without hesitating I could get to the front of the line.

 I was good at work, no, better than good, I was a rising star in the company.  I’d get notes from senior vice presidents congratulating me on my progress as a junior engineer.   And my entire career and civic life kept building by being able to step into roles I’d never filled before, with optimism and courage. I wasn’t naturally brave and fearless but my experience showed me undeniably that the risks were actually very small and the rewards very large for stepping out into newer and bigger challenges.   Certainly I found out that  I was better at some things than I was at others but either way I learned  that the prime quality required to succeed in life and business was the courage to take action.  And  once that became a habit, then it did not require much courage anymore.  It actually became fun to embrace new responsibilities!

Years later when I testified before Senate and House subcommittees in Washington DC I thought back to that play.  I remembered learning that role and realized that while I accepted it with sheer terror at the time, that now, facing off against hostile, professional politicians on camera I was no longer nervous. I was excited and thrilled to be there and to be in the game. The congressmen were just like the popular kids in high school, full of the same self doubt as the rest of us. In short they were just like me, no better and no worse.  And I think that is when it hit me, how my whole life changed on that answer I gave back in high school.  A simple yes, I’ll do it, I’ll be in that play.   And what if I had said no?  To tell you the truth it frightens and unnerves me to even think about how saying no to that one single opportunity might have just as easily become my life’s defining “go to” answer and how very sad and different my life might be now.

I’m not sure if anyone else would want a life like mine  spent solving puzzles of math, science, people and politics, but I love it, my past, my present and my future.  I feel like I got to do and be so much more than I ever expected and one possible definition of happiness might be exceeding your own expectations? Your expectations are your own, and if you are like I was way back then they may not be that inspiring.  But trust me, you are not locked into a mediocre life unless you choose to be.  You can say yes to a better future.

This community is all about turning financial lives around.  Thousands of people have changed their stars by stepping out of old comfortable, but destructive, spending habits. Because they took action their financial lives have been forever changed.  Most of them can think back to that one moment when they decided that what they were doing wasn’t working and that if they wanted different results they would have to try different answers.  If you are at the point of wanting a better financial life then do something you haven’t done before, say yes.  Sometimes a single yes can make all the difference.

Has your financial life changed because of a single point in time when you made a decision?

Did you have a pivotal moment in your youth that has had a huge impact in who you are now?

 

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