It’s Nice When Your Big Life Decisions Are Validated

If you’re a new reader and not familiar with my story, I reached financial independence accidentally by saving money and investing.  I semi-retired and went “half-time” to 20 hours a week at my job in late 2017.  I’ve been doing this 20 hour a week thing for so long now it’s become my new normal.  As I found out recently, that has implications. 

A few weeks ago, my happy-go-lucky life of leisure was dealt a shocking death blow from the past.  A week of misery validated my big decision to change paths.

 

By Choice

Let me state for the record that I still like being engaged at my W2 job for now, which is one of the two main reasons I don’t fully retire.  As long as I’m not managing anymore I find the work can still be intellectually stimulating and not too bad.  But 20 hours a week is plenty enough.

The other main reason I stay on part time is that I get to keep my healthcare plan, which despite a pretty significant cost is still way better than going on the ACA. 

And since COVID hit last March I’ve been working from home.  While a global pandemic is surely not the reason I would choose to become a work from home employee in an ideal world, it’s how it happened.  For me WFH is a silver lining of this whole mess. 

I absolutely love working from home.

 

Team Player

The project I’ve been working at my job unlike most government projects is on schedule and tracking for success.  I knew we would have a stressful February and March based on milestones, and I tried to prepare. 

In early February it was clear I was going to have to work a full 40 hour week to keep the project on course.  Holy crap, I hadn’t done a 40 hour week at my W2 job in over 3 years. 

Since I’m paid on a bi-weekly basis I’m required to work 40 hours every two weeks.  As a senior employee they allow me tons of flexibility and I can essentially make my own schedule, but since I went part time I’ve been sticking to 20 hours a week for the most part.  I usually do those 20 hours in two 10 hour days, that way I have 5 days off each week. 

I’m still a team player, so for the sake of the project I decided to take one week off completely and work 40 hours the week it was needed.  What I dreaded the most however is that the 40 hour week would be conference calls pretty much all day, every day. 

We would be interviewing and vetting technology companies to award a competitive contract.  Interviews were scheduled at the top of every hour, and lasted 50 minutes.  That gave us a whopping 10 minutes to finish our notes, and get ready for the next one. 

 

This Just Plain Sucks

As the week progressed, the suck-factor rose at an astonishingly rapid rate.  I was suddenly thrust back into the world that I purposely went part time to get out of.  The world of jam-packed days with barely any breaks, all day meetings with chat sessions running simultaneously, and basically chaos. 

In a nutshell it’s unhealthy and insane. 

At the end of every day I was mentally exhausted, that part was expected.  But I was also physically exhausted, my whole body was tired.  And I worked out way less that week. 

It was just like the old times, the bad ole times.  Studies suggest mental fatigue causes perceived physical fatigue, but not actual changes in biological measures.  Either way, my physical exhaustion felt real enough to me. 

I plopped down in bed every night feeling wasted.  And unlike normal, I had to keep doing it again the next day.

 

WFH = Amazing

Being at home basically stopped this really sucky week from breaking me.  I chatted to a colleague one day that I was going for a bike ride during our merciful one hour lunch break.  She said “A ride!?  How’re you fitting that in?“. 

She’s at the office, I’m at home.  That’s how.  Working from home gives sooo much flexibility. 

If I were at the office it would be a 5-7 minute walk to the gym to change into my riding clothes.  On the way I’d no doubt run into two or three folks I know and have to stop. 

“About that project blah blah….”

“Hey have you done any climbing lately?  I was reading an article about blah blah….”

Poof…..there goes 5 minutes, there goes 7 more.  Then I’d have to change, attempt to leave the building without running into someone else I know, walk the extremely long distance to get to my bike, and then attempt to ride.

Then I’d have to come back in early to leave enough time to shower quickly, change back into my work clothes, and get back to my desk before the next meeting.

Virtually impossible.  I’d be lucky to get 15-20 minutes of riding, and I’d be stressed the whole time.

But at home it went like this – during the final 15 minutes of the meeting before lunch, I’m changing into my cycling clothes.  No, I’m not on video calls – I do audio only for this reason! 

I was rolling my bike out of the basement door as I was hanging up the last call, and turning pedals 2 minutes later.  

On a couple of the days I was able to get a full 55 minutes of riding in, then walk back in the house and dial into the next meeting with a few minutes to spare.  It’s friggin’ fantastical. 

And with no one to watch me and judge I was able to change and eat as the next meeting went on. 

This is still not an ideal situation, but it beats the shit out of the alternative by a mile.

 

Choices, Validated

What a week.  Work-wise it was successful and we accomplished what we needed to.  But what I really took away from the week was a complete validation of my choice to semi-retire and go to half-time. 

I can’t live like that anymore, I couldn’t even fathom doing another week like that right afterwards.  That’s what my project colleagues had to do. 

As hellish as that week was I was still enjoying the benefits of working from home.  And I wasn’t dealing with management crap like I used to on top of everything.  I wasn’t even experiencing the full misery that I used to live every day!

The whole experience made me realize I’ve lost my tolerance to handle that shit.  I posted a while back about how I’ve been slowly losing my W2 muscles, but I’ve also lost the fortitude to handle the time-crunched chaos of that world. 

I generally don’t like to use the phrase “I’ve lost the ability to…” as I’d like to keep gaining abilities in life.  But in this case I really think I’m at peace with it.  I’ve become a full time white collar wuss, and that’s who I am. 

Deep down I know I could adapt back if I really needed to, but I have no interest in that.  Good riddance.

Financial independence has freed me from that fate.  I chose to semi-retire and in early February my choice was validated.