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I'm one of those who did move upon retirement. Born, raised, and lived my whole live in SoCal, pre-retirement. Upon retirement, I moved to North Idaho. It gets cold here in the winter, but nothing like the mid-west. Cold by California standards, pretty mild by Wisconsin standards.
I keep pretty busy in the winter, both outdoor activities and indoor. Tennis switches to the indoor courts, but the bicycles are put away for the winter because I don't want to take the time and effort to "bundle up". I love being outdoors this time of year because there are no tourists out and about. More times than not, I have the "place" to myself and the pups. I can let them off leash without worries because nobody is around.
Sleep patterns are changing. This winter, I've been staying up until midnight or maybe even later. Sleep in until the dogs get me up around 8:30 or so.
We have animals who have to be put in and fed dinner at dark. That's their routine. Our routine after that is to watch about an hour of TV and fall asleep.
In summer, that's about 10:00, sometimes later to wait until it cools down a bit.
In winter, especially when the weather is nasty, it is getting dark and cold around 4:30.
That means sometimes in winter we're ready for bed by 6:00 Maybe 7.
Course then we're up at 4 am.... and it doesn't get light til after 8.
Did you ever stop to think what life was like before electric lights, radio/TV etc?
People went to bed at sundown and got up at sunrise--Actually, people were accustmed to "two sleeps," That involved sleeping from sundown to about midnight, waking for 1-3 hrs , then returning to sleep. If you read 18th or 19th century literture, you'll often see the term "second sleep" mentioned...and most of the world has been accustomed to naps (siesta etc) in the afternoon. It's healthier to go with what MotherNature intended for us.
With a little creativity & imagination, one can always find ways to occupy their time, if one has creativity and imagination.
I think about that quite often and have heard about the sleeping habits of people before artificial light became common.
In the relentless and unquestioned drive for affluence and convenience, “developed” societies have lost a lot of priceless things that we didn’t even hunt down, sequester, buy, or APPRECIATE.
Every time I look out at a beautifully dark night sky pinpointedwith brilliant stars, I think about how the most convenient, well-amenitied, materially prosperous places don’t have this gift from the universe.
Winter skies on clear, cold nights stand out for their stark panoramas. I’ll take infinite natural wonder over infinite convenience any day or night.
This thread reminds me of a quote from my sweet little Grandmother, telling stories from her youth. My grandmother's name was Elvina, which she said was a play on the word Eleven, for she was the eleventh child.
I said WOW, eleven! Why so many?
She said well, they said it was a big farm and they wanted the hands to work the fields... but she said the truth is she didn't think they were all that planned, it was just very cold in Minnesota in winter, and back then there just wasn't much else to do after dark.
Last edited by Diana Holbrook; 03-04-2022 at 05:44 PM..
This thread reminds me of a quote from my sweet little Grandmother, telling stories from her youth. My grandmother's name was Elvina, which she said was a play on the word Eleven, for she was the eleventh child.
I said WOW, eleven! Why so many?
She said well, they said it was a big farm and they wanted the hands to work the fields... but she said the truth is she didn't think they were all that planned, it was just very cold in Minnesota in winter, and back then there just wasn't much else to do after dark.
my sweet little Grandmother, telling stories from her youth
(I guess I skipped over the "retiree" part of the thread)
Last edited by Diana Holbrook; 03-04-2022 at 07:34 PM..
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