It immediately reminded me of Jeff Bridges 
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Nice work! I didn’t know about your upcoming retirement. Congrats! How do you feel about it?
Thanks for asking, PopsD. It’s complicated, so bear with me.
Three years ago, when covid hit, I was working as the marketing/communications director for one of the colleges at the local university. I had worked there for only six months. It sounded like a new and exciting job at first, but once there, I found the faculty unfriendly and difficult to work with. The dean I worked for was also crazy — quite literally nuts.
When covid hit, most classes were handled remotely as students, faculty, and staff were told to do everything from home when possible. Temporary furloughs began occurring, and the “crazy” dean was forced out and was scheduled to be replaced by a new person who wanted to bring in her own people.
I decided to leave the toxic drama behind and focus on my freelance clients. That soon turned into full-time work, but I really missed working with teams of creative people at the agencies where I’d previously worked. I also missed working on the big jobs agencies get as opposed to the piecemeal work that one-person businesses seem to attract.
If this had happened 20 years ago, I think I would be out hustling bigger clients, looking for a partner, and growing the business. In hindsight, maybe I should have done that back then.
Anyway, I’m bored with the piecemeal work I’m doing. I have several great clients, but I’ve not felt the urge to search for others as projects end. It sounds a little weird, but I don’t really need the extra money. I’m also rediscovering what made me go into this field in the first place — the joy associated with art and creativity. This thread is an example of that. There’s also the added advantage at this stage in life of being able to share what I’ve learned over the years with others.
With all that said, I don’t have a date set for retiring. I have a feeling that one day in the near future, I’ll look back on the preceding months and realize that I’m more or less retired without having noticed that it happened. Like it or not, life moves on.
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Thanks for Sharing, J-B! You are correct—it is the JOY of art and creating that drives all of us to continue this whacky biz. In fact, with virtually every college intern I had the pleasure of taking under my wing over my five decades in the biz, the best advice I always gave them was:
“If you get into graphic design and advertising for the money you will become easily discouraged. Do it because you LOVE IT. That way, you will always do your best work. And because you are doing your best work, the people higher up than you will always recognize it. And that will eventually bring you to the best, most influential people. And that is when you will get paid well for it.”
Just as true 50 years ago as it is now.