And you run and you run to catch up with the sun but it’s sinking
Racing around to come up behind you again
Sun is the same, in a relative way, but you’re older
Shorter of breath and one day closer to death
-Pink Floyd, Time
I’m always listening to music; progressive rock and progressive metal are some of my favorites. I tend to listen while I’m walking, and today I went to get groceries, enjoying the music and the walk. “Time” came on, and I was grateful that work is currently recreational.
With so little time on this Earth, and even less in good health, I no longer spend my days waiting for time to pass so I can go home. That was one of the worst feelings. I don’t mind working, but spending 40 hours a week in a library was sometimes okay and sometimes felt like torture. I once worked alone for three months on a book list spreadsheet in an office with no windows and little social interaction. There was hardly time for anything except a short hello to my future wife while some papers printed.
During that job as Chief of Acquisitions for a major library, I first started devoting myself to the hope that FIRE offered. I was desperately trying to find other work in the federal government, even if it meant moving to the other side of the country. I stayed in that position for two years because I didn’t want to leave the federal government and was waiting for the right opening.
Eventually, I found a position in Oklahoma as director of a small Air Force library, where I could be as social as I wanted to be.
Each dollar I made gave me a little more freedom, including the freedom to move across the country for a new job. When I was Chief of Acquisitions, my life savings would have been gone within a year without income, but slowly, then rapidly, we reached financial independence.
Now financial independence gives me all the time in the world to enjoy my wife and daughter, earn a slightly better return working with real estate, write this blog, talk with family in the US, enjoy the perfect weather of Cuenca, and even, GASP, work a little.
No more staring at the clock in a windowless office, waiting 20 minutes to go home. I own the most important thing: my time.
I never wanna be old
And I don’t want dependence
It’s no fun to be told
-Porcupine Tree, Sentimental
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