Broke at 61 and Loving it
How did this come to be? This is a fair question but at the time I chose not to answer it, because it has no relevance in this situation. The why or how I am in this predicament is of little or no importance. The fact is that I am and this is what I want to cover.
When you are 61 years old and discover that you are completely without funds, property or any other tangible asset that could be converted to cash you have to stop and take a look at where you think you are headed. By all appearances it would look like you are headed for abject poverty as you progress in years. This is a very real possibility and one that no one likes to contemplate. Finding out that you are this old and have no funds is just about like finding out that you can’t swim just after you’ve been thrown in the river.
When this happens you have only two choices. One is to sink to the bottom and die. The other is to flounder around and try to stay on the surface long enough to reach shallow enough water that you can stand up and keep your head above it. The idea of learning to swim now seems a little bit like too little to late. More or less the way I find myself now. The prospect of replacing the money and property I thought I would have when I reached retirement age is slim to none. At first I considered seeking employment and working for a few years longer in the hope of regaining some of my finances, but it took only a short time to realize that at my age this simply isn’t going to happen. I have numerous qualifications and documents that should get me employment that would pay well. I soon discovered that most if not all companies are not interested in someone of my age group. This is a sad situation in so much as there are a lot of us out there that have a lot to offer and will work as hard or harder than our younger counterparts. The law states that companies are not to discriminate due to a lot of factors, one of them being age. The simple truth of the matter is that almost all employers do discriminate when it comes to age. So with this reality instilled in my feeble mind I resigned myself to the sad fact that I was not going to regain my financial independence any time soon.
The next logical step was to look at my situation as it stands. It took me only a few minutes to figure the math and I can’t say I was pleased with the results. In the absolute best-case scenario I could figure on around $900 to $1000 from social security at age 62 and a small pension from an employer of around $270 per month. So at best I would wind up with $1270 a month. This of course is if social security stays afloat as long as I do. If it were to go away I would not end up with enough to even feed myself. This is not a complaint it is just a simple fact. This equates to an astonishing income of around $15000 a year. As we all know this is below the poverty level and barely enough to live on, but enough to keep one from starvation. Now I also realize that I will have no medical coverage at all until I reach the age of 65. I have a job now that doesn’t pay one third of what I should be making but it does come with the option of having medical insurance that I have to pay for but at a rate I can afford. It looks like I will have to keep this job for a while just for the insurance if for no other reason.
I will have to be careful that I don’t make too much money and lose some of my social security. The government wouldn’t like to see some of us old geezers make too much and draw our social security too. You never know we might just get too independent for our own good. So now that I have resigned myself to my situation and figured the outlook I can’t say I am sad or worried about it, The fact is that now that I am broke I don’t have to worry about losing what I have. I already did this and to think I used to worry about it. I also find that I am happier than I have been in years, I guess I owe a lot of this to the relief from stress caused by worrying about losing the money I used to have. It’s not like the things I used to have were given to me, no I worked very hard for everything I had. I was never lazy when I was younger and I probably worked as hard or harder than most people I know did. But who said that life has to be fair? Life is not fair but life is not boring especially when you are on the brink of extinction. I have a better prospective of how the dinosaurs probably felt when they knew the end was near. I could have passed on with money left behind a few years ago but if I had I wouldn’t have had the chance to find out how it is without anything. The truly good thing about this situation is that I have to work now and in doing so I have come to realize that I will probably keep my mental capacity longer. I will stay in better physical condition because I will have to get up every day and do something. I am not a optimist by nature but there does always seem to be something good in any situation. I read something that summed it all up and I think it merits passing along. [Don’t dwell on all the things you have lost but think about what you still have]
