Hearts in Hawai'i
The Final Goodbye
3/27/2020
A new policy regarding how our schedules were to be submitted prior to each pay period struck me as being fairly dictatorial. When this happened, I began having regrets of changing my retirement date from March 27 to May 29. The initial date wasn't official, of course; I had submitted nothing in writing but it was a "courtesy" of sorts. This new administrative rule made clear to me that loyalty was a one-way street; the Agency I worked for didn't care for its employees other than knowing how they could make Administration look good. I wanted to move my retirement date back up to the original date of 3/27. The problem with this was that I really didn't want to sacrifice that extra $50-70 each month in PERA pension by setting an earlier date.
There were certain steps which had to be taken prior to retiring. One of these steps was a "pre retirement" meeting with Beth Menor. At the first meeting on January 31 I was informed of what I needed to do prior to the final meeting which would happen 1-4 weeks before retirement. I would have to complete a retirement letter and submit this to my supervisor announcing my retirement date and the final day I would work. I would need to apply for PERA benefits--I immediately made an appointment for a meeting at their office on February 6.
What I thought I had understood about the PERA "High Five", used to calculate the monthly pension, was wrong but I didn't know this until the first meeting. I handed my pension application to Kristen, the Benefits Coordinator which led to a chat about High 5. She asked me "Since you're so interested in maximizing your High Five, why not work until May 27?"
It soon was explained to me that the High Five wasn't based on when you were paid, but on when you earned your salary! The formula was simple--you took your daily wage and multiplied it by the number of days you're on the payroll for that month. That constitutes your monthly earnings. It had nothing to do with whether you received two or three paychecks (we were paid every two weeks so twice a year there would be an extra check in a given month) in the month.
Kristen than ran a new calculation and printed out the results. By working until the end of May, I would only realize $12 more per month. Patty looked at me and said "Go in March". In light of other things going on in the office, and how tired I was of that constant chatter in our office requiring my use of headphones (thanks, low partitions!), it immediately looked like an extremely good idea. By the time we'd left the PERA office, I was only 50 days from retirement instead of 106 days. Nice!!
After submitting a notarized application with the new retirement date, I applied to Social Security for benefits and completed my retirement letter. I had to supress a grin as I gave my retirement letter to my supervisor the next day. She did notice the new, earlier date and had no reaction other than to say "Well, we'll make it work". Obviously I didn't care whether or not it would work. It would no longer be my problem.
As I trained my supervisor on the myriad of tasks I was required to do, nearly all of them monthly tasks, the countdown to zero continued. In the midst of this, a new sickness, Coronavirus, (it would be called COVID-19) had migrated worldwide from its origins in China. This was something to be taken extemely seriously, as 3-4% of people contracting the virus were dying of this. The retirement party Patty and I were planning for our friends and relatives at the Golden Inn had to be scrapped.
As the final two weeks up to retirement commenced, people were asking me "How does it feel?" in reference to the fact that, after 39 years, my career with St. Louis County was about to end. "Weird" was how I most often replied, because it was! There was the excitement of knowing that my life was about to enter a new phase of freedom. On the other hand, there were fears of COVID-19, of not knowing how not having a set structure in my life was going to affect me, and knowing that a purpose of my life, to contribute to society, was about to end. My previous ideas of what I was going to do after retirement, in the short term, had been affected greatly by this new deadly virus. I would have to isolate to a great degree. Isolation isn't good for me. How would I react? Those questions would be answered in due time, but not yet.
UMD's quest for a National Championship "three-peat" was ended when the NCAA canceled the 2020 tournament. While the boys' hockey state tournament would continue, the state basketball tournament was canceled. Malls closed, as did restaurants and bars. Millions of people were nearly immediately laid off. It was estimated that the U.S. economy would undergo a 10% contraction in the second quarter of 2020.
All of this was happening against the backdrop of my impending retirement. While Patty and I joined Shar and Steve for dinner at Grandma's on March 14 (only a few days before indoor dining was banned in Minnesota), the family birthday parties for me, Bruce and Patty were canceled.
Throughout this, the County refused to close our agency and send everyone to work from home. The closest they came was on March 18 when they said people had the option to stay home and use accumulated leave if they were concerned about exposure to the virus. Well, other than the clearly ignorant, who wasn't concerned? They did, however, close the Government Services Center to clients on March 19 & 20. It was very unusual sitting up in those chairs on the second floor during coffee breaks, seeing no activity where they had previously been a steady flow of folks coming and going.
Monday, March 23 was my last "official" day of work. By that I mean everyone was sent home that afternoon. Our work unit had to have one person in the office in order to print certain client-related checks--I was left off the list of who had to come in, since I was so "short" by then. The rest of us had to be home either working from home (where possible) or tethered to their phone in case questions came up in the office about their job. A couple people gave me congratulatory cards, a few others wished me well. I did go back into the office for a few hours on Thursday to review and make a couple small changes to my job description. This 53-page manual would make it possible for my basic tasks to be completed by someone familiar with the software programs I used.
On the next and final day I went to work with camera in hand; after taking pictures of the surrounding area from whatever vantage points I could find on the upper floors of this seven-floor building, I spoke with Gwen for a while. Besides her and my supervisor, nobody else was there. I turned in my badge at 1 p.m. and walked out the door for the final time as a County employee.
Previous: 8/3/2019--Looking Ahead To Retirement
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