The need to upset the routine

Even in retirement there is routine.

It's not like, as some people believe, you retire from a career of work and begin a career of loafing around. At least that's not the experience that Baby Boomers, including this one, want for themselves.

We need to be doing something. In general, this is a generation of achievers -- over-achievers, in some cases -- and the idea of doing nothing is not an option.

In retirement we want to decide what to do with our time, not have someone decide or dictate for us what we do with our time.

My time is goes to writing and data mining as a contractor and sub-contractor. And my time goes to keeping myself healthy by going to the gym. And my time goes to keeping myself engaged in the outdoors by golfing, surfing and skiing.

And my time has a routine to it.

I'm in my home office between 6:30 and 7 a.m. each day to boot-up my computer and start writing for a couple of hours. I get to the gym usually by mid-morning. Then I get home for lunch and spend the afternoon doing rest of my contract and subcontract work. Within that routine I'll make room for the round of golf, a few hours in the surf, or some time on the mountains.

Even that routine, as appealing as it might be, needs to be broken up every now and then.

Which is why I've been happy to have been on a road trip this week to Maryland, Delaware and New Jersey.

It is said that writing is discovery. Writers explore their surroundings and discover something of themselves when they put words to paper (or words to screen). It is a mental journey.

Travel is discovery too, a tactile journey of the five senses:

• The feel of warmth of a late September sun in the left field seats at Camden Yards in Baltimore;
• The scratch of sand in my toes on Rehoboth and Dewey beaches in Delaware;
• The fleeting glimpse of dolphin leaping from the water;
• The taste of crab in the dip at Striper Bites in Lewes, Del.;
• The gentle roll of the ferry from Lewes to Cape May, N.J.;
• The glimpse through binoculars of the migrating raptors at Cape May Point.;
• The hum and clang of slots inside Caesar's and Trump casinos at Atlantic City;
• The aroma of the frutti de mare that came from the kitchen to my plate at Basil T's Brewery and Italian Restaurant in Red Bank, N.J.

In writing I can take myself so far. Travel outside of the routine takes me the rest of the way there.