Kamal Ghorui
Ah, retirement—the golden parachute that often feels more like a deflated balloon animal than free bird soul. One minute you’re dreaming of endless golf swings, tracking in hills and beachside margaritas; the next, you’re staring at your cup of tea, wondering if it’s too early for a nap… or a rebellion.
Take Arijit Singh, the playback singer who’s hanging up his mic at a lively 38. Thirty-eight! That’s barely old enough to even have a midlife crisis, let alone retire. Meanwhile, MS Dhoni is out there captaining cricket teams into his 40s like he’s auditioning for an anti-aging infomercial. And politicians? Forget it. They’re like vampires—eternal, bloodsucking, and only retiring when the stakes get too high. As Benjamin Franklin wisely quipped, “In this world, nothing is certain except death and taxes.” He forgot to add retirement, which is about as certain as a politician’s promise.
The irony of retirement hits hardest to government servants, where mid-career fantasies involve quitting early to “pursue passions” (code for binge-watching Netflix). But as the big day looms, suddenly everyone’s petitioning for age extensions. “Just two more years!” they plead, as if the office water cooler holds the fountain of youth. Why? Because modern life has turned aging into a slow-motion replay. Thanks to kale smoothies, yoga apps, and that little blue pill called sildenafil (because who needs gravity when you’ve got chemistry?), we’re all feeling like sprightly 20-somethings—well, except maybe in the bedroom, where side effects might include an unplanned floor roll. As Mark Twain once said, “Age is an issue of mind over matter. If you don’t mind, it doesn’t matter.” But Twain clearly never dealt with a family WhatsApp group demanding hourly updates.
So, what do you do with all that leftover life? Rest? Ha!Ha! Retirement isn’t about kicking back; it’s about kicking off new chaos. Social media becomes your full-time job—feeding the beast with pics from exotic locales you only visit because your grandkids guilt-tripped you via emoji storms. “Look at me in Goa or Mashobra!” you post, conveniently cropping out the tiredness of journey and the suspicious street food aftermath.
One of my friends dove headfirst into marathons a few years back. Not the Netflix kind—the actual running ones. Now he’s trekking mountains, zip-lining over hills, and “exploring menus” at adventure cafes, which I suspect is code for justifying overpriced chow. Visiting religious places and pilgrimage is the latest fad. All these are inspiring, really, until you realize the “to-do list” is longer than the pre-retirement inbox. As Winston Churchill growled, “Success is not final, failure is not fatal; it is the courage to continue that counts.” Churchill probably meant wars, but it applies to outrunning your own mortality after retirement.
Government retirees, bless their bureaucratic souls, undergo a magical transformation. Suddenly, they’re vocal visionaries, penning op-eds on how to fix the very problems they ignored for decades. “It’s so simple!” they proclaim from their armchairs. “If only the newbies listened to my advice.” It’s like watching a retired chef critique a five-star meal while microwaving ramen. And then there’s the nostalgia trap—endless stories of “back in my day” glory, laced with self-boasting so thick you could spread it on toast. The young ones nod politely before fleeing to Instagram or TikTok, leaving retirees to congregate in parks, clubs, or some fancy clubs like India International Centre (IIC), where the air is thick with tales taller than the Patel’s statue. These oldies’ clubs are sprouting like weeds—perfect for swapping war stories without judgment. But let’s be real, in a world obsessed with youth, retirees often feel like yesterday’s news. Unless you’re a corporate tycoon clutching your fortune like a dragon hoards gold, society will treat you like a “Margdarshak“—a fancy Hindi word for “guide” that really means “smile for the photo and stay out of the way” else you are a leech.
The recipe for seniors is universal — remain senior but secluded. Keep smiling, but stop singing (sorry, dear Arjiit). Run marathons, but don’t meddle in family affairs. Celebrate birthdays with cake, but heaven forbid you give birth to a new idea—like suggesting the grandkids read a book instead of scrolling.
Politicians and former kings buck this trend, of course. They’re the exceptions, powering through their 70s and 80s like Energizer bunnies on steroids. Trump tweets tirades at dawn, Bibi Netanyahu dodges scandals like dodgeballs, and Modi wins elections with the vigor of a man half his age. Why retire when you can rule? As Aristotle pondered “We are what we repeatedly do. Excellence, then, is not an act, but a habit.” For these folks, ruling is the habit; retirement would be like asking a shark to stop swimming.
Philosophers have long wrestled with this “state of affairs.” Epicurus preached seeking pleasure in simple things—gardens, friends, cheese (okay, I added the cheese). But in our hyper-connected era, simple pleasures mean dodging spam calls while plotting your next viral post. It is not that we have a short time to live, but that we waste a lot of it. Wasting on endless scrolling, perhaps, or arguing with bots on Twitter. Yet, herein lies the humor: Retirement isn’t an end; it’s a plot twist. You’re free to reinvent—or just nap judgment-free.
As I barrel toward my own retirement too in a few years, I am open to investments in this “field.” Expecting a flood of oldies eager to bend my ear, and skeptical peers hunting for my secret gyan. As we say, retirement is the show where you make up the rules, is it? Huh!
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