Kathleen M. Rehl

MY HUSBAND SAYS I’LL never retire. He’s right. Now in my 78th year, I have no intention of stopping work altogether to devote myself to round-the-clock leisure. That sounds unappealing, especially since I plan to live well into my 90s, just like my great-grandmother.
Most of my friends opted to retire in their 60s. That includes my husband, Charlie. He retired at age 61 after 38 years as a nuclear engineer, all that time with the same company.

ON DEC. 23, 2022, while Santa and his elves were busy loading his red sleigh with gifts, the 117th Congress was putting together some goodies of its own, formally known as the Consolidated Appropriations Act, 2023. Before we rang in the new year, President Biden signed the bill into law.
Included in that 1,600-page, $1.7 trillion appropriations measure was a special present for folks like me—the so-called Legacy IRA. This allows me to increase the sum I give to charity and the money I earn on my fixed-income investments,

ONE OUT OF FOUR Americans lives in a household with three or more generations under one roof, according to Generations United’s 2021 report. The number of folks living in these multigenerational households has increased sharply over the past decade, from 7% in 2011 to 26% in 2021. Although “multigen” households come in many shapes and sizes, the rarest type is a four- or five-generation family living together.
For most of my pre-teen years, I lived in a four-generation household.

A FRIEND ASKED ME recently if I got paid for the writing I do. She assumed that I’d be compensated, especially for research articles published in scholarly journals.
“Yes,” I replied. “I’m paid generously—in psychic income.”
“What’s psychic income?” she asked.
I explained. “Instead of earning a paycheck for my paper, I earn the satisfaction of this well-respected periodical running my article.” That’s also the way it is for my short stories and poetry that appear in specialty publications.

MY ANDROID RANG on a sunny Saturday afternoon. The screen said it was from a police station. Hesitating, I took the call. My biracial son came on.
“I’m going to jail, Mom. But I didn’t do it.”
Instant memories, almost 50 years old, of police guns pointing at my African husband’s head and mine. Wrong profile of an interracial couple. It wasn’t us. Checking IDs, they realized we weren’t the suspects sought.
With my son’s phone call,

YOUR ESTATE PLAN specifies what you want done with your money and possessions after your death. But your life’s treasures extend beyond these material items—to your values, heritage, relationships, hopes, dreams, memories and stories. You can share some of this with family and friends through a legacy letter, sometimes called an “ethical will.”
Not long before my mother died, she wrote her legacy letter. She asked that it be read during her memorial service.

FOR ME AND MANY other older baby boomers, the traditional retirement model doesn’t work. We’re healthier and living longer than prior generations. Most of us don’t want to sit in a rocking chair, gaze at the sunset, play golf continuously, eat boring lunches at the senior center or live like we’re on vacation every single day.
Instead, we want to remain relevant, with meaning and purpose in our lives, and we want to continue to learn and grow.

I TIED THE KNOT again—at age 71. Four years into widowhood, I met Charlie online. Also widowed, he and I began dating cautiously, each respectful of our late spouses and those marriages, as well as our adult children and grandchildren.
We also focused on financial and legal issues. We knew from experience, and from research we had read, that financial disagreements can derail love. In an international survey of  widows and money, women shared advice about re-partnering: Talking about money matters was essential before remarriage,