Life With Luna: Apparently My Dog Has a Retirement Routine Too

I thought retirement meant I would finally be in charge of my own schedule.

Apparently nobody explained that to Luna.

She has a morning routine.

She has expectations.

She has preferred locations.

And I’m fairly certain she has a mental checklist that starts the second she hears me moving around the house.

I retired in 2022.

Luna apparently became management.

And somewhere between my early-morning coffee, the patio, the garden and this little black dog following me everywhere, I’ve realized something:

Retirement didn’t get rid of my routines.

It gave me the chance to create new ones.

I Still Get Up Early — I Just Don’t Have To

I’m still a 5 a.m. kind of girl.

The difference now is that nobody is making me do it.

There’s no commute waiting for me.

No office I need to open.

No boss watching the clock.

I get up early because I’ve discovered that I love that part of the day.

The house is quiet.

BigDog isn’t moving yet.

The Arizona sun hasn’t fully announced itself.

And for a little while, nobody needs anything from me.

Well…

Except Luna.

Naturally.

She hears me moving and suddenly she’s awake too.

Not just awake.

On duty.

LUNA ON THE PATIO

Apparently, I Have a Patio Supervisor

Eventually my coffee and I make our way outside.

Luna comes too.

This is where she assumes her official position as Patio Supervisor.

Birds?

Monitored.

Neighbors?

Observed.

Random sound three houses away that no human being heard?

Immediate investigation.

Leaf moving suspiciously across the patio?

Potential security breach.

Meanwhile, I’m sitting there with my coffee thinking…

This is retirement?

Because if it is, I could get used to this.

Then We Check the Garden

The garden has become part of my morning routine too.

Which still makes me laugh a little because I’m very much a beginner.

I’m learning as I go.

Some things grow.

Some things die.

Some things turn into giant poblano bushes when I wasn’t expecting them to.

And some cucumbers apparently require more engineering than I originally anticipated.

Luna comes with me.

I’m checking plants.

She’s checking smells.

I’m looking for blooms.

She’s investigating the ground.

I have no idea what her department is actually responsible for, but she takes it very seriously.

LUNA IN THE GARDEN

Maybe That’s What I Didn’t Understand About Retirement

Before I retired, I thought about retirement mostly in terms of what would disappear.

The alarm.

The commute.

The office.

The schedule.

The obligations.

The job.

And yes, those things disappeared.

What I didn’t think about was what would replace them.

Because an empty calendar doesn’t necessarily stay empty.

Life starts filling it back up.

But this time, you get more say in what goes there.

My mornings became coffee on the patio.

I started gardening.

I went back to the gym.

I started writing more.

I built Gigi Unfiltered.

I learned affiliate marketing.

I started making videos.

I started Pinterest boards.

I started trying things I had absolutely no business knowing how to do yet.

And somehow, while I was doing all of that, Luna became part of the rhythm.

Luna Understands Retirement Better Than I Do

There is one area where I think Luna has me completely beat.

Rest.

I retired and apparently thought:

Excellent. Now I have time to build an entire damn business.

Luna’s approach was:

Excellent. More naps.

I’ll be sitting at my computer working on a blog, scheduling Pinterest pins, editing something or checking numbers.

I look over.

Luna is asleep.

Completely unbothered.

No analytics.

No content calendar.

No wondering whether Pinterest likes her today.

No checking whether anybody clicked anything.

Just…

nap.

Sometimes I think the dog may be onto something.

LUNA SLEEPING WHILE I WORK

Reinvention Doesn’t Always Look Dramatic

This is the part I’ve been thinking about lately.

We talk about reinvention like it needs to be some enormous event.

Quit your job.

Move across the country.

Start a company.

Completely change your life.

And sometimes it is.

But I think there’s another kind of reinvention that happens much more quietly.

It’s waking up one morning and realizing:

My life doesn’t look the way it used to.

And instead of mourning every piece of the old version, you start getting curious about the new one.

What do I want my mornings to feel like?

What do I want to learn?

What do I want to build?

Who do I want around me?

What deserves my time now?

Those aren’t small questions.

And you don’t have to answer them all at once.

I’m still answering them.

At 68.

I Didn’t Retire From Life

I retired from a job.

That’s a very different thing.

I didn’t retire from being curious.

I didn’t retire from learning.

I didn’t retire from wanting to make money.

I didn’t retire from dreaming.

I didn’t retire from trying something new and occasionally making a complete mess of it.

I didn’t retire from becoming somebody I haven’t met yet.

I retired from one version of my life.

That’s all.

And maybe that’s one of the biggest things I’ve learned since 2022.

You don’t have to know exactly what the next chapter is going to look like before you start writing it.

Sometimes you just start living differently.

And one morning you look around and realize:

Oh. There it is.

The next chapter already started.

The Ordinary Stuff Counts Too

Some of my favorite parts of this life aren’t particularly impressive.

Coffee before sunrise.

BigDog wandering onto the patio.

Checking whether something new bloomed overnight.

Going to the gym.

Writing something that matters to me.

Making a video.

Laughing because something I planted did something completely unexpected.

And Luna following me from one part of the house to another like she’s been assigned to make sure I don’t disappear.

There was probably a time when I would have considered some of that boring.

Now?

I think I’ve finally learned how valuable ordinary can be.

Because a good life doesn’t always announce itself.

Sometimes it’s just happening while you’re busy looking for something bigger.

Apparently We’re Both Retired

Technically, Luna never had a career.

Unless barking at Amazon drivers counts.

In which case, she’s had a very successful one.

But apparently we’ve developed our own little retirement routine.

I get up.

She gets up.

I make coffee.

She supervises.

I check the garden.

She investigates.

I work.

She naps.

I move rooms.

She follows.

And tomorrow we’ll probably do the whole thing again.

And you know what?

That sounds pretty damn good to me.

Because retirement wasn’t the end of my story.

It wasn’t even the beginning of slowing down.

It was simply the moment when I finally had enough room to ask:

What do I want my days to look like now?

Apparently mine include a patio, a garden I’m still figuring out, work I actually chose, BigDog, a whole lot of dreams I’m still chasing…

and one tiny black Patio Supervisor who thinks this entire operation belongs to her.

Maybe she’s right.

Don’t let your age determine the size of your dreams.

Sometimes the dream is enormous.

Sometimes it’s beautifully ordinary.

Both count.