"The worst thing you can do is lie about something. Don’t deny something that is true. If people can’t trust you to tell the truth then we lose all trust. That would be the very worst thing. Do you understand."

A friend gave me a bottle of wine maybe 50 years ago. It is really good wine he said. And then added, "If you open it when you have a good friend over it will be all the better". How true.

In the younger phase we are always being asked what we are going to do in life. The question usually refers to a career plan. In the last half or so of life we are usually asked what we are going to do in retirement. Many of us never prepare. We just launched into it.

It always amazes me that we can do all of our little errands and at the same time get terrific exercise. The papers and magazines are filled with articles that report about the effect of exercise on this or that disease. It seems like exercise is the only thing that is always recommended. I don’t think you can do too much.

We like to trust people. That is a good thing. However, sometimes we can be taken advantage of if we are not careful. As we grow older this can become a very serious problem.

I know some people who say they don’t know what they would do if they were retired. My experience tells me that you will, or can be, very busy. Busy, but busy doing exactly what you want to.

Freedom has all sorts of limitations. Retirement does open up new doors that were always closed. We now gain an advantage in life we have never experienced. But we must be aware of and willing to open those new doors.

Social isolation is a major problem for retired people. We can lose all emotional contact with others. We lose people to care about. Our phone never rings. We sit at home alone; perhaps get a dog, a cat or a bird. According to a recently published book it is our major problem in retirement.

Daily routines present themselves to us - like it or not. What's to be said concerning these daily tasks? Are they to be avoided; to let slide, to dread? Or are they jobs that can be done and even enjoyed?

How much money is enough? That’s a pretty good question. When people consider retirement, that is always first and foremost in their minds. They just don’t seem to know how much is enough. There seems to be no hard and fast rule.