A younger retiree, who cares to be fair and balanced, must look on people who retire at age 65 with an equal mixture of admiration and horror. I was thinking about this when the movie "About Schmidt" arrived. It starred Jack Nicholson. You can read a synopsis at imdb.com.

Near Schmidt's retirement he and his wife splurged on a big motorhome. The Schmidts never came right out and said that their "RV Dream" was going to redeem 45 years of quiet desperation. It gave them something pleasant to look forward to, and after all, if they are ever going to live it up, they'd better not wait too long. At any rate it's better than feeling old and useless. Most people's moral self-worth is tied up in their job, even if they hate their job.

Most people enjoy looking at pretty scenery during their two-week vacations. Still, they probably have enough common sense to realize that after a year or two of RV travel, they will have had enough. This is especially true of people who have no serious interest in the outdoors, which is the usual case.

Although full time RVers have fun describing their "alternative lifestyle," it could more accurately be described as a transitional lifestyle, which works quite well for most who try it, at least for a couple years.

When I started RVing as a relative youngster I was surprised how estranged I was from the Schmidts. It's not just the quirky habits of older folks. For a long time I couldn't quite put my finger on it. Was I being a snob and practicing some kind of age discrimination? In time I learned that two RVers of disparate ages are as different as two different species of animals, even if their rigs are the same and they resemble each other in other visible ways. Demographics is destiny.

Although an early retiree can have just as many disappointments and regrets about his life as Schmidt, he at least has the satisfaction of asserting a personal sovereignty over his valuable years, instead of surrendering them all to the System. Schmidt has only his least valuable years to live the way he really wants to live. But he'll have a bigger RV and won't have to worry about outliving his nest egg.

Early retirees need more activity of course, but the needs are deeper than that. A 65-year-old retiree can settle for a senescence and a quiescence. He's earned it. But the early retiree needs to work at something and be good at it. He needs retirement to be more like a self-directed profession; one that is challenging enough for him to build his self-identity around.

The extended, scenery-snacking road trip of "Schmidt" will not work for most early retirees. For all I know, most of this blog's readers are disappointed that I have moved away from the RV travelogue genre. But it is satisfying to me and long overdue.
Epilogue: A couple days after writing this post I stumbled upon the Star Trek episode, "Miri." You can watch it on Hulu or Netflix. In the episode children watch older children die from a disease when they go through puberty. There is something creepy and scary here that a younger retiree can relate to!