Monthly Newsletters

Retirement Advantage E-News

March 2007

At the Helm at the Maritime Museum:

One of the most satisfying ways of replacing the five benefits of work in retirement is by volunteering for an organization whose work you care about. Such has been the case for Ted, who, after a life at sea, now volunteers as a docent at the Maritime Museum of British Columbia. Ted (Edward) developed his love of boats and the sea while growing up on Salt Spring Island, where his father was a commercial fisherman. At the age of 16, Ted decided to leave school and to follow in his father's footsteps by joining a Vancouver barge and transport company as a deck hand. They hauled freight, coal and towed barges between Vancouver Island and the mainland. While working for this company, Ted gained valuable first-hand experience about the islands and inside passages up and down the rugged coast of British Columbia. Ted always enjoyed visiting new places and meeting new people in the various ports and small communities up and down the coast, including such well-known waterways as Seymour Inlet and Howe Sound. During this time, Ted was on an apprenticeship program that would eventually see him qualify for his Mate's and Master's certificates.

Now, fully qualified as a ship's captain, Ted ventured to the North for a change of venue and a stint hauling barges laden with fuel, supplies, and building material from Great Slave Lake to the Mackenzie River Delta and Inuvik, in the Northwest Territories, where they were building the new settlement just inside the Arctic Circle. Sailing down the Mackenzie River was always an adventure and fraught with perils, including running aground on sandbars, despite the fact that the ships used local native pilots who could read the waters of the river.

After this period sailing the great northern river, Ted returned to the coast and became a relief captain on the new Mill Bay ferry. For the next 14 years he captained the ferry until he left and joined the Pacific Pilotage Authority, skippering the specialized launches that carry the pilot to and from incoming and outgoing freighters and cruise ships off Victoria. When Ted retired in 1994, he had spent 46 years working on a variety of ships and vessels up and down the Pacific Coast of British Columbia.

Before he retired, Ted had already decided how he would spend a portion of his retirement time other than continuing his volunteer work with his church. He decided to become a volunteer and docent with the Maritime Museum in Victoria. With his knowledge and experience of coastal shipping spanning nearly 50 years, he had a valuable asset that he wanted to share with maritime historians, researchers and museum goers. What better way to share it than by volunteering to assist in research and historical projects sponsored by the Museum and as a docent and tour guide to educate visitors to the museum, whether they were local school children or boating and shipping enthusiasts from around the world.

For the past 13 years and continuing to this day, Ted has been an active member Of the Maritime Museum's volunteer crew, spending several hours each week and frequently devoting additional hours for special projects and fundraising events to help with the museum's programs. With this type of volunteering, so connected with what he did during his working life, Ted feels that he is a living link with the history of maritime shipping on the West Coast of Canada. He feels a strong desire to share his knowledge and experiences with those best able to appreciate them, including museum research and program staff. As a volunteer at the Maritime Museum, Ted has had the opportunity to extend his career and involvement in coastal shipping well into his retirement years, which are active, purposeful, and above all fun.

Tips on Volunteering in Retirement:

Throughout your working life, you’ve developed skills, experiences, and resources which you can devote to helping others. Volunteering your time to work for an organization or cause that you believe in or care about is a wonderful way to give back to your community. If you are nearing the end of your fulltime working career and are looking to assume a second career or do some volunteering, here are some tips to help you find the perfect fit for your interests, commitment and skill-set in the myriad of volunteer opportunities. Your first challenge is to narrow your focus to the organization or cause the best matches your commitment and your situation:

In conjunction with family and friends assess your situation:
• How much time do you have to devote to volunteering?
• How is your energy level?
• What skills do you have to offer or want to develop?
• Do you have financial resources to contribute?
• What volunteer experience do you have to draw on?
• One other resources can I contribute?

You will want to start to: 1. define the parameters of what you would like to do, for instance: do you want to work locally, regionally, nationally or globally? 2. Determine to size of the organization, whether local, national or international –such as, a focus group, a committee, small groups, or large or small projects. 3. Do you want to work at the grassroots level, with hands on involvement, or at the program or development level, perhaps in administration or governance? 4. Identify the needs in your community that you would like to address can think about how you can help meet them. 5. How do your values and personal mission fit with your focus?

But the most important tip of all is to act now. Don’t wait till you retire or get involved in the second career, start volunteering as soon as you can. Begin the process of searching out an organization or cause long before your transition. Volunteering is sure to reward you in many ways that you can’t imagine right now. Think about how you can use your current career work in a volunteer capacity that will keep you engage d and involved in your expertise.. Or choose something entirely different –revisits an old passion or commitment, strike out in two a new direction. While volunteering may not reward you financially, the other benefits of work will be richly replaced by new time commitments, a new purpose and a new status in your community among new friends. Not only will you give back to your community, but your new knowledge, meaning, and associations will contribute to a longer, healthier, and more fulfilling life..

2007 Canadian Budget Helps Older Workers

While there wasn't much in the Conservative government's new budget for retiring people or the older worker, it did include a change to when people must convert registered retirement savings plans (RRSPs) or registered pension plans (RPPs) into registered retirement income funds (RRIFs). The conversion will now be made when the holder turns 71, up from the current limit of 69 years

• • •

February 2007

Barbara's Family Video Links

As a former schoolteacher, Barbara knew that playing hooky could have unexpected consequences. In June of 1987, while attending a conference in Vancouver, she decided to play hooky and take a day-trip to Victoria. But not until October 2002, when she retired, did she realize her dream and now enjoys a new life in beautiful Victoria. The biggest impediment to her decision to move to Vancouver Island from central Ontario was her family, especially her granddaughter, Emily, the light of her life. To soothe her conscience for deserting her family, she promised to visit them twice a year. To ensure that Emily would remember her between visits, in the spring of 2003, she rented a video camera and taped herself reading two children’s stories. She sent the tape to Emily and her parents played the tape before her next visit. In August, when she arrived at Pearson airport, there was her family waiting outside the doors of the baggage area. Emily was in her father’s arms and waving at her! She was welcomed with a big hug from her nineteen-month old granddaughter who had not seen her since January. There were tears in all the adult's eyes.

What does all this have to do with her finding something meaningful to do after her retirement from education? How could she use her experience as a teacher-librarian, elementary school principal and public librarian? She has always had a strong belief in the value of reading as the basis for learning and in a love of literature as the basis for developing strong reading skills. In addition, she has always been interested in family history and the recording of it. Her father, for example, was a great natural storyteller. The year before he died, she taped four hours of his memories about his family and his life. She values those audiotapes highly and they have been useful to her extended family.

Combining all those interests and experiences together, plus her new role as a grandmother, the first idea came to her to videotape other grandparents reading children’s literature and then sending the books and video to their grandchildren as a special gift. It would be a way for grandparents to participate in their grandchildren’s learning experience. She was determined to make a professional-looking video with theme music and credits, so that it would look like a television program that families would enjoy watching and would save as a permanent family keepsake. Gradually, the second idea evolved of videotaping people telling their life stories, or family histories — an invaluable memento for families to have. She realized that many people have wonderful photographs of family members who are unknown to newer members.

Since she knew little about business, she enrolled in a small business program at Business Victoria and since 2004 has run her own business named Family Video Links. She has continued with her education and has taken courses in video editing, a skill which she primarily uses to appreciate the work of hired editors. So far, she's been successful in interesting over 20 grandparents to be videotaped reading quality Canadian children’s books, telling family stories on DVD, taping messages to send for a special event, or having their home videotaped to share with family or friends. She's also begun to film legacy statements by recently deceased people explaining their wills or leaving end-of-life statements to family members.

Barbara is well on her way to another career adventure and is thoroughly enjoying her experience as a senior entrepreneur. One of the bonuses of her business is meeting some interesting people, for those clients who want to participate in one of her video projects are kind and caring people. As an added bonus, a portion of her profit goes to support agencies that promote her strong interest in children's literacy, namely, the Raise-a-Reader Campaign and CODE, an international children’s literacy organization that supports initiatives in Africa and the Carribean.

For more information about Family Video Links, go to www.familyvideolinks.com