Winter was long.

The days were short.

The gym had officially become muscle memory.

Swipe in. Treadmill. Weights. Pilates. Smile politely. Leave.

Autopilot.

And then one day, mid-leg press, a horrifying thought entered my mind:

I miss my job.

Excuse me?

My job? The one that emotionally sanded me down for 30 years? The one that required medication as a coping strategy? That job?

Impossible.

And yet.

What was I actually missing?

Not the deadlines.

Not the politics.

Not the “per my last email.”

It was the human interaction.

Turns out exchanging nods with strangers while sweating aggressively on a treadmill is not the same as debating strategy in a boardroom or gossiping in someone’s office with the door half-closed.

You cannot have a deep meaningful conversation when you’re gasping for oxygen at 6.2 miles per hour.

So I would come home from the gym.

And dread the day.

Which is ironic because I no longer had a day to dread.

The more I dreaded the more unhappy I became.

The more unhappy I became the more dramatic my internal monologue got.

Fine. I will be productive.

I’ll make dinner.

Start a load of laundry.

Take a shower.

Rewatch Bridgerton. Again.

Revisit Heated Rivalry. For research purposes.

But then what?

Oh yes.

I can scroll Facebook and Instagram until I either:

1. Develop carpal tunnel, or

2. Throw my phone across the room in a fit of self-awareness.

By 10:30 AM.

Because when you’re retired, time moves differently.

At 10:30 AM your brain has already:

Compared your life to 47 strangers.

Fallen into a romanticized fantasy world.

Questioned every decision you’ve ever made.

Eaten a snack you weren’t hungry for.

Now that my brain is fully comatose in romanticism, dopamine deprivation, and fictional aristocrats…

What exactly am I supposed to do next?

It’s 10:30 AM.

And I have an entire day.

Again.

What I didn’t yet understand was that the emptiness wasn’t about missing work.

It was about missing myself.

But that realization was still a few ugly cries away.