Posted on 05/15/2026 10:47:43 PM PDT by nickcarraway
Atlanta — Going into retirement, 58-year-old David White of Atlanta, Georgia, had some preconceived notions.
"I thought it would be blissful and easy and joyful," White told CBS News. "… It wasn't quite."
In September 2025, White retired after 33 years in education, the last 15 spent as principal at the Burgess-Peterson Academy, an elementary school. It was a career so illustrious that White was once awarded Principal of the Year for the entire Atlanta Public Schools district.
He said he left mostly to be free of the daily demands. But having so much free time got old.
"I was just hanging out with the cat, and it was a little lonely," White said.
White said he really started missing his school community. He knew he couldn't be principal again since they had already hired a new one. But when a different position opened up, he fired off his resume immediately.
"I said, 'Hmm, OK, that's interesting.' I said, 'Absolutely, apply,'" Holly Brookins, the new principal at Burgess-Peterson, told CBS News about when White notified her of his plans to apply for the position.
The video player is currently playing an ad. His job title is site manager, but he is basically the handyman. He does everything from power washing bathrooms and inspecting fire extinguishers to cleaning gutters.
A lot of managers like to say every job is important. But how many truly believe it and truly show it? Not many, and not like this. And although he's no longer climbing the ladder, metaphorically, he doesn't seem to mind in the least.
"Yeah, I'm one of the bottom rungs, if you look at in a hierarchical way," White said. "… It doesn't bother me at all… I still feel like I'm contributing meaningfully to a place I really care about."
😁😁🤣🤣🤣
I remember that story!
Agreed. Once you have retirement locked in, a lot of the worries of working go away.
.
Don’t they still need to keep it mowed? They just let it grow wild?
Hang in there, bud. It is worth the wait!
Yeah, they do. The golf courses may be mowing fairways less frequently since 2019 due to the high cost of fuel...My chosen profession is CAD Design and although I still love the work, I don’t care much for the business! I have other things now to keep me busy. In early May of 2020, I bought a Honda dual sport motorcycle and since then have added 11,000 miles to it.
LOL, my wife hasn’t murdered me yet, so...that makes me happy!
I was ready. I carried a pager for 40 years, and that damn thing took a toll on me.
When I worked in Nuclear Medicine, when I got paged at 3 AM, I would have to get in my car, regardless of the weather, even if it was a blizzard, drive an hour into the hospital, be there for at least several hours, then, if I had the early shift, be back there at 6 AM...meaning not going home. Then, in IT, it was worse.
I got so sensitized to that pager, that when it went off while I was sleeping, I would levitate out of the bed about a foot, turn in mid-air, and my heart pounding wildly, would grab the pager off the night stand. I once threw my pager over a house.
It got so bad for me, my wife and I were watching television one night, and a program on the tube featured a pager going off, and that actually made me visibly twitch.
My wife saw this and said gently: “Maybe it’t time for you to think about getting another job.” Then, I went into Radiology IT, and for a long time, I was the only one on call, 24x7. It was awful, even if I did enjoy the work and its challenges.
I worked in healthcare, first ten years as a clinician, then the last 30 as an IT specialist in Radiology Informatics. I worked on average between 50-60 hours a week, and it was always stressful. I had to be “on” all the time, and I often worried that when I retired, I wouldn’t be able to turn “off”.
I had a revelation last October...my fears were unfounded.
My wife who retired about five years before I did (at my urging, because her high stress job was killing her) has become an amazing gardener, but rabbits were decimating her garden, so she asked me, after I retired last year, to see if I could find a way to keep them out of our fenced in yard.
First, I tried taking them out with a pellet gun, but that was fruitless, as it was like trying to empty the ocean with a bucket, so I found myself sitting quietly, considering how to keep them out of our yard, and I realized...
This is awesome.
Instead of having an Emergency Room physician hovering over me and yelling at me because he is unable to see the CT Brain Scan images on a stroke patient, and each second that passes has the potential to take out a hand, and arm, a whole side of a body, speech, and even life from that patient...I am trying to figure out ways to keep cute, fuzzy bunnies out of my back yard!
Yes! I can handle this kind of stress for whatever life is left to me!!!
Yep! I feel as if I have been given a second lease on life! I love it...:)
Stress is killer. Worked a high stress job at CENTCOM. Retired at 63 last year after being disabled in a car accident. Unfortunately, the health deterioration following the accident (whiplash, nerve damage) has limited my health improvement after removal of stress. My goals are get healthier and exercise as much as my body supports it.
When I first retired I was bored but as time passed I found things to do. Recently I was at a doctors office and the older lady who checked me in and I started to talk about retirement and it turned out she had but was bored and went back to work.
I said I could remember the break times and what everyone was doing during the day and she responded that I soon forgot which I responded yes as I was doing something I liked.
Keep busy and walking or at least have a treadmill or exercise bike (fixed arm) and do stretches to keep the body & nerves working.
Disclaimer: Opinions posted on Free Republic are those of the individual posters and do not necessarily represent the opinion of Free Republic or its management. All materials posted herein are protected by copyright law and the exemption for fair use of copyrighted works.