The learning process and new decisions....

With the prospect of Mike going blind now firmly behind us and both of us working hard to get back into decent physical shape to minimize any future health issues, it was time for some hard evaluation.

We had learned that we did like being on the ground in another place and a different culture.  We had learned that the Charles Schwab checking account worked exactly as advertised and was perfect for us.  We had learned how to use Gmail and Facebook in ways that suited us.  We had learned that we absolutely hated flying long distances and we had realized we would now never be content without some significant exposure to other people and cultures in our lives.

The Peace Corps seemed like a perfect way to begin that process of living at least part of our lives outside the United States.  We continued to work on all the medical forms, made appointments for doctors, dentists, lab-work, diagnostic procedures and continued to move that process forward.  We had made the decision when we went to Spain for the TEFL course that we would live in the residencia, a far different environment than we had ever used for vacations (we had been of the 4 and 5 star resort and golf course mentality).  While it was a new experience for us it was also a rewarding one the we thoroughly enjoyed.

Our new perspective was that the Peace Corps would really take us back to our roots and help us learn to live very simply and frugally.  We started to realize that our perspective on the entire world and how we would live in it had changed.  Gone was the desire for more stuff or to recreate our American lifestyle and in its place was an insatiable curiosity about other people, places and cultures and a desire to not only see them but to live and experience life with them.

Suddenly it was time to seriously start getting rid of stuff.  We did not know exactly what the future would look like but we knew that we had some significant changes to make.  The house had to go, being a long distance land lord just did not have any appeal to us.  Getting it on the market became a priority for the summer.

First and most important we had taken the time over the holidays to explain to our two daughters what we were thinking.  They actually both thought the Peace Corps was a really cool idea and they were very happy for us.  They had mixed emotions when we told them we had decided to sell the house and that these could be the last holidays we celebrated in this house we had lived in for 17 years.  Then the really big thing….here are your sticky notes, go through the house, pretend we died, and mark anything you want to keep:  books, furniture, artwork, kitchen supplies, everything.  Difficult for them, easy for us!

We actually figured that we would need some kind of small storage unit for the things we would want to keep, thinking that we would need some furniture and maybe a few boxes of things to get restarted with when we came back to the States.  Assuming that we would leave for the Peace Corps sometime in the next 18 months as planned, we would be getting through sometime in 2014, and who knew what we would want to do at that point.

Then the real work began, with more learning, like how to use Ebay and Craig’s list, how to figure out what you should try to get for stuff you haven’t seen for 10 years,  and what charities you want to give things to that you either can’t or don’t want to sell. 

We also had to learn how to manage what we were calling our “leave behind” budget.  A storage unit, life insurance policies, property taxes, and all the other little things that we would still need to pay for even if we were living somewhere else. 

Learning new ways of dealing with each other was no small task either.  Never, in our entire married life had we spent so much time together.  We needed to work as hard on making our relationship work for both of us as we did on all the other stuff.   Two very strong personalities making tough decisions in the midst of very high stress can take a toll on any relationship and yet for us in many ways it seemed to help bring us together.  We began to see that even if we came to the answers from very different perspectives, we kept coming to the same answers.  

The idea now was to get the house on the market so hopefully it would sell by the end of the year.  Once the house sold we would become apartment dwellers, renting until time to leave for the Peace Corps assignment, whatever and whenever that might be. 

The idea of continuing to travel after our assignment just kept getting stronger.

First steps

One of the things we talked about was the possibility of serving in the Peace Corps for a couple of years when we were ready to retire.  This idea appealed to both of us and sounded like an ideal way to begin our retirement.  Initially we had planned to retire in our early sixties.

We looked long and hard at the Peace Corps and found positives and potential drawbacks.  We could serve together and it wasn’t unusual for people with more “life experience” to serve (5% of volunteers are over 50).  After attending a couple of recruiting meetings we were more or less convinced that this was something we could do.

As we evaluated other parts of our lives including downsizing our home and simplifying  our day-to-day existence we started to think: “Why not now?”  We could sell or lease our house while serving and restart our lives when we returned.  Perhaps the perspective we would gain while serving in the Peace Corps would help us determine the next direction for us. 

The application process; what can I say?  The Peace Corps application process is designed for the recent college graduates that make up the vast majority of their applicants.  Imagine finding dates, locations and physician names for vaccinations or surgeries that occurred 35 to 40 years ago, and getting transcripts from every university where you ever took a class. Then there’s the reference letters.

Reference letters are supposed to come from recent work or volunteer supervisors, kind of difficult when you been self-employed and haven’t had one for over 25 years.  Additionally, a personal reference letter is required, that’s the easy part…just gang up on your friends and see who is willing to put in the time required to fill out the online reference form sent out from the Peace Corps and answer all their questions about you.  Our friends, well you’d have to know our friends.  They could do more damage than help all in the name of humor or, alternatively, would be very uncomfortable or unfamiliar with the type of evaluation asked for.

We fought our way through the application process completing and submitting them in less than 5 weeks.  Las, our wonderful recruiter, explained many things to us about serving together and having significant “life experience”. Turns out it is difficult for the Peace Corps to place a couple together because they must match both of your skill sets with positions that come available, simultaneously.  This can take some time.  Although we both have quite varied skill sets the programs only classifies or needs a few.  To facilitate the selection process we decided to add to our skill sets whenever possible.

But what skills do you add to a lifetime of business and non-profit experiences?

As part of our research into retiring and living abroad we looked at ways to earn money or make a living overseas.  There are more alternatives than we originally thought.  One thing that made a lot of sense for us and that fit into the Peace Corps model was obtaining a TEFL (teaching English as a foreign language) certificate.  Teaching English, especially the TEFL method is utilized by the Peace Corps and is in demand worldwide.

TEFL certification courses are taught all over the world.  From a personal growth standpoint, we wanted to spend some time on the ground, living in a different culture where we didn’t know the language and would be required to learn some, and where we had never been before.  Kind of a “stick our toes in the water” approach before taking on a Peace Corps assignment.

We had always wanted to go to Spain….