Esperanza Samonte-Nunez, PhD
Master Teacher I
General Gregorio del Pilar Integrated School
Bulakan, Bulacan
They say the long fermented wines are usually the sweetest: in fact,the best wines are served during feating but ironically, that seems to be unfitting to humans. Opportunities in all facets for the elderly bespeak of limitations because the luxury of time is shortened. The vigor reduces while fragility increases. These are only few of the myriad of things that are beyond control of the elderlies in this material world.
Life is God’s ultimate gift for us and men should make the most out of it. Life has its alpha and omega. It has a spring, a summer, and a fall. Life is a cycle but it has its peak. Just like any flower, it blooms, dries up and dies.
Life is what you make it and men’s spirits are dampened upon reaching at the retirement age. Retirement is obviously a departure from action but an onset of diminishing returns. It is an inescapable process that all of us will undertake. Paaradoxically, why do men have difficulty in accepting this phase of life? Majority of them refused to sit back, relax , and see the world goes by. Instead, they opted to re-engineering and retooling themselves, so they could still be counted.
Aging is a universal process and it starts from the moment that we are born. All of us will soon be retirees. We should not be afraid of getting old and not refuse it; rather accept reality and emphatically brace yourselves with the followings:
- Retirees want to remain independent because most of them never wanted to be helped.
- Retirees enjoy relationships and they always need somebody to share their experience.
- Retirees participate actively and they still wanted to learn what the younger people do.
- Retirees never wanted to be called old for they believe getting old is tantamount to senility and these are different.
In some countries, the retirees are well respected, cared for and are priveleged in many instances. They are still employable beyond sixty or sixty five years old. In the Philippines the government retirees enjoy the benefits and compensations while the private companies do have their limited share of benefits. Nonetheless both group of the retirees are categorically financially rewarded based on their length of services.
In three years from now, I am about to end my service and join the band of educator-retirees but I do always have the optimism to prepare for my retirement. As an educator, I am positive that I could always continue to take part in the academe and ceaselessly serve as fountain of knowledge, source of inspiration, sparkling light to the students and teachers, source of historical data, pillar of success for many individuals who love to grow holistically and living witness to the ups and downs of many learners and educators as well. As Adams said, “A teacher affects eternity; he/she can never tell where his/her influence stops.”
