Retirement

When I retired at the end of 2007 it was actually earlier than I planned. Edward had retired in 2004 so had been retired for three years at that time and he wanted me to retire so I decided to do so. He was busy with his interests in genealogy and especially the Ottawa Branch of the Ontario Ancestors (was Ontario Genealogical Society). I knew that wasn't going to be how I spent all of my time but I had picked up an interest in DNA and after testing myself and one brother, I was into all of that information. Building trees I only do as a necessity on rare occasions when I am trying to discover a match usually because someone has written to me about a mutual match. I am not really a genealogist unless one considers DNA studies to be genealogy and now fifteen years later one doesn't really do genealogy unless one does DNA so it has come full circle. 

But thinking about Edward's interest in genealogy. He always was interested as long as I knew him. As soon as we had a car we were off to repositories as he tried to learn more about his 2x great grandfather Isaac Kipp. Alas even with 50+ years of work he was not able to unleash the information on Isaac's parents but DNA led him back in time to the Kip family of New Amsterdam now New York. We mostly worked on our own in those early days. Ed visited with cousins and friends in the area where he grew up (Princeton and Burford) when we still lived in southwestern Ontario. But we never got into genealogical societies or anything; we did belong to the Royal Astronomical Society which we both really enjoyed. He was busy working on his PhD when we first married and on weekends we used to drive about to farm auctions and discover old books and things. A number of these items we did pass on to Ed Phelps at UWO who was an historian and Edward struck up a friendship with him. He had a few ideas for Edward on how to pursue his Kipp ancestor and we did follow those ideas (at least he did and I just came along for the ride!). 

When we first came to Ottawa, we joined the Ottawa Field Naturalists and went for many walks on the weekend with this group along with my attending the Anglican Church nearby. Edward spent time at the Family History Library. Then when we bought a house, he wanted to go to his own Church which is the United Church and there was a new small one in the area. We talked about it a bit and then I agreed to go as a family because that is the way I think it should go. There he met up with a cousin Gordon Riddle and they started to attend the Ottawa Branch OGS as it was known then. Not sure how long they went together but both were very interested in their mutual Kipp ancestor. Edward however stayed with that group the rest of his life - he loved going and being part of the meetings. He also researched his Link line which led to his United Empire Loyalist  ancestor and became active in that group. He and another member created bus trips into the Mohawk Valley and down the Hudson River which became one of his retirement activities and it took up a lot of time planning, doing trial runs and then the actual weekend adventure. Again I came along for the ride and helped out where I could. 

As that wound down, I was able to persuade him to fly to Europe and that took a very long time. I first started looking at that when he finished his PhD in 1970 as I said wouldn't it be fun just to backpack around Europe for a couple of months. He said no he needed to get a job and work and so we did. Finally we got to Europe in 2008 (first stop my cousins in England). The first trip did it and we went back every other year and sometimes adjacent years. That was so lucky. Edward was retired seventeen years before he passed away and got in most of the traveling that he wanted to do - trips to Germany and Holland just could not happen with COVID. 

In the meantime I was working away on my DNA and had convinced another three siblings to test. I had reams of data now and have spent the time organizing it into useful form and phasing my grandparent's DNA. I also am a member of the Guild of one-name studies looking at my parent's surnames - Blake and Pincombe. I had become interested in their surnames and even went so far as to look them up in a book at the library way back in my mid-teens. But I never really thought about any of that until my Gray family cousin asked me to write a profile for a local history book he was editing in 2003. Long story short ending as I did take it on along with 42 courses at the National Institute for Genealogical Studies and with the help of mutual cousins. It is in print lacking just one surname as I should have called George instead of emailing to let him know I had the proofs for the parents of my 2x great grandmother Elizabeth Rew married to John Pincombe. I do prefer the written word to the spoken!

So now I continue working away on Edward's studies to get them sorted out and distributed and published where it suits. I am also continuing with my newsletters in the days that God has given me to live on this earth. I am looking forward to writing up my H11 newsletter once again. Hopefully that will be sooner as one prays that the war in the Ukraine will be gone by August when the next issue is due. I remember my ten year plan when I was in my late 60s which saw me winding down with my one name studies as I approached 80 but at nearly 77 I seem to have acquired a new momentum with my research and taking on the project of revision of published books from a century ago. The DNA of course is always developing as more and more people test out of curiosity or because it is part of their genealogical pursuits. I guess for as long as this brain keeps clicking away I will continue with my studies although my time has become less my own as I work through Edward's material. 

Some days I feel as if I have spent my entire day chatting as I respond to various emails and so the mental health people 's thoughts that one must have social interactions is fulfilled to abundance. 

I think though one of the most important items in retirement is exercise and I do have my minimum four exercise sessions a day - weight lifting, running, calisthenics and walking. That generally gives me 18,000 steps per day and about 150 minutes of exercise activity that shows up on my FitBit. The fourty minutes of running generally extends to about twice that once the summer comes as I run morning and night then. The cleaning also occupies a number of hours in each week and lots of good exercise there. Then there is gardening (not a favourite pursuit of mine) and I will try to keep up Edward's gardens. They will be scaled back though as I do not really enjoy gardening as he did but I do enjoy eating the lettuce, spinach, green onions, tomatoes and peppers that we tend to grow. The flowers are nice as well and I must plant some annuals this year. I found four packages of sunflower seeds and will get them started shortly. We generally have frost in late May and so will not set them out until early June. 

I am also starting to think about Edward's Celebration of Life and interment service. It will be just our very close family. That was really what we preferred; just our very small group. Edward was always so busy with his activities that we treasured the times that we had together as a family and saying goodbye should also be a small group for us.