DeBorah Beatty

So, now, Sam sits on his porch with his morning cup of coffee and watches all the people going to work, the kids going to school, and all the other signs of life he feels are going on around him but not including him. One one hand, he's glad he doesn't HAVE to hit the freeways, gulping coffee and a drivethrough meal, feeding his ulcer and hoping he'll get to work on time. On the other hand, though, he misses it. At least it was going somewhere.

That's it, he says, I've GOT to find...

This is the story of a man, let's call him Sam, who worked for 20 years for a megacorporation, hated every day, but had a family to support. He retired last year with an abbreviated 401K and a pat on the back for all his years of service.

His house is three payments away from being paid off, his two kids are grown and on their own, and eight months after retirement, he's bored to tears! He and his wife did the traveling thing, the fishing thing, the fix-up-the-house-now-that-we-have-time...