reyonthehill

Through the years, I've seen countless professional athletes retire, only to un-retire soon after. Bret Favre is in the news -- constantly -- because of this, but it really started with Mike Jordan. Um, I mean Michael Jordan. (It's interesting that his first name was never given nickname status, although I'm quite sure his childhood friends refer to him as 'Mike' and not 'Michael.') Jordan retired in 1993, following the sudden death of his father and amidst gambling allegations, only to come back after a relatively decent stint as a minor league baseball player in 1995. He then retired again after his sixth NBA title in 1998. And then the greatest basketball player in history tarnished his name when he un-retired again and came back to play for the team that he co-owned, the Washington Wizards. It was a disaster. But Jordan did it because he felt he could still play; and he could, just not at the NBA level (at least all the time).

Back to Favre. He retired, and this was after several seasons in which he repeatedly hinted, suggested and even flat-out stated that he would retire "after this year... maybe." And then two-a-days come, and guess what? Favre wants to play; he thinks he still has it. And he probably does. But that doesn't take away the fact that he was given a king's farewell when he retired months earlier.

Does retiring only to subsequently un-retire take away from a person's stature? Does this occur in real-life? Would a teacher retire at 55 when his retirement benefits kick-in, only to find it too difficult to not teach, and then un-retire and teach again? And if so, would he teach in another school in another district? If you were that student in his "last" class, would you be upset to learn he was back teaching the next year?

What is retirement in today's world? In my profession, people do not retire. They usually step-back and become a consultant emeritus of some sort. The engineer will be gone, but not really. He still has company email and gets annual benefit summaries in the mail. He still shows up at in-house consultant meetings and the annual holiday party.

And what about blogging? Has a blogger ever retired? Ana Marie Cox (of Wonkette) said she would, only to re-appear at Time running the Swampland blog. A better gig, no doubt, but blogging still. Most bloggers who left the scene probably just 'quit' and really shouldn't be considered 'retired.'

Why would someone retire from something that is so easy (or should be considered easy; if blogging is 'tough,' than most likely that blogger wouldn't be blogging, or shouldn't be, anyway)? Blogging (or writing) tends to come natural for those that keep at it. And what if you re-appear or make a comeback? Is that un-retirement? Or is that reality, that all you really needed was a break or time "away?" Would that be a bad thing, something to look down upon?

Can anyone really retire these days? Can you simply stop everything -- waking, thinking, writing, speaking, consulting, collaborating? Is this the new world paradigm?