“retirement”, what’s that?
It helps to have a plain and clear email style and just use my first name as a sign-off. It’s consistent, so people who prefer formal email with signatures etc. understand it isn’t rude, and you only need to soften a few words for people who respond better to an informal style. We use Basecamp for much of our communication at work and its design encourages this kind of communication. Unsurprisingly it was made by a couple of younger Gen-Xers.
I miss wordplay more than formal business language but that just hasn’t worked well as I’ve become slightly more widely read.
Every human interaction carries a vast amount of information from one to the other, almost all of which is subconscious but allows us to shape the interaction by making assumptions and judgements about what will work, the person we are dealing with, what their motivations and purposes are and so on. This all happens more or less instantly in the moment and is much richer than we usually realise.
When we are not interacting directly, the same process occurs but is much harder: we have so much less content to build on. That’s why there were conventions about letterheads, formal letters and so on. It was making explicit things which were harder to assess without the personal cues - status, the origin of the communication etc. - and provided some protection from the damage of making wrong assumptions (e.g. writing to a CEO as if s/he was a junior)
With the massive changes in the speed and directness of communication, the monetisation of stranger-stranger messaging, as well as many models where a million messages might result in one sale, but that could still be worthwhile as messages are so ridiculously cheap to send, we need new conventions, and don’t yet have them. That’s particularly important when the entry point for bad actors is very low and the value of owning the means of social communication and controlling (via algorithm) what gets through is so high.
People communicate ineffectively not because they want to, but because it’s very hard not to. What works in one context (e.g. getting attention on social media) may not work in another (gaining thoughtful consideration from a powerful decision maker) and the ease of person-person communication makes many assume that everything is and should be a cold-call.
I’m not sure it’s really a generational thing. There’s a lot of cultural assumptions too (us Brits still find many Americans “rude” and you think we’re painfully reserved and arrogant) as well as class and status and lots besides.
I have a very low threshold for rejecting new contacts that I don’t think are worthwhile and I try not to waste any time on them, but if I think there’s value in finding out more, it’s usually quite quick to work out the unwritten rules by which we’ll communicate with give and take on both sides.
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It’s when you couldn’t care less how an email is written as long as you get the information you need from it.
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I understand your point, and certainly our communication should fit the occasion and purpose; an email need not be Shakespearean in quality. 
But that said, I think we should care. The character of any culture is determined by the billions of actions of each individual in it. Everything we write reflects something about us and, even if to an infinitesimal degree, contributes to the quality of our communication, our thinking, and our culture. In isolation, the hastily worded email dashed off in a hurry makes little difference. But in the aggregate, all of those isolated communications shape how we communicate as a society, and that overall quality will either elevate or diminish the character of our culture. Small things matter because habits in small things accumulate and affect the big things.
Relax. I was just having some fun.
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I think my biggest problem was that I gave up many decades ago about getting ahead. Just couldn’t figure out how the financials worked. But, I’ve always paid my bills and whatever debts I’ve had.
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That’s when you finally get to work only half days.
You generally get to choose the stuff you work on and which 12 hours to do it in.
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My grandpa loved saying that. Just quoted it to my wife last week. 
He was a hard-working gas station owner before opting for mere nine hour days as a printing technician for a few decades.
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I think that more and more it’s going to be the point where you’ve gradually reduced the number of hours your contracted for until you can walk away.
In the UK, the current expected retirement age (when we get our social pension from the government) is 67. I’m currently 50 and cannot imagine working full time in 17 years. so I’m hoping to reduce the number of days I work gradually until the age of 60 while simultaneously gradually increasing the amount I pay into my work pension each month. at some point (hopefully by 60) I’ll have enough pension equity to retire completely from work. 
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65m I was wondering if I would be able to quit working, or if I’d just have to work until I die. Partly financial - I have no savings of the quantity needed for retirement, and partly governmental - will they keep raising the retirement age before I get there?
Mercy, I must be a glutton for punishment. 
I have no intention of retiring until I’m at least 72, or my mind goes. I have a good bit of work ahead of me!
I believe that the choice to retire is a very personal one. It could be you need to continue to work for financial reasons or that you enjoy the interaction with others on work that you’re involved with or both. There is no cookie cutter formula that is right for everyone. Have fun and enjoy your life in whatever way makes you happy and feel fulfilled.
Some of us have to retire in order to get on with our real life’s work. I was lucky to be able to do that; I wish everyone on this planet could, too.
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Here. here. What I’m doing right now is my life’s work. I really do like fixing other people’s computers. I don’t know what else I could do, but at some point, I’m not going to be able to do it anymore and that’s really what I’m wondering about.
@MacSparky @ismh86 You do not know how much I love this forum. Everybody here talks like adults.
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For me, I’m not attempting to speak for anyone else, this is a calling and a stewardship. I’ve more or less concluded that I will be able to give my best work to my calling through about 72. After that, I’ll continue “working” but will focus on church ministry and if I can find the right opportunity, devoting time to the disadvantaged. We shall see.
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I’m blessed in that this IS my real life’s work.
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Agreed, I’ve always put my all in at work when working, and when I used to work in IT, quite often I worked a lot of hours and was on call for the best part of 8 years in my last IT role.
I’d always be doing something, in fact by retirement age, I would quite fancy learning to wood work.
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In typical MPU fashion, this post went from how to construct emails to “boomers” talking about retirement. I love it.
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