Latest / Illinois Valley - Shaw Local / Paperwork: Beyond her fabulous career, I see achievements that built a family

Transcript

Paperwork: Beyond her fabulous career, I see achievements that built a family · Illinois Valley - Shaw Local

• 0:05
  Paperwork. Beyond her fabulous career, I see achievements that built a family.
• 0:13
  This article is being read by an automated voice, brought to you
• 0:16
  by Everlet. One hundred miles a day. That's all she has to
• 0:22
  say, to get what she wants, because the message, although said with
• 0:26
  a tiny twist of humor, delivers a powerful punch of truth and
• 0:29
  guilt. Which is why Cindy, my wife, has a bottomless trunk full
• 0:33
  of IOUs from me. Each one simply quotes her, 100 miles a
• 0:38
  day. For several decades she has driven about 100 miles a day
• 0:41
  to work and back home. She's up before six AM, the dog
• 0:45
  helps with that, and hits the road by seven ish. She gets
• 0:48
  back home by five or later sometimes, with plans for a dinner
• 0:51
  meal, or after an exhausted exhale, she suggests we go out to
• 0:55
  eat or order in. I would never object because well, you know,
• 0:59
  one hundred miles a day. My drive to work was less than
• 1:02
  five minutes. Those logistics fell into place long ago because of our
• 1:06
  jobs and our love of the community we live in. Ottawa is
• 1:10
  a great place to raise a family. But all that changed on
• 1:14
  October fifteenth, twenty twenty six, a Thursday and a good day for
• 1:17
  Cindy. The plan was for me to drive her to work and
• 1:20
  then join her after a special gathering. I was the designated driver.
• 1:25
  So we pulled into the lot and saw her usual parking spot
• 1:28
  was filled with a cluster of co workers. They were wearing small
• 1:31
  cone party hats and holding a banner. Happy retirement. Chalked across her
• 1:36
  space were many stars, and this greeting, congratulations, Cindy, reserved for VIP.
• 1:41
  She was greeted with lots of smiles. Cindy teared up, no surprise.
• 1:46
  It rolled into a a day of goodbyes and thank yous, her
• 1:49
  last day as public information officer for the Will County Forest Preserve
• 1:53
  District. She was retiring after more than twelve years doing something she
• 1:57
  loved. At the end of her shift, a coworker drove her to
• 2:00
  join more coworkers at a local restaurant where they relived memorable moments
• 2:04
  and laughed a lot. I'm glad I was there to see it.
• 2:07
  Perfect closing to an important day. A joyful nudge into retirement. Retirement.
• 2:13
  No longer working. Freedom is the word tossed around by those wishing
• 2:17
  her the best. She has not felt the impact of that freedom
• 2:21
  yet, and I know it will take some time to figure it
• 2:24
  out. I've been retired for almost twelve years. And I'm still working
• 2:27
  on it. This was not an easy thing for her to do.
• 2:30
  She has been working since she was sixteen years old, starting in
• 2:33
  one of those tiny photomat booths. Now she is wrapping up a
• 2:37
  journalism slash writing career that spans some forty-five years. Most of her
• 2:42
  newspaper years were with the Herald News and Joliet. I commuted from
• 2:46
  Ottawa to Joliet since nineteen eighty six, so forty years of avoiding
• 2:51
  potholes and crazy drivers. And scary trucks, she told friends. Through all
• 2:56
  the stress, deadlines and traffic jams, it was the people I met
• 2:59
  that nourished my soul. Colleagues, story subjects, public officials. Thanks to everyone
• 3:04
  for your friendship and support. On to the next chapter of my
• 3:07
  life where I get to be just me. No hoops to jump
• 3:11
  through, no ladder to climb, minus thirty. Those one hundred miles a
• 3:15
  day became routine for her, part of the deal for something she
• 3:18
  wanted to do. For me, that drive was a daily fear. When
• 3:22
  her car pulled back into the garage, I relaxed, until the next
• 3:25
  day. She looks back at her long drive as part of an
• 3:29
  exciting career. She has a lot to be proud of, but I
• 3:31
  see more, I see sacrifice. She made the drive, I did not.
• 3:35
  She worried about meals. Sometimes I opened cans of tuna, she managed
• 3:39
  doctor visits, daycare, and then school, shopping, sports, birthday parties and more
• 3:43
  for our sons. I transported when I could. We both worked. Life
• 3:48
  so many others, we needed two incomes to build a comfortable lifestyle
• 3:52
  for our family. In the end, her income far surpassed mine, for
• 3:55
  good reason. I suspect her working days are not completely over. Time
• 4:00
  will tell, there's no rush. I am proud of her achievements, and
• 4:04
  will be ever grateful that her tiresome one hundred miles a day
• 4:06
  began with and returned to family. Now she joins me in the
• 4:10
  retirement world. Her life will change, and oh yeah, so will mine,
• 4:14
  again. As I do have miles and miles of IOUs left to
• 4:17
  repay. Lonnie Kane, retired managing editor of The Times in Ottawa, also
• 4:22
  was a reporter for the Herald News and Joliet in the 1970s.
• 4:25
  His paperwork email is Lonnyjacane at gmail.com. Or mail the News Tribune,
• 4:31
  426 2nd Street, LaSalle, Illinois 61301.