Retired in 2007...but before that...

 From an older post, telling about my last job before retirement.

First, I had family with grandchildren living in Tampa FL. So this move was a no-brainer on that score. I had lived there before and just after my divorce, but that had been about 30 years prior.

In the years before I retired, I worked as an Activity Director in a 200 unit senior citizen apartment building.  That meant there were at least 200 people, and really many more because a lot of apartments had a couple living in them.



Jewish Center Towers is a well maintained building, and I greatly enjoyed providing programs daily, including publishing a calendar which I posted on each of the 16 floors weekly. (Tampa also had Baptist Towers and Methodist Village all built about the same time.)

Warning...the volume is very high on the following video, so you might want to turn down your own volume, or be ready to put the volume on the video lower quickly.

 

I haven't tried posting a video before, and this one just jumped out of my files.  

That was many ago.  And my life has changed so drastically it's hard to remember how it used to be.

Five days a week I was in that office at 8 am until 5 pm...except the days when I provided an evening program which included anything from catered dinners with an entertainer to I theme parties.  I was also responsible for cleaning up the kitchen and dining room following those programs so the lunch people would have a tidy and clean area the next day, and some of the senior residents also helped.  There was a Kosher lunch provided which was cooked off site and brought in each day.

I did such fun things as arrange Tai Chi for elders, including Chi Gong, and daily sit-er-cise videos.   I taught folks how to paint a watercolor tree like the one on my wall in my office. 

We had some celebrations of various holidays, Thanksgiving, Valentines, St. Patricks Day, etc.  We had weekly Bingo, which I led as well as being responsible for the prize money from the purchased cards.  All the money was divided between the 20 games we played...and these were serious Bingo playing people, and the house didn't get anything left over!

I arranged a lot of volunteer visits by some of the "well known groups" in Tampa.  We had a "Pirate Krewe" of lovely ladies visit who are part of the parade and doings at the annual festival called Gasparilla.  We had some students who were in competition for Irish Step Dancing perform for us.

I also had a weekly Coffee and Cuban Bread group, which sometimes had bagels instead.  It was an interesting mix of people at J C Towers, because perhaps a third of the residents were Jewish, and a third were Hispanic.  Did I mention this is in Tampa, FL?  Almost everyone was over 65.  The rent was subsidized for many of the occupants.  What a fun group of people!

People didn't move away very often.  This was an independent living situation, so everyone was on their own.  Occasionally there would be an emergency medical team called for a few folks who had accidental falls or other problems.  And every once in a while there would be a fire drill.  That was not much fun, because you couldn't use the elevators, and those folks from way up on 16 had a long way to come down.

Tampa is in the path of hurricanes every once in a while...so the residents all learned what they could do when and if the electricity was off.  Again, no elevators.  And sometimes no water.  The windows could be opened in the apartments, and when you opened your doorway to the hall, you could get some cross ventilation...as well as more light besides the emergency lights.  Tampa is certainly hot during much of the year.

I made up my mind never to live in a tower when I retired!

I was certainly ready to move to the mountains of NC and to not be any place on a daily schedule, and so I slumped into retirement with a lovely period of depressed adjustment.  I'm glad I got involved in a lot of things after a few months.  But that's the "after retirement story."  This is the "before" story.

I just tried looking on line for pictures of the apartment building, and the only one I found is the one above.  It is kind of hard to take a picture there without any people in it.  I spent lots of time taking pictures of the people at parties, then posting them for their enjoyment and to share with friends.

Today's quote: