SO CLOSE....AND YET SO FAR!

The big day - January 3rd, 2010 - came, and went. It was a dream for many years, a goal to be reached and celebrated with delight!  PAT TURNED 62!!!!

He has been haunting the SSA.GOV website for years. He has collected ALL of those many-folded statements the Social Security office sends you each year regarding the benefits you might expect to have at age 62. Well, the big day came and Pat wistfully wished he could submit his paperwork and start waiting for those monthly checks to roll in. Alas, he is forced to wait longer. The home in Ellijay that we once loved and marveled at our amazing luck to be able to have, is now a two story brick and Tudor around our necks. The real estate market in that little Georgia town is at least two years from any sort of recovery. The entire area is depressed financially. What was once a thriving mountain vacation home market is now flat as a pancake.  To continue that analogy, the times of flipping homes is long gone in Ellijay!

So, Pat gets up Monday in the dark and trudges to wherever the FDIC needs him...a lone figure on the thruway of life, driving his Silverado through the snow, still dreaming of submitting his Social Security forms, collecting his stipend, reclining in the family room - living the American Retirement Dream!