Angus is extremely happy that the weather here in central Texas has finally turned cooler.
Last month I turned down a job offer. It was an attractive offer in many ways: to do interesting and challenging work with smart people in a cool city. And it would have solved a problem: Ever since I agreed to retire at the end of the 2026-27 school year, I have fretted about the decision. Teri and I have saved diligently for retirement, but (as is common) we’ll take a significant financial hit when my Baylor salary ceases. This new job would have meant having several more years at full salary while contributing more to my retirement account. Also, people keep telling me “You’re too young to retire!”
Yet I said No. Why?
In large part because Teri and I love our house, our neighborhood, the daily routine we’ve established. We have a favorite coffee shop, a favorite bakery, excellent restaurants where we’re greeted as friends when we enter — and a church that continues to nourish and comfort us. Life in the cool city would have much to offer ... but not these things, places and patterns that over a dozen years we’ve grown into. We find that we don’t want new good things — we want these good things.
(When the job offer first came I thought that I had been granted means by which I could escape the consequences of my bad decision to retire early. But in the end it proved to be an opportunity to reaffirm my decision and our commitment to this place. God really does move in mysterious ways.)
And there’s something else driving my decision to stick with the retirement plan: administrivia. I simply cannot wait to shut down my Baylor email account and never hear about such things again.
The big problem will be: I love teaching, I love it more than I can say, and I will miss it terribly. When classes resume in August of 2027 and I am not a part of them, not then, not ever again ... that will be a tough time for me.
So I am already thinking about how I can turn my online presence into a teaching opportunity — with you, my readers, as my students. Between now and the summer of 2027 I will be exploring the best ways to do that, and as I learn more I’ll give updates.
As I always say to those of you who have been able to give financial support to my online writing: It means a lot. It encourages me to pursue this thinking-in-public writing that I really love but that otherwise would be unremunerative. Right now your support is a nice-to-have — but in mid-2027 it will become something closer to a need-to-have. So save your pennies!