I'm trying to catch up (financially) with the...wiser crowd. Dad got laid off in 2009 and was bummed for a couple days having spent 33 years of his life with Sears having started out loading trucks in a warehouse. To make a long story short, he never returned to the workforce and has been happily living out his retirement years. He worked full time and had multiple real estate investments for 30+ years and I never had a want or need that wasn't fulfilled.