Shy of retiring
Being 'self employed', it is not so easy to retire.
Not only because it is hard to tell the difference between retirement and just not finding work, but also because it's actually quite hard to make the step.
I have been privileged for many years to work at what I would basically choose to do if I didn't work. I love what I do, and what it does. DSP is an acronym for Digital Signal Processing, which basically means just about anything you want it to - specifically, combining computing, physics and maths for practical applications. So you get to learn how the world works, how to work out how the world works, and how to change the way the world works (that last, just a little bit..).
I've had a lot of fun and a lot of 'interesting' challenges: speech synthesis and recognition; digital audio; digital camera and TV design; the 'streaming' technologies; medical imaging using magnets, sound and radio; surveillance; controlling things ranging from the engines of a Type 45 Destroyer to the most precise robotic measuring instruments; sonar, radar and ultrasound; and each of these applied from chip design to ship design. Not that I am particularly brilliant at any of those things: I worked with people from whom I learnt and who I admired and liked, and so built a breadth and depth of experience that has proven endlessly fascinating to me, at least.
But now I'm Retired.
It isn't easy to retire.
I wanted to, but couldn't: my work was a large part of my life - I did it because I wanted to, needed to, couldn't think what else to do - if I had to invent my life I'd have invented what I did, I was lucky and happy and fulfilled. But one gets old, and slows down: I could feel my mind slowing down, getting stuck in familiar pathways - colleagues who deferred to me because of my experience, I knew, were now better than me - quicker thinking, more innovative, brighter, more diligent. The problem is, though, that colleagues who respect you don't help you to recognize that they have surpassed you: they are nice, supportive, respectful, kind. I didn't know how I could retire.
In the end the problem resolved itself in that brutal way that only The Halls of Academe can manage. A small part of my life - but an important one - was lecturing at Kingston University. I started because, as a consultant active in Signal Processing and working with companies like Philips, Samsung, Yamaha, BT, Sony, Nokia, and Symbian, I noted that in my industrial teaching ("Knowledge Transfer") , there was a demand for a Masters Degree in Embedded Systems: that is, those computers that are embedded into everything - what has become known as The Internet of Things, as if the Internet was once not made of Things, and Things were once not connected to The Internet. So I suggested, to Kingston University, that they should offer an MSc in Embedded Systems - and once it started, I was invited, first to be a Guest Lecturer and then, when I took on teaching of a Core Module, an Hourly Paid Lecturer (HPL). The difference between a Guest Lecturer and an HPL is about £40 an hour - the HPL is paid a lot less - but if you teach more than ten days a year you can't be a Guest Lecturer, so you have to be an HPL, and to teach a Core Module in Signal Processing you have to teach more than ten days so that is that. I didn't mind, because to be honest the pay of a University Lecturer is peanuts compared to that of a hot-shot Consultant in Signal Processing, so less than peanuts wasn't a lot less and I enjoyed it. Actually I first went to University because I wanted to be a teacher, so lecturing fulfilled that early ambition - I never became a teacher because at crucial decision points, people I respected told me - rightly as it turned out - not to - but I always had an inkling to, eventually - and being a University Lecturer fulfilled that yearning. I loved it, to be truthful - if teaching is a vocation then it was indeed mine - inspiring the innocent enthusiasm in aspiring mid-20s graduate engineers was for ten years a high point in my year: and seeing some wake up to the key ideas of careful quantitative questioning due diligence in turn inspired me.
Anyway, University courses in useful practical subjects never last, so Embedded Systems declined, inevitably eclipsed by far more urgent subjects like Games Programming. Who wants to learn how to control a Royal Navy Destroyer capable of detecting, engaging and destroying 50 incoming targets at once, or a real self driving car with all the ethical issues of avoiding or running down pedestrians, when you can push a bunch of pixels round a screen? So the demise of Embedded Systems was inevitable: as indeed was the eventual demise of my other professional consultancies in medical diagnosis of cancer, where frankly I had given my best work and was really best employed in convincing those who regarded me as The Expert that they, now, were the experts. But how to disengage? How do you walk away from a profession you love, whose practice fills you with real joy and whose challenges you welcome even more than you dread?
Luckily, Universities provide what I think is now called an 'exit strategy'. The way a University says 'thank you for founding this Masters Degree course, and for your nine years of diligent service in teaching it', is that when you log in to do the marking for the exam, you meet a message: "your account has been deleted". What that means is, "welcome to retirement". The upside is, you can't do the marking: the downside, as an HPL you can't get paid because you can't submit your timesheet online. Although I have to say, HR are brilliant at recognising you as a human being and sorting the pay issue.
So the difficult question: "how do I retire?" is solved, at a stroke, by the magic of Academia: you just Are Retired: end of. And even though The Halls of Academe were only ever a small part of my life, retirement from them was symbolic, and helped me in retiring - gracefully, I like to think - from my real career. For someone who has been involved in computing all my professional life, being retired by computer was sort of fitting: "Game Over".
I retired a year ago. I took it as a Sabbatical Year: time off, time to waste or use, as I saw fit. That helped, because I had Projects: The Acoustic Camera (I'll get around to finishing that soon..); the book on Slow Water (that too..); The Croquet Lawn (I finished that but it's not Hurlingham..). That helped: the Sabbatical Year led me slowly (slow is my new watchword..) into realising that what I thought was The Meaning of My Life, was, but also wasn't - that Life is more than I thought, more than I imagined. So yes, I can't do multi-dimensional transformations in my head as easily as I once could, and The Matrix of Confusion confuses me in ways it never did before, but it's kind of nice to hand these things on and not think they are what validates me. Maybe I'll come back to maths, and physics, and engineering, and intellectual challenges, if I feel like it, in time. But for now I'm happy that my granddaughter thinks it cool that I can lay my hand on bendy wire to make coathangers for her doll's warbrobe; that my daughter asks me about the statistics of Covid; that my son asks my advice on applying The Matrix of Confusion to cyber security; that my grandson wants to watch London Has Fallen with me; and that my wife Sarah is happy that I am happy.
Not only because it is hard to tell the difference between retirement and just not finding work, but also because it's actually quite hard to make the step.
I have been privileged for many years to work at what I would basically choose to do if I didn't work. I love what I do, and what it does. DSP is an acronym for Digital Signal Processing, which basically means just about anything you want it to - specifically, combining computing, physics and maths for practical applications. So you get to learn how the world works, how to work out how the world works, and how to change the way the world works (that last, just a little bit..).
I've had a lot of fun and a lot of 'interesting' challenges: speech synthesis and recognition; digital audio; digital camera and TV design; the 'streaming' technologies; medical imaging using magnets, sound and radio; surveillance; controlling things ranging from the engines of a Type 45 Destroyer to the most precise robotic measuring instruments; sonar, radar and ultrasound; and each of these applied from chip design to ship design. Not that I am particularly brilliant at any of those things: I worked with people from whom I learnt and who I admired and liked, and so built a breadth and depth of experience that has proven endlessly fascinating to me, at least.
But now I'm Retired.
It isn't easy to retire.
I wanted to, but couldn't: my work was a large part of my life - I did it because I wanted to, needed to, couldn't think what else to do - if I had to invent my life I'd have invented what I did, I was lucky and happy and fulfilled. But one gets old, and slows down: I could feel my mind slowing down, getting stuck in familiar pathways - colleagues who deferred to me because of my experience, I knew, were now better than me - quicker thinking, more innovative, brighter, more diligent. The problem is, though, that colleagues who respect you don't help you to recognize that they have surpassed you: they are nice, supportive, respectful, kind. I didn't know how I could retire.
In the end the problem resolved itself in that brutal way that only The Halls of Academe can manage. A small part of my life - but an important one - was lecturing at Kingston University. I started because, as a consultant active in Signal Processing and working with companies like Philips, Samsung, Yamaha, BT, Sony, Nokia, and Symbian, I noted that in my industrial teaching ("Knowledge Transfer") , there was a demand for a Masters Degree in Embedded Systems: that is, those computers that are embedded into everything - what has become known as The Internet of Things, as if the Internet was once not made of Things, and Things were once not connected to The Internet. So I suggested, to Kingston University, that they should offer an MSc in Embedded Systems - and once it started, I was invited, first to be a Guest Lecturer and then, when I took on teaching of a Core Module, an Hourly Paid Lecturer (HPL). The difference between a Guest Lecturer and an HPL is about £40 an hour - the HPL is paid a lot less - but if you teach more than ten days a year you can't be a Guest Lecturer, so you have to be an HPL, and to teach a Core Module in Signal Processing you have to teach more than ten days so that is that. I didn't mind, because to be honest the pay of a University Lecturer is peanuts compared to that of a hot-shot Consultant in Signal Processing, so less than peanuts wasn't a lot less and I enjoyed it. Actually I first went to University because I wanted to be a teacher, so lecturing fulfilled that early ambition - I never became a teacher because at crucial decision points, people I respected told me - rightly as it turned out - not to - but I always had an inkling to, eventually - and being a University Lecturer fulfilled that yearning. I loved it, to be truthful - if teaching is a vocation then it was indeed mine - inspiring the innocent enthusiasm in aspiring mid-20s graduate engineers was for ten years a high point in my year: and seeing some wake up to the key ideas of careful quantitative questioning due diligence in turn inspired me.
Anyway, University courses in useful practical subjects never last, so Embedded Systems declined, inevitably eclipsed by far more urgent subjects like Games Programming. Who wants to learn how to control a Royal Navy Destroyer capable of detecting, engaging and destroying 50 incoming targets at once, or a real self driving car with all the ethical issues of avoiding or running down pedestrians, when you can push a bunch of pixels round a screen? So the demise of Embedded Systems was inevitable: as indeed was the eventual demise of my other professional consultancies in medical diagnosis of cancer, where frankly I had given my best work and was really best employed in convincing those who regarded me as The Expert that they, now, were the experts. But how to disengage? How do you walk away from a profession you love, whose practice fills you with real joy and whose challenges you welcome even more than you dread?
Luckily, Universities provide what I think is now called an 'exit strategy'. The way a University says 'thank you for founding this Masters Degree course, and for your nine years of diligent service in teaching it', is that when you log in to do the marking for the exam, you meet a message: "your account has been deleted". What that means is, "welcome to retirement". The upside is, you can't do the marking: the downside, as an HPL you can't get paid because you can't submit your timesheet online. Although I have to say, HR are brilliant at recognising you as a human being and sorting the pay issue.
So the difficult question: "how do I retire?" is solved, at a stroke, by the magic of Academia: you just Are Retired: end of. And even though The Halls of Academe were only ever a small part of my life, retirement from them was symbolic, and helped me in retiring - gracefully, I like to think - from my real career. For someone who has been involved in computing all my professional life, being retired by computer was sort of fitting: "Game Over".
I retired a year ago. I took it as a Sabbatical Year: time off, time to waste or use, as I saw fit. That helped, because I had Projects: The Acoustic Camera (I'll get around to finishing that soon..); the book on Slow Water (that too..); The Croquet Lawn (I finished that but it's not Hurlingham..). That helped: the Sabbatical Year led me slowly (slow is my new watchword..) into realising that what I thought was The Meaning of My Life, was, but also wasn't - that Life is more than I thought, more than I imagined. So yes, I can't do multi-dimensional transformations in my head as easily as I once could, and The Matrix of Confusion confuses me in ways it never did before, but it's kind of nice to hand these things on and not think they are what validates me. Maybe I'll come back to maths, and physics, and engineering, and intellectual challenges, if I feel like it, in time. But for now I'm happy that my granddaughter thinks it cool that I can lay my hand on bendy wire to make coathangers for her doll's warbrobe; that my daughter asks me about the statistics of Covid; that my son asks my advice on applying The Matrix of Confusion to cyber security; that my grandson wants to watch London Has Fallen with me; and that my wife Sarah is happy that I am happy.
Comments
Post a Comment