My last day was a year and a half ago. I quit Megacorp at the end of the year (I hung around to collect generous holiday pay). My last day in the office was Dec 23rd. I had already had the retirement luncheon and all that crap. Being two days before Xmas, there was virtually nobody left in the office. I had a long checklist of signatures require for termination. I had to go thru security debriefing on all the different classified programs that I was working, had to get checked out with IT, HR, etc. It was like the retirement scavenger hunt. Finally, there was the last stop at payroll to pick up my last check. Then walking out and getting in my car to drive home for the last time. It is hard to put into words what was going through my mind on the drive home. Mostly it was an overwhelming feeling of relief. Although my last day in the office was Dec. 23, I was not officially retired until midnight on Dec 31. I was at a New Years Eve party counting down at midnight and then toasting to my blissful new state of unemployment. My first day after the holidays was like this: I got up at 5:00 AM (I still do to this day) read for a couple hours, had an unhurried breakfast and then started working on some projects that I had been planning for some time. I was surprised that I did not think about what was going on in the office at all. Not. Once.
