Martha shares the oodles of listeners’ emails responding to a caller seeking a better word than retiree to describe himself and his wife. How about pre-tiree? Or jubilant? This is part of a complete episode.
Transcript of “Pre-Tiree”
A while back, we had a call from a guy named Steve who was looking for a better term than retirement.
Remember that one, Grant?
I do. Steve and his wife were both leaving their jobs after many years, but they wanted to keep their options open, maybe do some more work or get involved in something on the side.
So they wanted a word for retirement that suggested something a little more dynamic than just sitting around the house.
And holy cow, our mailbox has been overflowing with suggestions from listeners.
Stephen from San Diego proposed pre-etirement, which I kind of like.
And Richard from Indianapolis called to suggest the initialism FTC, meaning free to choose, which I kind of like too.
Hey, my wife and I are FTC.
A lot of people called and wrote to say that we should just use those great words freelancer or consultant because if you’re doing a lot of things all at once, either one of those words could apply, right?
Yeah, that always works, consultant.
And other listeners wanted to replace the term retiring with other words that have an initial RE, like redirecting, regrouping, recasting, restaging.
I don’t remember what else.
But finally, several of you reminded us that in Spanish, the term for retirement is jubilación, which is a relative of the English word jubilation.
And both English jubilation and Spanish jubilación go back to a Latin term that means to shout for joy.
So maybe we should start calling retirees jubilance.
I sure know a lot who feel that way.
Jubilant.
That’s great.
Instead of a retiree, jubilant.
Well, if you’ve spotted a phenomenon that’s still in need of a name, we’re the ones to help you name it.
Give us a call, 1-877-929-9673.
Or send an email to words@waywordradio.org.
