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An Excellent Morning Routine Is Key For A Happy Retirement
Posted on Tuesday, August 22, 2023 by Ian Gargan, Comments
time to wake up
When you’re aging, everyone talks about the countdown to retirement. According to the latest polls, Americans at retirement age want to keep working to stay busy 51% of the time. But you don’t need to work to keep busy, you need to develop a morning routine that will set the pace for the day. You will learn how to fill your day with subtle joys that you may have overlooked in your hectic work-fueled life.

Whether you consider yourself a morning person or not, the day has to start somewhere. No matter the time when you first wake up, begin with a breathing activity. This improves lung capacity and increases brain function. A perfect technique for beginners is the 3-part breathing technique. Begin by taking a deep breath through your nose and bring it deep into your belly. Keep inhaling until you feel your chest and ribcage expand. As you exhale feel the breath leaving your collarbone and upper chest with your ribs and belly to follow. Don’t struggle or force it, keep each breath smooth, slow, and deep.

Once your bodies are adequately oxygenated many will reach for their phone. Don’t do it! Unless you’re visiting the AMAC webpage. That’s ok, but in all honesty, reaching for a phone or tablet will set you up for an unproductive day. The design of many apps intends to keep you from noticing the amount of time that’s passed. The best way to avoid this constant loop of cat videos is to never get into them.

Assuming you’ve avoided the phone trap, the next thing to do is make your bed. This will create a barrier, halting you from sliding back under the sheets at some point. Completing an activity will give you a sense of accomplishment and leave you ready to take on many more. Making the bed is great for your mental health and offers you a reward waiting for you at the end of your day. Think of it as unwrapping a comfy sleep present.

For the rest of the day, set small goals. Setting the bar too high will be discouraging. Break down big tasks into micro steps and focus on one micro step a day. You will have obstacles in your way, but be sure to reward yourself, frequently. And the most important thing you could do in retirement is to stay connected to your loved ones. A conversation with your kids, grandkids, or the family pet with lead to a very fulfilling life of retirement.

August 10, 2011
by Judy E. Bushy
The Committee to Celebrate Dear Mad’m Day is honored and delighted to have Rod Diridon, Sr. come and speak to us for this occasion.

Rod said in his reply, “I’d be glad to share thoughts about Stella, the Clear Creek Claim and our even earlier times at the Classic Hill placer mine about 12 miles up Indian Creek near the state line.

“Grandfather John Covert filed three mining claims at Clear Creek with Fred Crook around 1910 and Fred, an authentic mountain man, stayed there to do the annual “claim improvements” to hold title. Grandpa wondered off to earn and loose a couple of fortunes. Seems he was a brilliant builder but imbibed a bit too much.

“After quite a time in set design and construction in Hollywood, Grandpa helped to build the Hurst’s Wintoon “Castle” from the mid 1930s to the late 1940s.

“After an altercation with a couple of loggers in a bar, Grandpa resettled (was resettled) on the Classic Hill Mine that was purchased by Grandma Allie’s Redding-based logging family (Middleton, Cocherine, and Notley) for timber rights. In the late 1940s and early 1950s Grandpa worked the claim illegally in the winter when the streams were muddy so his tailings weren’t discernible. It was a massive old systems with miles of ditches and high flumes, hydraulic “giants” and piping, a small town (blacksmith shop, stables, hay shed, machine repair shop, large orchard, etc.) at the main HQ bunk house and superintendents home dating to the late 1800s….

( After )”Grandma Allie moved to the Classic Hill and they then moved to the Clear Creek claims with Fred. Grandpa built a very nice home, later cut in two and moved to Happy Camp after Caltrans condemned and bought the the claim in the early 1960s to straighten and widen the road…..”

Rod Diridon, Sr. the son of an immigrant Italian railroad brakeman, is called the “father” of modern transit service in California’s Silicon Valley. Raised in Dunsmuir, California, he worked his way through college as a railroad brakeman and fireman receiving a BS in accounting in 1961 and MSBA in statistics in 1963 from San Jose State University. Rod served four years as a naval officer with two Vietnam combat tours.

He is especially proud of son Rod, Jr. (a two-term Santa Clara City Council member and vice mayor recently reelected city clerk/auditor) and daughter Mary Margaret (director of counseling for the Silicon Valley YWCAs). His wife, Dr. Gloria Duffy, former US Deputy Assistant Secretary of Defense directing nuclear disarmament negotiations, is now the president/CEO of the Commonwealth Club of California

by Judy Bushy
Recently there was an inquiry about the Nolton name at Thompson Creek. I wish that we could talk to Violet Anderson! Violet wrote to me telling about her memories of Thompson Creek.

She particularly was telling how the Chinese workers digging ditches for John Wood up Thompson Creek saw a large hairy man digging and eating roots. They were really scared. and refused to return to work! After awhile they convince them that a gorilla had fallen off a circus train and got them back to work. The story was well known in the area in the early 1900’s according to Violet Anderson.

Someone has presented the theory that they were familiar with the Abominable Snowman stories and even though the beast had been quietly digging roots, they wanted a few days off. However, most accounts had no doubt that they were really frightened. The China Flat Museum downriver has a skull of the Abdominal Snowman in their newer Bigfoot section of the museum.

They were paid by the foot of dirt they moved, so they got back digging the Seattle Ditch Job. I thought Ben Shinar was involved with the stage there but Violets account say Ben and his boys were the ones involved in the ditch built in 1895 that carried water to Menetta Bee Mine. There aren’t many old timers, like Violet, here to tell us more about the “good old days.” We miss them!

She recounted how the first settlers of Thompson creek were all killed between the late 1850’s-60’s except Mr Thompson who hid in caves between forks of Thomson Creek. ,. He wasn’t to escape later after he had built another cabin,

Later, some men found a rusty gold pan with heavy gold and nearby a pouch with nuggets.

As time went on there was a store, and boarding house and Nolton Post office run by Clara Wood. It was a stage stop.. There was a large barn for horses and mules, put together with wood pegs. Clara’s husband John had a sawmill up Thompson Creek in 1867.to what is called Mill Creek and floated umber down the ditch.

Violet wrote about Kate Fehley in the Klamath River #2 issue of the Siskiyou Pioneer. Kate’s proper name was Catherine Augusta Wood born 1875 to John and Clara Wood. They had eleven children but three died in childhood. John and Clara homesteaded at Thompson Creek in 1879 where they lived the rest of their lives. When Kate was born, John was Sheriff of Happy Camp.

Those who didn’t want them there brought a gift of a squirrel that had been poisoned as the whole family became ill after eating it. In fact July 5, 1869 Margaret Ellen died and then John Walter.

There were lots of girls to help Clara but help was needed to help her father at the sawmill and so Kate had to step up to help. Kate could shoot as well as her brothers and loved music and her violin playing was appreciated at local dances.

When the Wood home burned tin 1905 the only thing saved was pump organ. It was precous because it came around the Horn for Clara.

When she was 17 Kate married Robert E. Wood., who a friend of the family, not related. They had two children Edward and Emma but divorced.

She later married Elmer Fehley, miner from Oregon. For awhile they moved down river to Orleans to work at Big Bar mine. Elmer Jr. and Edith Goldie were born there.

Kate passed away September 7th, 1970 on her 95th birthday at Beverly Manor. Kate was buried in Fort Goff Cemetery with her Father John, Mother Clara, brothers sisters husband Elmer and her children. William Wood had donated the land for the Fort Goff Cemetery in the late 1860’s.