“My wife would be proud of me because I am enjoying life”

How do you deal with work and money for now and later in life? Do you live day by day or do you deliberately plan your financial future? And will you deal with “later in life” yourself, or are you part of a pension fund?

Ruud Vorstermans has been enjoying an excellent pension for the past year and a half. But he would trade it all in if it could bring back his wife.

Ruud Vorstermans (68)

Profession: retired, worked in automation and as a labor expert

Weekly hours: full-time

Income now: 3,200 Euros net per month

Saving: about 50,000 Euros

Pension arranged? Yes

You have been retired since August 2, 2019. How do you like it?

“I did not experience any black hole, even for a second. In fact, I don’t have enough time. I was really ready not to have to do all kinds of things anymore. That is also because, in addition to my work, I was the primary caregiver of my wife for years. She had metastasized breast cancer and died of that in 2018.”

That is sad, you must really miss her.

“Yes, my wife brought out the bet in me. We were married for nearly 43 years; what we had was unique. Of course, I miss her, but getting stuck there doesn’t help anything. Four weeks after her cremation, I went to Italy for a month with a camper. I traveled around Toscani, to places where we used to go together every year. A trip down memory lane. I enjoyed it a lot. I am keeping the memory of her alive. On our first wedding anniversary after her death, I got dressed up and went to her favorite restaurant, in a suit and tie and sat down with a picture of her across from me. I really enjoyed doing that and I still do it every year.”

How do you spend your days, now that you are no longer working?

“To start with, I walk and ride my bike a lot. I have made it into a daily routine to walk about seven kilometers. I ride an electric bike, because then I can also cycle on vacation in hilly landscapes. And I have given myself a new hobby: doing jigsaw puzzles by Jan van Haasteren. Once in a while, I buy a second-hand puzzle through Market Place or Facebook. If the seller lives within a 20-kilometer radius from where I live in Bergen op Zoom, I go and pick it up on my bike. That gives me a nice goal for my bike trip.”

And what else do you do?

“Sudoku, cross word puzzles, sometimes I write poetry, I have a blog, I cook. My wife was a great cook. When she got sick, I started to use her recipes so that she could give me instructions. I took pictures of everything and made it into a cooking blog. That helped me a lot, especially right before she died. I also do volunteer work for the breast cancer society. My wife did that too, from the day she got breast cancer until she died from it. She was given an honorary membership for that. It soothes me to continue her work. I have a Facebook group for women with metastasized breast cancer. Because I see the positive in everything, I try to give others who don’t do that a different vision. Life doesn’t stop when you’re sick; try to enjoy what you do still have as much as possible.”

Don’t you miss your professional life at all?

“No. I enjoyed my work for 46 years, but that was enough.”

What kind of work did you do before this?

“In 1975, I started at the former GAK (common administration office, ed), my dad worked at the head office in Amsterdam. I had no idea what I could do with my high school education and my dad said: why don’t you try working here. I got to try out automation and I stayed there for 25 years, and eventually became a manager. But at a certain point I needed a change. In the early nineties, I went back to school and completed 3 higher education courses; a legal one, related to personnel issues, commercial economy and business management. After that I started to work as a labor expert. First at the former UWV and later in health and safety services. That’s what I did until I retired.”

Did you do that full-time?

“More than that. I started at six in the morning and didn’t go home until after rush hour. I worked about 12 hours a day. But that really paid off. All those extra hours provided me with a 30 percent bonus and if you achieved a certain target, you could get an extra bonus on top of that. That’s what I used to buy our first camper.”

What was your income before you retired?

“My monthly salary was 5,500 Euros gross.”

And what is your income now, from your Old Age Pension and your company pension?

“Annually about 55,000 Euros gross, which works out to about 3,200 net a month. In addition to Old Age Pension and my own pension, I also get a survivor’s pension of 87 Euros a month. My wife only worked part-time for about fifteen years.”

Are you happy with what you get?

“I realize every day that I have an excellent income. I would trade all the money in the world to get my wife back, but that is not an option, and I’m very happy with this. It is very comfortable. In fact, I am able to save 1,000 Euros every month. My kids, who make a lot more money than I ever did, say: come on, Dad, why don’t you buy a new TV? But why should I? Would it make the programs any better? I spend my money consciously. When I didn’t have a lot of money, I bought all kinds of things, but now that I have money, I’m like Uncle Scrooge.”

What are your regular expenditures?

“I spend about 1,500 Euros a month on my mortgage, car, taxes, insurances and subscriptions.”

What else do you spend money on?

“I enjoy eating out and going to the theater. These days, during corona times, I sometimes order take-out. And I regularly go on vacation. The camper is ready to go to the Veluwe in two months.”

How much do you have in savings?

“About 50,000 Euros. It used to be a lot more, but when we realized that my wife was not going to get better, we shifted our life into 6th gear. Before that, we already did a lot, but instead of going to a concert in De Kuip, for example, we would go to concerts in London, Dusseldorf or Dublin. Just to make it even more memorable. We also took trips to America and Indonesia. In about six years we spent about $100,000 in savings. It was a little scary to my wife sometimes; she would worry that we wouldn’t have enough left for the maintenance of our house. But I wanted us to enjoy our life together while we still could and make memories. And I still enjoy them every day. I think she would be proud of me, because, despite the fact that I miss her, I am enjoying my life to the fullest.”