SARASOTA, FL—Admitting he had encountered a new kind of emptiness in his life since leaving his job nine months ago, 67-year-old Matthew Whalen confided to reporters Friday that he was feeling useless in retirement and secretly wished he could just go back to feeling useless at work. “Until I quit working, I never appreciated how important it was for me to have a place to go to every day where I could be around colleagues while doing something meaningless and unproductive,” said Whalen, who added that since retiring, he had felt a lack of purpose at home that for more than 40 years he had been accustomed to experiencing only at the office. “Now, I just sit around the house—morning, noon, and night—doing nothing of consequence and feeling insignificant. It really helped break up the time better when I could spend eight hours of my day doing that at work. I did consider taking up a hobby, but the ones I looked into seemed every bit as pointless as my job was. At least with my job I got paid.” At press time, sources confirmed Whalen had decided to go back to work part-time, hiring himself out as a completely useless consultant.

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