Not so often that I chew charcoal or what I might find after a campfire, kindling charred some, that I nibble on. Yet when I went into the terrain where the courage-ones go, meaning a local American grocery store, first, and on a tight budget, second, I bought Yuban coffee. Let's applaud that the Yu arrives from Yuletide when these original coffee beans began roasting in the 1930s to celebrate winter holidays. Today Yuban has migration roots, like most commercial edible sources worldwide, from one of the ag biz domains and that is kraftheinz. For the sake of perceived value, I bought a 1.5 pound tub at $18. And in a pinch I would buy again, yet the flavor was that sooty burnt chew, a cup of caffeine, sure, and grateful, clearly, and I worried about me and money.

Which is why I share a gentle nudge that if you are over 30 years old (or younger, why not start asap?) reading Lee Eisenberg's book The Number, A Completely Different Way to Think About the Rest of Your Life is fundamental to coffee drinking. In lively nonfiction anecdotes—poignant, complex, and financial—Eisenberg relies on humor and truthful empathy to ask “Is the Number about where we want to be, or who we want to be?” (200). For definition, the Number circulates in the minds of most Americans as a concrete money figure or the finance Number she or he needs to retire for good—as in lasting, good for self, and good for others.

Eisenberg recounts hundreds of financial perspectives that meet me where I am at—a 59 year old lesbian woman fretting on the quality of my morning coffee, questioning if such a charcoal flavor is necessary this early in the day or perhaps ever? The Number shares expert research on “answers,” or historical context and perspective enough to rethink how I thought of the “rest of my life,” just as the book title promises. One operative word that rises above all others is the M word—as in, meaning. You get to define what is meaningful when retiring. Coffee is meaningful to me. But can I or will I be able to afford a quality cup in my future years? Exploring we go.

A financial advisor of yesterday is called a Life Planner today. The crunch the numbers type now goes to seminars on how to meditate and to breathe equanimously in order to listen better to clients like you and I. Eisenberg wonders “If life is about the human spirit, and money just plays a part, what do they [Life Planners] know about that?” Turns out that advancements in Life Planner skills are opening how to define the Number that exclude crunchy as in crunching the numbers: friendship, enlightenment, healthy living, empathy, courtesy, and decency, as a few starters. Ever consider relying on Elderhosteling to travel the world on a simple dime? Maybe even working some here and there, seldom making arthritis a conversation topic?

In short, today's Number resembles little what retirement folks in their 60s and beyond used to scribble on a piece of paper and hand over to the numbers cruncher. Those days are gone. And so is golf seven days a week. (And golf gets a fair analysis in The Number.) Five days perhaps, but what about the other two days? When George Kinder leads seminars for modern Life Planners, he is aiming to integrate into the professionals work perspective “what ancient Hawaiians referred to as 'the passing of a blessing.'” (208). Will you consider gifting those two non-golf days as meaningful time to support local community? As conduit for clients to perhaps go there, Kinder coaches the planners to encourage their clients to “stay true to your values and figure out a way to make what matters happen. That's money maturity, or in simplest terms, 'gaining ease with dollars and cents'” (214).

One of Kinder's methods to bring future Life Planners into better alignment with who they help is to ask three questions:

• 1) Imagine that you have enough money to never have financial concern for the rest of your life. Total financial freedom. What would you do with your money resources? How would you live?

• 2) Imagine that one visit to the doctor brings you news that you have between five to ten years remaining for living until a rare illness ends your life. How would you live the years that you have left?

• 3) Imagine that you feel healthy and yet when you go to the doctor the news is that you have 24 hours to live. The focus here is on what did you miss? Who did you not get to be with? What did you not get to do?

The thousands of responses that Kinder has heard over the years share themes: after a lifetime of being there for others as parents, employees, and volunteers, these retirement years are for me; downshifting to a smaller home and easygoing activity is healthy, wise; now that I have planned my money well to last my lifetime, who will I leave the extra and how will I give back since I have extra hours (time) on my hands? The last question on extra money and extra time exemplify the greatest change. Today in modern retirement culture, many realize that in our 70s and 80s and 90s, we have plenty energy to volunteer as a reading tutor at the local school, as one illustration.

Ultimately, though, question number three reveals how mythical the Number ever was and always is—for when we reflect on what we might miss out on, if we mask our interests as a money limitation, then we have missed the point. Go do what you love at any age is what Kinder advises the financial advisors (Life Planners) to advise.

And I happen to love coffee. Given life's brevity, allocating honest funds to purchase quality coffee is a must in my retiring years. This early Saturday morning, I have brought myself to a Hawai'i outdoor picnic bench. Before me is a panoramic view of tropical trees swaying in a warm wind. Freshly brewed, just before I left the house, is a Costa Rican medium roast Jose's coffee that is the best. One full thermos is about right-sized for several hours writing. Life is good, for sure. Even as I don't deny a handful of stubborn challenges. Overall, blessings all the way.

Just exactly at what cost is that cup of coffee, though? And can I afford all this relaxing? Why don't I go save the world anyway? Time is running out. Let's begin with the last question and work our way to the first. The picnic bench where I sit is in King Kamehameha Park in Kapaau on Big Island. A hundred feet away to the side are two tall metal garbage cans that need assistance and the park maintenance guy, a few minutes ago, emptied them and lined with brand new plastic bags. This same community helper has seen me at several park benches writing away especially at Keokea Beach park, several miles north from here, where for several months I wrote a nonfiction book titled Escaping Addiction—Like Quicksand, Simple But Not Easy.

That was several years ago and this morning I said to him, “Thank you for your service.” He laughed scornfully like what he does, does not actually matter. “No, really. I mean it. Any work for community is helpful,” I said. A thoughtful smile he had then. These moments are my framework on “saving the world,” one generative conversation at a time. What we say to each other in the daily-daily so matters.

That's pretty much reason why I can “afford” or devote all this relaxing because I must live inside recovery rooms; my kuleana (responsibility) is to go easy does it (but do it!), one day at a time, first things first, keep it simple, and let go, let god (good orderly direction = god). If I don't go all in for what appears like relaxing, and at the end of the day sure feels so, then I experience an absence of serenity. And neither you nor I nor anyone in my proximity wants that, trust me. Been there, done that and despite being the kunoichi dyke (female ninjitsu) I am now, the show was not pretty. I got my pretty back and nobody gonna interfere in disturbing my serenity zone again. Nobody. Especially myself since I had a few life lessons to learn—and no the Life Planners did not teach me them. Coffee drinking does not seem to disturb my serenity so anyone welcome to join if a free moment happens.

Which brings us back to the first question: at what cost though? The difference is about $5 at Costco, $10 at a Big Island grocery store, and $20 to $50 at a coffee farm—varying prices for same quantity, which is one pound of coffee. Yesterday while shopping at Costco, a 1.5 pound tub of Yuban went for $11.39 while the quite ono (delicious) Jose's coffee sells for $17.50, a three pound whole bean bag. Will I invest the additional $5 for worlds beyond in quality (and twice the quantity) and clearly, yes.

But one spending challenge is that I so wish to support local farmers yet I cannot afford the coffee beans—as I know so far. Coffee beans direct from Big Island local farms deserve to be paid the $25 to $70 per one pound bag. Right now that is a figure my budget is staying creative on. For this reason, I spent an hour yesterday inside that fluorescent cave called Costco where bargains do exist but I would rather invest locally.

So I shop at KTA, a family owned island business, open for successful business many decades now. This is the source for the charcoaley Yuban tub for $18 purchased a month ago. Diligently, I went through the entire 1.5 pounds and hope to buy again only in a pinch. If that dire pinch happens, Costco has same tub for $11.50. True that I often shop at KTA and will continue because I appreciate the integrated Hawaiian culture that I see on the grocery shelves.

Blessings that the coffee I am drinking right now has a smooth flowery taste and aroma, a bouquet of light flavors ranging from dark chocolate to raw honey and myriad decants in between. For a few extra dollars? I'll take a bag of those coffee beans, please. I guess retirement consumerism means patience to locate such bargains and being politically flexible. I want to support local farmers and I do so as can, can. For one medium cup of cold brew coffee I paid $5 at Kona Mountain Coffee https://www.konamountaincoffee.com Simple effort based on a frugal budget. Fantastic coffee, too!

So, in my second adolescence as these aging active years are now called, how I spend money based on what matters to me is the meaningful investment question that I ask. What I am striving for is to use the coffee bean dilemma as framework for all financial decisions in my retirement years. Where will I invest given the newish framework that I am “retired”?

For example, the local grocery store a few miles from my house is Takata and these folks buy Costco bulk then repackage into smaller portions to sell affordably. These I buy because I wish to support them. But they don't have affordable coffee so I shop elsewhere. How I allocate my finances is to prioritize housing, first, and from there consider what is a luxury that I can “afford.” I'm a mother to my 13-year-old son and he has projects that need financial support—clothing, video games, and a few other splurges. What I observe is that we have acclimated to living a rural Hawaiian life that remains quite modest in financial cost.

What this minute attention to coffee beans reveals is that once a few well-planned financials are in place, I can return to retirement. For example, yesterday I spent $250 at Costco on food and for the next five weeks or longer, I won't give food costs one thought. Nada. Zilch. Nothing. Plenty serenity time leftover to fill the days meaningfully. Ocean swims, hikes Hawaii coastlines, phone calls with friends, cook meals, recovery circles, create essays, write books, parent a teenager, landscape work, thrift store shops, bookstores, garden flowers, library discovery, music concerts, read novels, cinema movies, spirit practices, and beach campgrounds are ways that I spend my time. Each and every minutes feels like a chosen sensibility.

I wish to live this way and nearly all that I describe costs little to no money. The goal has been to reframe my perspective on time spent not money spent. In my retirement world, time is not money. Time is value, a valuable way to spend my time is when I am not overly busy—a lesson taking many decades to understand and truly love to live this way.

In one of my recovery books Hope for Today, the April 3 reading reminds that we Americans have the “buzz on busyness” in that we are “always filling every minute with the noise of 'important' activity. Life was one big, busy evasion” (94). Slowing way down to smell the quality of the coffee beans is the reward I find in these retiring days. I'm getting to know myself well and that my life is important, so I treat myself to the best coffee I can pour—on a life well-planned budget. When Socrates shared 2,000 years ago that an unexamined life is not worth living, how Eisenberg translates these words in 2006 is that “the moral here is obvious: An unexamined life may or may not be worth living—but it's almost always more costly than an examined one” (252).