#11 – Wheels of Fortune with Dave Hogan

Ryan Doolittle [00:01:49]:
And thanks for buying that headset, Mic. You look great.

Dave Hogan [00:01:53]:
I need one anyway, so he did me a favor.

Ryan Doolittle [00:01:57]:
Yeah, it was such a coincidence because I recently interviewed pickleball champion Owen Mitchell, and then I found out later you had written an article about him, I think, for this retirement life blog.

Dave Hogan [00:02:10]:
That’s correct, yes. I love to do profiles of inspirational, exceptional retirees, and I wouldn’t certainly want those. He’s an amazing guy, very disciplined.

Ryan Doolittle [00:02:21]:
Yeah. I was thinking we could do the whole hour about him. Is that okay?

Dave Hogan [00:02:25]:
We certainly could. He would be happy about that.

Ryan Doolittle [00:02:28]:
No, there’s too much good stuff you’ve got going on. We have plenty to talk. You have? Before we even get started. I want to get into these two incredible blogs you have and you can explain. Blog can kind of encompass a lot of things, but one is called this e bike life, which is kind of how we found you.

Dave Hogan [00:02:49]:
Okay.

Ryan Doolittle [00:02:49]:
And the other is this retirement life. So you want to just explain those a little bit?

Dave Hogan [00:02:53]:
Yes. Right. I started the, this retirement blog probably six years or so ago because one of my personal hobbies is bicycling and I got into ebikes. I started writing more and more on the retirement life about ebikes and realized this is really why these people signed up for this blog, just a year about my bicycle adventure. So I started a separate blog about two years ago for the ebike stories. And really it’s morphed into more cycling in general. Not just ebikes, but all types of issues involving cycling.

Ryan Doolittle [00:03:28]:
Okay. Yeah, I was looking through, I think I was looking through both. But when I saw this retirement life, I thought, well, this can’t all be just Dave. There were so many articles, but they all said, written by Dave Hogan.

Dave Hogan [00:03:42]:
I will occasionally have a guest contributor to the blog, but yes, 95% of it is me. And I would love to write more. But as we’ll get into later, I still have some work responsibilities too, and other things going on in my life. So one thing I found about blogging is you could make a full time pursuit of it easily. Interviewing people and chasing stories, doing research, marketing the blog. It could be a full time pursuit and frankly, probably an enjoyable one for me since I like to write, but I just don’t have that time. So I do what I can with it, but I enjoy the experiences. I said, I get to meet some great people like Owen Mitchell, who have exceptional stories to and you know, when.

Ryan Doolittle [00:04:26]:
I hear you say, you just don’t have time, that’s such a consistent thing that I hear from happy retirees. The happiest retirees don’t have time because they’re constantly doing tons of fun things.

Dave Hogan [00:04:39]:
I think that’s true in my case. As you and I have talked offline, I still work part time and that job can sometimes be pretty busy. I have big weeks, slow weeks, heavy weeks. So that takes a lot of time. So that’s kind of my first priority. I still have a paid position, so I have to do that first. But then why have time? Sure, there’s always another bike trail I haven’t ridden yet. I’d love to ride somewhere or travel pursuits for my wife and I writing for the blog, there’s always something to.

Ryan Doolittle [00:05:09]:
Do oh, for sure. Okay. Let’s get a little bit into your story so we can set up who you do. Where are you from, and what did you do during your primary working years?

Dave Hogan [00:05:21]:
Yeah. Grew up in Memphis, Tennessee. That was my hometown and where my wife and I met at the University of Memphis as college students. But we’ve been away from there for a long time and have moved around mostly in the southeastern U. S. We’ve been in North Carolina and South Carolina and Florida primarily is where we’ve lived the most. And then also Texas. I’ve done a variety of things.

Dave Hogan [00:05:44]:
I’ve had to sort of reinvent myself. My degrees were in journalism. I have the undergraduate degree from University of Memphis, graduate degree later from Ohio State. The Ohio State University, I should say.

Ryan Doolittle [00:05:55]:
You got to add that, right?

Dave Hogan [00:05:59]:
So I was a newspaper journalist for several years right out of college. It’s a good thing, I guess I got out because I could see the writing on the wall already that that field didn’t seem to have a good future to it and wasn’t making the progress I wanted to make career wise. So moved into other fields, into financial planning, investment work for about a decade, and moved into investor relations work, which most people don’t know what that is, but it’s representing a public company to their shareholder base. Interesting. Public relations work. Worked for a couple of universities in public relations field, and the last ten years has probably been the most enjoyable of all, career wise for me. I’ve worked for a nonprofit. It’s a christian academy and children’s home in central Florida, and I thoroughly enjoyed that.

Dave Hogan [00:06:50]:
I’m in marketing and fundraising for them. They call it development work, and it’s been very rewarding. Like a lot of nonprofits, they do very good work as you get to see the progress that children and families are making as they go through the program. So it’s been a great adventure. So that’s how I’ve ended my career in the nonprofit side.

Ryan Doolittle [00:07:11]:
Yeah, you had mentioned, and I should say volunteering always tops the list in our research for what happy retirees like to do. And you sort of expected to be volunteering, but it turned into a part time job.

Dave Hogan [00:07:26]:
Yes. I actually was working full time for the children’s home. And then about six years ago now, I was at a point where thinking about retiring someday, but didn’t know quite when. And our daughter got pregnant, gave us our first and only grandchild, and I was working for.

Ryan Doolittle [00:07:41]:
Congratulations.

Dave Hogan [00:07:42]:
Thank you. Working in Florida, the children’s home. She was in Texas, and so my wife and I talked about decide we wanted to spend part of our year in Texas near our granddaughter. And so I approached my bosses at the children’s home and academy, and we worked out terms where I would go. I guess you could call it semi retirement, but I’m working part time, and I’ve done that now for six years in that capacity. So I went from full time to part time with the same nonprofit. So in a way, it’s kind of best of both worlds. I want to do volunteer work.

Dave Hogan [00:08:14]:
Anyway, I retired, and now I’m getting paid to do so. So that works out well.

Ryan Doolittle [00:08:19]:
Yeah, that works out great.

Dave Hogan [00:08:21]:
Yes.

Ryan Doolittle [00:08:22]:
So you live part time in Texas, part time in Florida, right? Yeah, that’s what you said.

Dave Hogan [00:08:27]:
Yes.

Ryan Doolittle [00:08:27]:
So do you own in both places? Do you rent? How do you do?

Dave Hogan [00:08:33]:
We’re not wealthy people. We had one nice house there in central Florida and that we decided, well, what are we going to do if we want to spend part time at both places? We’re going to need a home, but we can’t afford to buy two houses. And so we sold that main home and bought into a 55 plus manufactured home community in Florida. Those are quite common down here. They’re mobile homes, but nowadays it’s more politically correct to call them manufactured homes.

Ryan Doolittle [00:08:59]:
Okay.

Dave Hogan [00:09:00]:
Hey, don’t call the trailer. It’s a nice community, but still relatively low cost. So we put part of the money from our house into that and then bought just a modest condo out in Texas. And so those work real well because both of the type houses we can lock the door and walk away from, we don’t have any outside maintenance to do at either. Someone else taking care of that. Yes. So it’s worked out very well for us. We’ve got good neighbors.

Dave Hogan [00:09:31]:
Both places have enjoyed both homes, and.

Ryan Doolittle [00:09:34]:
You don’t have to rent out one of them while you’re not there.

Dave Hogan [00:09:37]:
Yes, we’ve debate about that because I guess we could, or we could do an Airbnb or, you know, you know how it is. It’s your stuff, and we just don’t want to go to the bother of having to deal with other people coming into our.

Ryan Doolittle [00:09:52]:
If you, if you don’t have to do it, obviously it’s preferable. Yeah. And when you’re in Texas, are you in Abilene? I think that’s where your mid sized.

Dave Hogan [00:10:01]:
Town about 3 hours west of.

Ryan Doolittle [00:10:06]:
That considered. I know West Texas is like a region that west Texans are proud of. So that counts as that.

Dave Hogan [00:10:12]:
Yes. We’re in the oil belt out here in west Texas. Yes.

Ryan Doolittle [00:10:16]:
And then when you’re in Florida, you’re in near Orlando.

Dave Hogan [00:10:19]:
Yes. Mount Dora is where the children’s home is located. We live nearby, and it’s know depending on where in Orlando you’re going. But from the center of Orlando, about 1 hour north.

Ryan Doolittle [00:10:31]:
Okay, very good. Gotcha.

Dave Hogan [00:10:32]:
Very beautiful area state. Lots of the big live oak trees with the spanish moss and lots of lakes. In fact, our county is called Lake county, and there’s clearly hundreds of named lakes within the county.

Ryan Doolittle [00:10:45]:
They all have alligators in them, right?

Dave Hogan [00:10:47]:
They do. Every one of them.

Ryan Doolittle [00:10:50]:
Yeah.

Dave Hogan [00:10:50]:
If they don’t today, they will tomorrow. Yes, you’re right.

Ryan Doolittle [00:10:54]:
Yeah. Assume they do and you’ll be assumed.

Dave Hogan [00:10:57]:
Yes. I see people out there doing the tubing and board stuff and all that. I don’t know. I want to be a good, solid boat if I’m in the water down there.

Ryan Doolittle [00:11:10]:
We went down to Orlando for a convention, and I didn’t even want to step in a mean. I’m not from there, so I’m scared.

Dave Hogan [00:11:18]:
Yes.

Ryan Doolittle [00:11:19]:
Okay. So, Dave, why are you a happy retiree and why do you think people can benefit from listening to your story?

Dave Hogan [00:11:27]:
Yeah, it’s always a hard question to answer about yourself. But I think if there’s a few things, brevs that I could share about my story that maybe can help someone else. One is I think it’s really important in retirement to have a purpose. Now, in my case, of course, still working part time gives me some of that purpose because I work for a nonprofit. They do good work. I love the calls, and so it’s easy to do that work, but it gives me something each day to get up. I’ve got an agenda, I’ve got things to do. So whether it’s working or volunteering for a nonprofit, maybe even being a caregiver or somehow involved helping with the grandchildren or parents or.

Dave Hogan [00:12:04]:
You got to have something that motivates you to get up. So having a purpose, I think, is really important. Everybody’s wired differently. I don’t want to criticize someone that finds happiness and playing golf every day of their life, but to me, there’s got to be more than that. So I enjoy my bike, for instance. But do I want to ride every day for 20 miles? No, not really. I ride several days a week, but that’s not something I want. That’s not the main thing I do.

Dave Hogan [00:12:30]:
Right. So I think it’s a good purpose, I guess. Secondly, too, I think it’s really good to keep an optimistic outlook. Too many old people get in that rut of complaining about things, complaining about how life is so much better back when, and playing about young people today, those kinds of things, I think that tags you as an old person. So I think you got to keep young at heart, so to speak, keep optimistic. I’m not afraid of technology, I’m not afraid of the future. Some things are going to get better, some things are going to get worse, but that’s the way the world is. But I think we live in exciting times and I don’t want to dwell on the past.

Dave Hogan [00:13:10]:
The past is the past, and some of it was better than now, some of it was a lot worse than now. So I think it’s good to keep optimistic and keep looking ahead and not backwards.

Ryan Doolittle [00:13:20]:
Well, I guess the purpose of this podcast isn’t just for me to be happier, but I want to say that that advice I’m going to use because I’m in my forty s, but I still find myself sometimes being the crotchety old guy who’s like, why are these kids doing this? So I think that you’re right, a lot of the new ideas and methods are good. They improve life. So having an open mind to that is a positive.

Dave Hogan [00:13:47]:
Yes it is. And I work working at an academy school. I’m around a lot of young people, and some of them are absolutely amazing young people who are very focused, very dedicated to what they do, who are accomplishing things. At their age, I would have never accomplished. So when people say how bad kids are, they say, well, they’re good and they’re kids and they’re bad kids. But our generation was the same, I’m sure.

Ryan Doolittle [00:14:12]:
Right?

Dave Hogan [00:14:15]:
There are lots of wonderful young folks out there who give me hope for the future.

Ryan Doolittle [00:14:22]:
Right. Whenever I’m around I have a niece and a nephew who are young and I have a one year old, so he’s a little too young to have conversations with so far, although we try. But my niece and nephew, I don’t remember being that smart when I was that young. So I’m very much optimistic about that. They seem very smart kids today.

Dave Hogan [00:14:44]:
Yeah.

Ryan Doolittle [00:14:45]:
Okay, so let’s see, we talked about what listeners can learn from you. Is there anything that you would say that could help spark someone who’s maybe trying to find that purpose? Did you already know what yours was or did you have to search for it?

Dave Hogan [00:15:00]:
Well, I mean, it’s changed somewhat, I think I’m a person of faith and I thought maybe while I was your age or in my fifty s, I assumed when I retired I would maybe get more involved in church work, perhaps be an elder officer at my church, and probably find one or two nonprofits to get engaged in. That’s what my vision was of this stage of life. So it’s changed some. But I do work still for a faith based nonprofit, so I’m not too far from where I plan to be. But I think it is good to start thinking about it early. You don’t want to wait till 65 to start thinking, well, what am I going to do next? So it’s good to have some thoughts about that ahead of time. What you want to do when you do retire and maybe even plan for it. Perhaps you want to go back to school and get a degree and start something else.

Dave Hogan [00:15:45]:
Saw a story recently about a woman in her early 70s who got a medical degree and wants to be a doctor that really, I mean, she’s like 72, but I mean, why not? Wow, more power to her. She may have 15 or 20 years to practice medicine, and who knows? But I think whatever the dream is, you need to have something you can aim for and put into practice. Another good reason to do that, too. Sometimes retirement comes to people before they’re ready for it. So if you wait too late to start thinking about it, planning for it, you can be caught flat footed because the boss may call you indian when you’re 61 or whatever and say you’re done, and then all of a sudden you’re retired where you didn’t plan to be yet.

Ryan Doolittle [00:16:29]:
Yeah, I interviewed a guy who that happened to, and he thought he was forced into retirement at a younger age. I think in his. He thought, wow, I just won the jackpot. They’re going to give me a severance. I don’t have to work. And then all of a sudden, he found out he was depressed.

Dave Hogan [00:16:44]:
Yes.

Ryan Doolittle [00:16:46]:
Right. So it takes more than just not working. You have to have a reason that you want to get up and go do something. And when you talk about the woman that wanted to become a doctor later in life, at least when I was younger, I thought, well, the journey doesn’t start until, in her case, maybe she becomes the doctor. But no, becoming the doctor is also such a know that process of learning, and all of all, it all counts. So that’s very interesting. Okay, so you began your career as a newspaper journalist. Where was that?

Dave Hogan [00:17:21]:
Worked for two newspapers. First in my hometown in Memphis, Tennessee, and then later, after I got out of graduate school, went to work for a newspaper called Florida Today in the space coast area, Brevard County, Florida, Melbourne, Cocoa beach area.

Ryan Doolittle [00:17:38]:
Oh, by Cape Canaveral, or. That’s what I think.

Dave Hogan [00:17:42]:
Yes.

Ryan Doolittle [00:17:43]:
And the paper was in Memphis, the original.

Dave Hogan [00:17:46]:
The first paper. Yes. That was back in the days when. Now, you’re right. You wouldn’t remember this, but most large cities used to have a morning newspaper and an afternoon newspaper. That was common back. Heard.

Ryan Doolittle [00:17:58]:
I’ve heard. Yeah.

Dave Hogan [00:17:59]:
So I worked for the afternoon newspaper, and we were quite competitive with each other, I think. Yes. The morning. The afternoon paper, I was on a beat, and if I got scooped in my beat, by the morning paper, my boss would be all over me, like, why didn’t you get that story first? It was a good thing for the public because there were two of us and we were competing with each other.

Ryan Doolittle [00:18:21]:
It was a sibling rivalry. And everyone else benefited.

Dave Hogan [00:18:24]:
Yeah, we were under the same ownership, but we were on different floors of the same building. And honestly, we didn’t have much interaction between us because we wanted to keep independent from each other.

Ryan Doolittle [00:18:35]:
Oh, I see.

Dave Hogan [00:18:36]:
Competitive.

Ryan Doolittle [00:18:37]:
And how did that work? If you had a deadline or you were sitting on some breaking story, you’d have to wait all the way until the afternoon, or you wouldn’t share that with the morning people so they could get it out there.

Dave Hogan [00:18:49]:
Now, we were very independent at that point. We would do our best to get the story out on our time frame if we could.

Ryan Doolittle [00:18:58]:
Yeah. Okay.

Dave Hogan [00:19:00]:
Those were kind of the glory days of journalism, in a way. Back when newspapers really had a lot of muscle, most people took, subscribed to the local paper, one or both of them. And newspapers really mattered.

Ryan Doolittle [00:19:11]:
Yeah.

Dave Hogan [00:19:12]:
Unfortunately, after online, of course, came about, the ad revenue all went elsewhere, and that was the end of the glory days, at least, of newspapering.

Ryan Doolittle [00:19:22]:
Yeah, I’ve tried to sort of rekindle it just in my life. I subscribed to the paper, and then it just kept piling up, and I would read the stories online anyway, so it’s tough to get back to that. Okay, so you’ve talked about this, but I want to kind of label it. Well, you have probably more than two, but your two biggest core pursuits would you say, are writing and cycling?

Dave Hogan [00:19:49]:
Yes. And they go together well. So, of course, one of my blogs is about cycling, but again, I first got my love for writing. I was on the high school newspaper staff and went on to major in journalism in college. So I’ve always enjoyed to write, and hopefully I’m halfway decent at doing so. That’s when I retired from what I. Oh, thank you. I appreciate that.

Dave Hogan [00:20:13]:
I did think when I retired, I would like to spend more time writing. So that’s where I decided to start the blog and also began to write on my first book. Well, my only book so far, but I wrote a book about ebikes, electric bikes, and cycling, primarily geared toward the senior audience, because at that time, I thought of the book as an offshoot of my retirement blog. So it was geared toward the senior age market about why I get back into cycling and how to do it as a senior. And that book still, it was published in December of 21, so it’s almost two years old now. They’re still circulating. It’s on Amazon and Apple and Barnes Noble.

Ryan Doolittle [00:20:53]:
Those sites, two big core pursuits are riding and cycling. And what I loved about that was you mentioned that one exercises your mind and the other one exercises your body, and both of those are so important for health and happiest.

Dave Hogan [00:21:07]:
Yeah, that’s true. Thanks. Obviously, of course, writing is a good intellectual pursuits. I’m always looking for the next idea or the next person to interview retirees, doing some research, and then the writing and then the production side, putting the blog together, getting into style correct, and getting it out there to the public. So there’s a lot of pieces to doing our blogs. That certainly keeps the mind active. And the bike is really good for mental health as well as for physical health. So cycling has a number of benefits, I think, again, particularly for senior adults and many times, too, particularly now that we have electric assist bicycles, which is what an ebike is, you still pedal, but it has an electric assist to it.

Dave Hogan [00:21:50]:
Now that those are available and more and more seniors are able to get on a bike and ride where it may have gotten too hard to ride a traditional bicycle, now that there’s a little bit of an electric boost that will help you, cycling all of a sudden becomes alive again as something that seniors can do, and it opens up, really a whole new lifestyle because you find there’s, I guess, thousands of trails, but trails all over the country and even in other nations that make great travel opportunities. And I’ve traveled to several states for the primary purpose of just riding on some bike trails that I had read about.

Ryan Doolittle [00:22:23]:
I think you’ve been to 14 states, right?

Dave Hogan [00:22:26]:
Yes, I’ve ridden trails in about 14 states, about 50 bike trails altogether. And honestly, that small potatoes. Some of the guys who are really passionate about this and who are maybe fully retired, I’ve seen some have done 150 or core trails, and it’s really nice. It gets to be a bit addictive, I guess, like lots of hobbies, but it’s so much fun. To be out there. There’s something about a bicycle that’s unique, and you get out there, you have winds blowing your face, and it just feels really good to be out there in nature on a bike. And some of the bike trails like I did, for instance, the Coeur d’Alene trail up in northern Idaho, this beautiful scenery. I’ll go through the mountains and the woods up there in Idaho.

Dave Hogan [00:23:07]:
I mean, you just can’t beat the experience.

Ryan Doolittle [00:23:10]:
Yeah. And when you do that, are you on an e bike or you’re on kind of a Tour de France bike? I don’t know what else to call.

Dave Hogan [00:23:17]:
No. Yeah, we talk about bikes, too. There’s so many different types of bikes. Like you said, there’s the Tour de France. You have the racing style bikes with the low handlebars and the skinny tires. That’s not what I ride. More power to those who do. That’s great.

Dave Hogan [00:23:33]:
And there’s still a lot of seniors even, who ride those bikes and are very athletic. But I have the more cruiser style bike with the higher handlebars and the nice cushion seat with an electric assist. So you can ride for hours on those without getting too exhausted or uncomfortable.

Ryan Doolittle [00:23:52]:
Well, yeah, I think that would be less overwhelming for me because then I’d know I could exert as much energy as I want. But if I’m tired, I can kind of let the bike do more that day.

Dave Hogan [00:24:03]:
Exactly.

Ryan Doolittle [00:24:05]:
Yeah. I have a friend who’s a college professor, and he rides his bike to work every day, and it’s a little far. You don’t want to get to work completely sweaty. So he has an ebike, and that way he can kind of go back and forth on the exertion. Yeah, right.

Dave Hogan [00:24:22]:
So he probably takes it easy going to work and then maybe do a little more hard exercise going home, perhaps.

Ryan Doolittle [00:24:30]:
Yeah, exactly. It works out great for you. Your bike is your freedom. You were specific about that, right?

Dave Hogan [00:24:37]:
Yes. As a child, I think this is a common thing you hear from baby boomer generation people. The bike really was our first taste of freedom. We were able to get our bike and ride around town and back in those days, it was pre cell phone. And before, we worried about our kids as much as we do. Mean, I’d be out for hours. My know parents had no idea where I was and no way of reaching me. I had no way of calling home, and I’d just be out exploring the town.

Dave Hogan [00:25:04]:
And that was typical for my generation. It was a lot of fun, by the way, while I went to the Netherlands, this year I did a bike tour in the Netherlands. I found kids over there. Kids over there have the same freedom. Today. It’s really interesting to see like twelve and 1314 year old kids who over here in the House can’t. In the US, they can’t go anywhere without mama or daddy taking them in the car over there. They just hop on their bike and ride because they have such great bike infrastructure and trails that kids over there have much more freedom and reminded me of my own childhood.

Ryan Doolittle [00:25:36]:
Yeah, I’m jealous. When I was a kid, it was the same. It was just, bye, mom. And then it’d be back for dinner. I’d throw my bike on the front lawn and it was there the next morning. I missed that. Yeah. But now with my son, who’s, when he gets older, it’s going to be hard for me to give him that freedom that I had.

Ryan Doolittle [00:25:55]:
And I guess that’s something I need to explore. But yeah, I totally agree. And would you say that? Well, I guess one thing I wanted to point out to some of the aspiring happy retirees listening is that when you’re looking for a core pursuit, it doesn’t have to be something you’ve never once thought of. You don’t have to hang glide naked or some crazy thing. For you, it was things you already liked and you went to those, and that makes you happy. So it doesn’t have to be some crazy thing. It can be the core pursuits can be the passions you have always loved.

Dave Hogan [00:26:30]:
Yes, because I’ve always owned a bicycle. Depending on what was going on in my life and career. Some years I rode more than others. I wasn’t always a passionate cyclist, but I’ve always owned a bike, always kind of considered myself a bicycle guy. But really with, of course, having more time when you get to retirement age, even working part time, I have time to work in bike rides during the day. That helps. But also the introduction of the ebike technology, which is a fairly new thing, has again made bike riding more fun and possible. On my bike I had before, I was already getting to the point where I wasn’t looking forward to the next hill, hills or wind was just like, yeah, this isn’t fun riding a bike into the wind.

Dave Hogan [00:27:14]:
But now with the ebike, you just cut right through the wind. It’s not a problem or go up the hill. And so, particularly as a senior, I ride more now than I ever have in my life. And it’s because of the ebike technology.

Ryan Doolittle [00:27:27]:
Yeah, that’s great. I hadn’t ridden in a while. And I went out riding, and like you said, the wind was coming at me, and I realized this is a lot harder than it used to be.

Dave Hogan [00:27:38]:
You need an e bike.

Ryan Doolittle [00:27:39]:
Yeah, I know I need an e bike. Okay. So in addition to biking and riding, you and your wife, Kathy, one of your core pursuits would be traveling.

Dave Hogan [00:27:50]:
Yes, we enjoy traveling. As I said, we went to Europe late this summer, early fall. And of course, I had to work in some cycling with that. So I did a five day bike tour through the netherlands, which is a wonderful experience that anyone who likes to cycle at all, I definitely recommend holland. It’s a great place to go and cycle. But we went to Germany and switzerland, too, so we enjoy travel now. That’s probably our most exotic trip we’ve done so far. Most of our travel has been here in the states or maybe a cruise or something like that here in north America.

Dave Hogan [00:28:21]:
But really, it’s just a factor of time and money. I would love to travel a lot more than what we do, but we try to get in at least one big trip a year.

Ryan Doolittle [00:28:31]:
Tell me about some of the trips. So this year was the Netherlands?

Dave Hogan [00:28:34]:
Yes, netherlands and Germany. Yeah. Last did. Actually, I did two trips. My wife was with me on one of them, the bike trip I told you about to northern Idaho. Coeur d’alene.

Ryan Doolittle [00:28:45]:
Right.

Dave Hogan [00:28:45]:
I did solo. I drove from a texas house up there. We have a minivan. And one thing I enjoy doing when it’s just me is I camp in my is we’re not really camper people. We haven’t done a lot of camping. We’ve never owned an Rv. But my minivan is one of those. We can drop all the seats into the floorboard and I can put up a bed back there and buy a few essentials that you need for camping.

Dave Hogan [00:29:12]:
And throw my bike in the back, too, in the minivan. And off I go. So I went up through colorado and wyoming and montana and then Idaho and stopped along the way. And I rode bikes in at least three of those states and had a lot of fun. But that was just me. I was grateful my wife was nice enough to let me go do that on my own. I was gone for about three weeks from the home.

Ryan Doolittle [00:29:38]:
But then later, boss gave you some time off.

Dave Hogan [00:29:42]:
She did?

Ryan Doolittle [00:29:44]:
Yeah.

Dave Hogan [00:29:45]:
She said, please go. Yeah. No, I’m kidding, but stay as long as you want. Then later, the two of us together went up to northern Michigan along the Lake Michigan, Patoski and Traverse City. Just gorgeous country in the summertime. Beautiful lake. And there again, I did some biking while I was there, but we also did things that she enjoyed. We went to Frankenmouth, which is a german village in Michigan.

Dave Hogan [00:30:14]:
Went to Mackinac island and saw the sights there. So we had a good know.

Ryan Doolittle [00:30:20]:
The host of our flagship podcast retires sooner, Wes Moss. He loves Michigan. In fact, he won’t even go through a podcast interview without asking someone, what’s your favorite place to visit in? Like, that’s his specific question. So I hear about Michigan a lot. I feel like I need to go there.

Dave Hogan [00:30:40]:
Well, it’s a little bit embarrassing for me, since I’m a graduate of the Ohio State University, to say how much I enjoy Michigan, but I do.

Ryan Doolittle [00:30:48]:
I know you don’t go if you avoid Ann Arbor, maybe it’s okay.

Dave Hogan [00:30:55]:
Yeah, but Michigan is a beautiful state. There’s so much to see. In fact, that’s one of the places I would very much like to go back to and see again.

Ryan Doolittle [00:31:06]:
Yeah, for sure. Same here.

Dave Hogan [00:31:08]:
Our other main travel pursuit, back 30 years ago, we bought some timeshare weeks down on the southwest coast of Florida, a town called Marco island, just south of Naples. Okay. And it was kind of sleepy at the time as cis emerged into a really first class resort area as the whole Naples, southwest Florida area has grown and matured. And so we still go down there, and usually one or both of our children and their husbands will join us for part of the time at the beach. So we love that beach. We’re kind of beach people, and we enjoy going down there and just sort of chilling and read books, play in the water, do those things, just rest.

Ryan Doolittle [00:31:46]:
And speaking of books, and while traveling in a van, there’s a great book called Travels with Charlie by John Steinbecker that he. I guess he was in more of a camper. But I don’t know how you did your laundry, but the next time, you might want to consider, he would put it in a bucket, and then just the shaking from driving would wash his clothes for him. So give that a try next time.

Dave Hogan [00:32:10]:
I should read that book. Yeah.

Ryan Doolittle [00:32:14]:
Okay. So we find in our research that the happiest retirees, they live near at least one of their adult children, or, I guess half. But you have. Wait, how many daughters do you have? Did you say?

Dave Hogan [00:32:28]:
We have two daughters, and one’s in North Carolina and one’s in Texas, so they’re very spread out.

Ryan Doolittle [00:32:33]:
Okay.

Dave Hogan [00:32:33]:
And again, our main home was in Florida before our granddaughter was born. So we do spend roughly half the year with our younger daughter and our grandchild. And, of course, our son in law in Texas. We live about 15 minutes from them, so we see that quite often. Usually have our granddaughter over for a sleepover at least once a week.

Ryan Doolittle [00:32:53]:
Yeah, you had said that. I thought that was so cool. So pretty much every week she comes over, spends the night. You put the training wheels on. I don’t know if it’s an ebike or a bike, but. Just a bike. Just a bike. She’s got young legs and you go out and ride in the park with her and just have a great time.

Dave Hogan [00:33:10]:
Yeah. A nice park nearby with some paved trails in it. So she enjoys going with me. I feel like I’m hopefully raising the next generation of cyclists this way, instilling that love of bicycling in her. So it’s a lot of fun she and I could do together.

Ryan Doolittle [00:33:26]:
Oh, absolutely. And I don’t know if you find this, but I’ve noticed with my son, my parents, and my wife’s parents, all of a sudden, they’re super sweet. They were a little more disciplinarians for us.

Dave Hogan [00:33:39]:
Yes.

Ryan Doolittle [00:33:40]:
I don’t know if with your granddaughter, you’re probably the sweet guy we have.

Dave Hogan [00:33:46]:
Funny, because she calls me a silly peppa. So, yeah, it’s fun to be able to pep us, play a special role, I think, with young children where you can’t goof around with them a lot and don’t have to be too serious. Yeah, it’s fun.

Ryan Doolittle [00:33:59]:
Okay. We find social groups can be a really important part of staying happy in retirement. And you had mentioned that most of your social circle comes from church.

Dave Hogan [00:34:13]:
Yes. We’re both people of faith, so we’re pretty involved in church. And so, yeah, we’re in a Bible class there on Sunday mornings that is made up of people our age. It’s probably 50 people or so in the class, good sized class. All of us are the grandparent age, and so we get together. In fact, we just had a luncheon yesterday for the senior group at our church, and we usually have a dinner in someone’s home at least once a month and to do things together and occasionally do some service projects, know, for the church or the community. So it’s a good group. And we have found most of our friends tend to come from that church experience.

Ryan Doolittle [00:34:54]:
And do you have a church in Texas and you have another one in Florida? How do you.

Dave Hogan [00:35:00]:
So we belong to. Yeah. Which is a little weird at times. And being away for a few months to come back, it seems like things have changed. And who are those new people?

Ryan Doolittle [00:35:09]:
Right.

Dave Hogan [00:35:10]:
Even in six months. There’s a certain turnover of people at a church. So that’s why I said earlier in life, I thought by now I might be an officer in my church or have a more permanent role, but I can’t do that because of my transitory nature. My job in Florida, too, involves I work representing a children’s home, and much of our support and donations come from churches and the members of the churches. So a lot of my weekends in Florida, I’m out visiting churches, speaking at churches about the children’s homework. And so unfortunately, I don’t have a lot of time to spend at my own home church where I belong in Florida.

Ryan Doolittle [00:35:48]:
Yeah, well, it seems like you’re still doing good.

Dave Hogan [00:35:51]:
Net good, even though you meet some great mean. We’ve made know through some of those church connections. Sometimes when you go to speak on Sunday morning, they’ll say, why don’t you come on Saturdays at our house overnight? So we’ve made some great contacts and friendships in Florida as well through the children’s home experience.

Ryan Doolittle [00:36:11]:
Yeah, absolutely. Okay, so how did you choose your original retirement date?

Dave Hogan [00:36:17]:
Well, I think, like many of us in the early or mid 60s, even if we wanted to retire, we really can’t because of the health insurance issue. So I really never thought I could even consider retirement until 65. And then it’s like, well, my Social Security full retirement year for me has changed now, but we’re 66. I thought, well, okay, I’ll work one more year at 66. But it was sometime in that period of time, actually, I guess when I was 65 that our granddaughter was born. And so I went ahead and went part time and went on Medicare, and so that made retirement possible. But as far as my part time gig, I really don’t have an end date in mind. My employer might.

Dave Hogan [00:37:02]:
We’ll see. I guess I could be done at any time, maybe tomorrow. But I feel like right now I can still contribute to the work there. It’s white collar work. I realize if I was working on utility lines or paving streets, I would probably have had to retire earlier. And I get that. So everybody’s situation is different, but when you do white collar work and you’re in reasonably good health, there’s really no reason you have to retire unless you just want to. So I still find enjoyment in what I do and feel like I could contribute to a good cause.

Dave Hogan [00:37:37]:
And so I don’t know. I’ll quit at some point, but I don’t know when that point is yet.

Ryan Doolittle [00:37:43]:
You’re coming to a white collar job, but you could still wear a blue collared shirt if you want. Right.

Dave Hogan [00:37:47]:
There’s no.

Ryan Doolittle [00:37:49]:
Okay. It sort of brings up the point of the definition of retirement, because you are retired, but you’re kind of not retired. But that’s at least something that I’m trying to point out to our listeners, is retirement doesn’t have to mean what you think it means or what you used to think it means. It’s just sort of a change. You do less of the things you didn’t like and more of the things you want to do. Right. So would you say that’s kind of how you define it?

Dave Hogan [00:38:19]:
Yes. In fact, I think my situations are becoming much more common and may even become the norm going forward for a lot of reasons. For some people, of course, it’s financial necessity. They have to keep working. I think ideally, it’s better if you can be able to choose. In other words, you could get by, and that’s our situation. We could manage okay without my job financially. But that’s nice situation to be in, where you can choose, man, I could choose to quit, or I could choose to keep working, and that’s ideal.

Dave Hogan [00:38:49]:
And I think there’s a lot of satisfaction in having that option. But really, you see the 75 year old lady’s cashiering at the grocery store and things. Sometimes you think, oh, pity her. But the reality is she’s probably happier doing that than she’d be sitting at home. So what is she doing by choice about financial necessity? Either way, she probably finds a lot of fulfillment in getting up and going to that job every day.

Ryan Doolittle [00:39:14]:
Yeah, this is sort of a similar theme in a much smaller way. But I’ve noticed that on days when I’m feeling kind of down or just off, I just go take a walk. And it’s just something about that movement, things start to flow a little bit. So in retirement, it’s kind of a similar thing. If you’re out there doing things, your juices are flowing. Maybe you’re releasing endorphins. I don’t know. I’m not a doctor.

Ryan Doolittle [00:39:39]:
Although I could become one later in life if I want. Using that lady inspiration.

Dave Hogan [00:39:43]:
That’s right. I think, too, we all need that social element. We’re social creatures. We need other people in our lives. And while the risk of retirement, especially if you’re widowed or widower or not married, the tendency is to hoe up in your house, to become more of a hermit, so to speak, more isolated, and not have a lot of social interaction with other people, I think that’s very unhealthy. So again, whether you’re a cashier at the supermarket or doing whatever, or again, volunteer work doesn’t have to be a paid job, but doing something like that to keep active is healthier for you. Probably going to live longer and maybe be happier than if you just stayed home. Heaven, watch tv.

Dave Hogan [00:40:30]:
I can’t imagine to me a worse retirement than sitting and watching tv all day. I would not want to do that.

Ryan Doolittle [00:40:35]:
Yeah. Unless there’s a college football game on, then you might consider it.

Dave Hogan [00:40:39]:
Yes. Especially the buckeyes. Yeah.

Ryan Doolittle [00:40:44]:
What would you consider the biggest challenges that you faced along the journey of retirement or semi retirement?

Dave Hogan [00:40:51]:
I guess knowing when to quit is sometimes hard. Sometimes you look at yourself, say you’re getting older. Are you still relevant? Can you still do your job? In my case so far, I think the answer is yes. But sometimes you wonder if you’re objective enough to make that call. So sometimes knowing when to slow down, when to quit, how much of your time you should spend family with your spouse and doing personal stuff versus being engaged in work activities or even other pursuits instead. I know guys and they love doing what they do, but I mean, literally some of them spend half a day or more on their bicycle, and I don’t really want to do that even. I think you got to try to find that balance of spending time if you’re married, of course, with your spouse, because those years are precious, too. You never know how many more of those years you’re going to have together.

Dave Hogan [00:41:43]:
And so it’s really important to be able to enjoy that time together and balance that with whatever else it might be you’re doing in life. And if you’re fortunate enough to have kids or grandkids nearby that you get along with, then it’s great to spend time with them, too.

Ryan Doolittle [00:41:57]:
Yeah. So in that way, it sounds like you’re saying some of the main limitations in retirement are more physical, so that the mental and emotional you’ve been able to maybe stretch your wings more, but with physically, I better not ride my bike as long, or maybe you don’t want to anyway. But is that kind of what you’re.

Dave Hogan [00:42:17]:
Saying, or just the time constraints? I suppose. How much of your time do you want to spend in leisure activities versus work versus family or maybe versus, again, volunteering? So I think, like you said before, even though seniors complain a lot about lack of time, and that’s true because you want to do so many different things. But I think to me, happiness is trying to find a good balance there where I’m not ignoring my wife because I have a job, I’m not ignoring my kids. And not ignoring your health because that’s something we haven’t touched on much yet. But I think for seniors, it’s really important to make your health a priority. Of course, it helps if you’ve been doing that all along, not waiting till you’re 65, but exercise and of course, getting rest that you need, watching your diet, all those things are really important as you age. Yeah, we all have a different set of circumstances. Some have health issues that are not their fault at all, but in many cases, our lifestyle creates additional health problems that we wouldn’t have had otherwise, and so bad habits, et cetera.

Dave Hogan [00:43:22]:
So I think trying to live, I guess what you call a clean life and taking care of yourself, exercising, I think, is really important because to me, it’s not about extending the quantity or relief of my life. When I go, I go, that’s all right. I’ve had a good life, so I don’t worry about how many more years I’m going to live. Hopefully a long time. But what I do worry about is being able to stay independent, to be able to stay in control of my life, not having someone else push me around that wheelchair, so to speak. So those good health habits and exercise will help you stay independent and productive longer.

Ryan Doolittle [00:44:00]:
Right. And if it’s a wheelchair, it could be an e wheelchair. That way you keep going.

Dave Hogan [00:44:07]:
Yes, I will definitely want to stay mobile as long as I can. Some way.

Ryan Doolittle [00:44:11]:
Yeah.

Dave Hogan [00:44:14]:
My wife has a three wheel electric bike. It’s called an e trike. I joke that I can’t ride a bike anymore. That’s what I’ll do, is get one of those and keep riding.

Ryan Doolittle [00:44:25]:
I didn’t know those existed.

Dave Hogan [00:44:27]:
Yes.

Ryan Doolittle [00:44:28]:
That’s really cool.

Dave Hogan [00:44:28]:
She was having some balance issues. Some seniors do, actually, some people of all ages, I guess, have balance problems. But, yeah, she rode a bike before and really never crashed or had a problem. But in her mind, she was losing her confidence. It wasn’t fun anymore for fear that she would fall. So she got an electric trike and has really enjoyed it. So that may be my final bicycle. I’ll have one of these days.

Ryan Doolittle [00:44:55]:
Hey, whatever works. You speak about that balance. I already find that because I get into this dilemma where, oh, if I’m working too much, I feel like I’m neglecting my family, but if I’m hanging out with my family, I feel like I’m not doing a good enough job at work. So it seems like that challenge continues into retirement. You just have maybe new scenarios for it.

Dave Hogan [00:45:18]:
Yes, that’s absolutely right. Plus, you get the idea and more doctor appointments.

Ryan Doolittle [00:45:24]:
Okay.

Dave Hogan [00:45:26]:
It seems to core with this age. We used to joke about old people talk about their aches and pains and doctor appointments, but I’m kind of one of those now. So that does become another factor in your life that you didn’t have when you’re younger, working around all that schedule.

Ryan Doolittle [00:45:43]:
I want to get into the fine print of your deductible and core. No, I don’t. All that stuff is never very fun. Okay, so you have said that in terms of people following your example. I tried to get you to tell me about that, and I know it’s a very tough question, but one thing you said that I loved was you said everyone’s road to happiness will be different. Maybe talk a little bit about that so that people don’t feel pressured to do things one way or another.

Dave Hogan [00:46:12]:
Yeah, sure. You said some people get their enjoyment for work. I mean, Warren Buffett is still working. He’s in his believe there. And obviously he has enough money. He could retire if he chose to and not work anymore, but he still works. To him, that’s how he finds his satisfaction. Fulfillment in life is working other people.

Dave Hogan [00:46:35]:
Again, if you can play golf or where your sport or pursuit is, I don’t mean just to pick our golfers, but if that’s where you find happiness, and sometimes, of course, you get that social element and the exercise through doing a sport. Pickleball, of course, is incredibly popular right now with the senior crowd. And so whether it’s through an activity like that that you find your fulfillment or doing volunteer work, everybody thinks it’s going to have a different way of discovering what works for them and makes them happy and keeps them active and healthy again. The worst case scenario is just to sit at home and to be isolated, not to be around. Other people think the future is not going to be too good if that’s the path you’re taking. And that’s what happens to so many people who look forward to retirement, and then they retire, they don’t have a plan. They find, well, this is kind of boring. So next thing you know, six months or a year later, they’re back to work again.

Dave Hogan [00:47:29]:
And so you got to have something that gets you out of the house and that gives you some purpose and keeps your juices flowing, so to speak, and creatively, intellectually, all those ways.

Ryan Doolittle [00:47:40]:
Yeah, in a way, everyone’s road to happiness will be different. Just make sure you’re not sitting on the side of the road. That’s the way it’s.

Dave Hogan [00:47:47]:
Yeah, that’s great. Bad. Hey, I like that. Very good.

Ryan Doolittle [00:47:53]:
I have a few good ideas now and then, but don’t expect them. Okay. So I was asking you for a few suggestions that people could take into their own life, and I’m going to summarize them real quick and then I want you to add to them or correct me or whatever you feel. First, you said find a purpose. Second, take good care of your health. Third, be an optimist. And then you said kind of a three and a half or four would be, be open to change. And I really loved how you said including new ideas and technology, don’t complain about it.

Ryan Doolittle [00:48:29]:
It’s inevitable. So you can’t stop it. Which makes me right now makes me think of AI and much of it’s going to be good. So yes, there are challenges, but a lot of it could be good. So don’t fret. How did I do? Does that sound kind of like your suggestions?

Dave Hogan [00:48:45]:
Yes, it is. Right? I think so. I guess it boils down to attitude, largely. Yeah, you got to keep a positive, optimistic attitude. Got to kind of see the cup as half full and not half empty and not be a complainer. And it’s just really, no one wants to be around someone that’s a whiner and complainer. So it’s not doing yourself any good either. And sometimes people get fretful about the world and everything.

Dave Hogan [00:49:13]:
I’ll tell people sometimes, yeah, I know other seniors who have a lot of time in their hands. They spend hours a day just watching the news on tv and then they get all fretful. Why don’t you just stop watching the news, just go out and do something? Get out of the house, turn off the tv set. They get too wrapped up in all that stuff. So I think you’ve got to keep an optimistic attitude, whatever that means you, whatever changes you have to make to get there, it may be harder for some people at this stage of life, and we all know our health isn’t always going to be great. You’re going to have bad days. Most of us have some kind of health problems, but you can’t let that define you. You can still push forward, be the best that you can.

Dave Hogan [00:49:53]:
I guess one thing, too I didn’t maybe mention. Maybe I did, but I think trying to define younger people, perhaps that you can be a mentor to or be an influence for. Obviously, if you have grandchildren or great grandchildren, that’s kind of a built in target audience. For you. But in some cases, too, it might be neighbor children or even a neighbor family. I’ve become much more sensitive, for instance, to single parent families because our choice home has a mystery for that. And we talked to a lot of single moms and kind of learned about their plights. We know maybe you’ve got someone like that in your neighborhood or someone that’s been recently divorced that has children who really could just use some mom and pop kind of influences in their life for them and their children and someone who could help with the kids.

Dave Hogan [00:50:39]:
Maybe. There’s just so many different things we do if we keep our eyes open and look around us. There are people who might, could pivot from our wisdom and experience, but also just from maybe extra time we have to help them with their children that they don’t have when they’re working two or three jobs, trying to keep making ends meet and also have children to raise.

Ryan Doolittle [00:50:58]:
Yeah, absolutely. Gosh, I love that. I love that. Well, Dave, before we go, I want people to be able to find more wisdom from you, even after this podcast. Obviously, this will be the highlight of your. But, um. Of course, but because I know you want some other things. Tell our listeners where they can find your work.

Dave Hogan [00:51:19]:
Ok, I have two blogs. As you said, this retirement life is the name of one and it’s all about retirement living. But again, from a kind of upbeat, positive approach, I interview people like Owen Mitchell, who have a story to tell.

Ryan Doolittle [00:51:32]:
He was the pickleball champ that we.

Dave Hogan [00:51:34]:
Yes, pickleball champ, yeah. But amazing guy for many other reasons. And then this e bike life is the other one. Now, for both blogs, I have a corresponding Facebook page and a Twitter feed or x or whatever you want to call it these days under the same name. So you can find me on any of those. I like the social media feeds, actually, because I don’t just post my work there, but I try to search the web and other sources and come up with stories of interest to people who might be e bike riders or retirees, senior adults. And so I find stories of interest to them from other sources and share those on my Facebook page or on my Twitter feed. So you might enjoy following me on those social media sites on the blog.

Dave Hogan [00:52:22]:
I do have an email subscription, of course. It’s free and you can drop anytime you want unsubscribe. But if you want to follow my stories as they come out, you can just sign up with your email address on either of those two blogs. And then of course, my book. Can I give a promo for my book. This is the book.

Ryan Doolittle [00:52:37]:
Go for it.

Dave Hogan [00:52:37]:
It’s called ebikes, putting the fun back into cycling and life at any age. So again, it was written more for the senior audience to get them back into cycling and to introduce them to electric bikes. But it would be, I think, an enjoyable read, really, for anyone of any age, any adult.

Ryan Doolittle [00:52:58]:
They can order it on where?

Dave Hogan [00:52:59]:
Yes, on Amazon. It’s available. This is the paperback version or in an ebook format, and then most of the other formats like Barnes and Noble online or Apple online, those bookstores, it’s available only in the ebook format.

Ryan Doolittle [00:53:15]:
Okay, great. Well, Dave Hogan, thank you so much for being on the Happiest Retirees podcast.

Dave Hogan [00:53:21]:
It’s been a pleasure, Ryan. I’ve enjoyed it. And I think it’s a great idea you have here for this broadcast.

Ryan Doolittle [00:53:26]:
Oh, thank you. Like I said, I have a great idea every, I don’t know, ten years or so.

Dave Hogan [00:53:33]:
I wish you best and I will be much more keenly interested in hearing some of your other podcasts now after we’ve had this time together.

Ryan Doolittle [00:53:41]:
Well, thank you. Thank you so much.