Preparing for the Future - Questions of the unknown

Assalamualaikum everyone...

Lately, I have been thinking on how I will shape my future until I die... when will I die? How do I make an estimate of this... I need this to chart out how long I need to prepare for myself... here are the data about my family that I know:

• Rasulullah passed away at the age of 63
• My father passed away at the age of 58
• My mother passed away at the age of 70
• All of my siblings are still alive and so far have no chronic disease, at least not that we know of

So, I decided that I will use Rasulullah's age when he passed away since it falls right between my father's and mother's.  If 63 is the age when I will die.  Then, I have exactly 19 years to live in this world.

What do I  need when I am old (perhaps between 50 - 63):

1. Home - should I finish payment for my house or should I just let the insurance take care of it when I die?
2. Car to move around - the last car I own must be bought at the earliest when I am aged 53.  So that the car will not give me much problem during my old age.
3. Savings - how much will I need to live on per month after I have retired from my job? RM6000 per month, if I still haven't my mortgage at that time?
4. Work - until when should I work? 55 years old? 60 years old?  After that what will I do?
5. Health - can I afford to have terminal illness like cancer, diabetes (my mother had it), high-blood pressure? No-way.  I am afraid to eat the medicines, period! What more to eat it on a daily basis non-stop... what a scary thought...
6. Legacy - how much, what should I leave for my children after I am gone? house? Land? I don't have any land... Money?
7. Supporting my children - how can I continue to help my children after they have start working and get married?  Should I help to take care of my grand children.  I needed help when my children were small and suffered when trying to juggle office work while taking care and keeping my children happy.  I hope my children will not have to go through the same struggles that I went through... what kind of support can I give my children in the future?
8. Activities - what do I do on daily basis once I have retired? Learn agama? but I want to learn now, why should I wait until I am old... should I take-up gardening? but I hate gardening... I like beautiful flowers but I don't like waiting for it to bloom... nope gardening is not for me either... what then.. hmm..

Are you thinking of the same thing as I do?  What is in your plan list when you are in your 50s and 60s?  Care to share?  I will tell you what I am planning for my old age in my next writing ok... but these questions are going round and round in my head for quite some time already...  I am thinking about it but not doing any action yet to answer or shape the future for myself...

Let's sleep on it some more.  Tonight, I am leaving a whole lot of questions to all of you and me too... Good night then, sleep tight... Lots of love from me to you... Let's be happy and live to find redha Allah so that we will go to Jannah... May Allah always help us and always be by our side to keep us safe and in this religion, Islam, until death comes...

Wassalamualaikum...

-yellow rose-

A new job - Alhamdulillah

Salam my friends,

This must be a treat huh!  I write 2 articles in one sitting.

I told you sometime back that I had to take VSS (Voluntary Separation Scheme) from my previous employer.  So that actually happened in September 2016.  That was done and dusted.

Before it was done and dusted - I was terrified.  I am a single mom who just committed a big mortgage on a house just before my previous company announce the VSS.  I was in a pit big time! Like any normal kiasu Malay women - I applied for jobs left and right.  Linked-in, Jobstreet, friends and families recommendations, re-wording my resume (at least 3 times), applying on-line at many-many companies website, I even applied part-time lecturing (thinking if I cannot get full-time job, i still can live on part-time jobs)....  Alhamdulillah, finally I managed to secure a job.

So here I am since last October 2016, I have joined another company.  Alhamdulillah, everything is fine now.  But with this new job, my whole life scheduled changes.  The travel time to and from office takes me about an hour or more depending on traffic of the road on any given day.  The work at my new office is more compare to my previous company so I had to stay back at office more often. After many considerations however, I don't feel my situation is all that bad.  My life schedule does change for the better somehow.  I have less time, but that makes me treasure and appreciates the time I have more.  I see my friends less often, but we continue to contact each other via whatsapp and I try to find time to see them.  I have to put in more effort to see my friends, but because I put extra effort, I appreciates my friends more and I miss them even more because we so rarely can see each other.

I still see my children during weekends (I'm a weekend mom since my children decide to stay with their father)... actually just my daughter.  My son has entered into Matrikulasi and is only allowed to come home once a month.  Me and my daughter have great mother-daughter time.  We eat out, we go for swims (ok, she swims - me just sit in water, berendam), watch movies, etc etc.  Life is still good... Alhamdulillah... Thank you Allah.  I love you and Rasulullah... Good night my friends...

Hello 2017

Assalamualaikum 2017 and my fellow friends,

How have you been?  I hope life has been good to you.  How is my life... fairly fine.  Everything is as what I wanted but why it seems that I want more?  We humans are never satisfied, but that is a good thing actually.  That way, we will always challenge ourselves so that we strive to make a better tomorrow than today.

Anyway, that is not what I wanted to tell you.  I just had a conversation with my daughter who is 17 years old, who will be sitting for her SPM this year, in sya Allah.  We laughed so hard at my daughter's story that I thought I must share it with you.

My daughter has 3 tuition teachers.  She takes home-tuition as I believe 1-to-1 tuition is the most effective.  2 of her teachers are male and the latest one is a female.

One of  the male teacher taught her Modern Maths and Add Maths and the other one taught her Physics and Chemistry.  Both of these teachers only brings a pen when they come to teach.  If they bring a bag, there's nothing in the bag.  If they need to use papers or calculator they will just use whatever my daughter has.

Today, she replaced her Physics and Chemistry teacher with a lady teacher.  To my daughter's astonishment, the lady teacher came with a bag full of reference books, and a full load of pencil case. You can find blue, black and red pens,  She has her own calculator too.  To add to her uniqueness, when she draws a graph she use her multi-colored pens to the fullest.  She even draw a graph twice because the first one didn't come out pretty.  My daughter is amazed at how different her tuition teachers are.

Her male and female teachers are too far apart in their behaviours that my daughter and I couldn't help laughing away... Conclusion, men are normally plain and women are normally very colorful and very interesting in nature.  If a man don't get married, I think their life will be extremely boring. However for women, we try to put colors in our lives whenever we can and I think it is so much fun being a woman.  Thank you Allah for making me a woman - colorful clothes with ruffles and layers with many interesting friends.

Good night and may Allah bless us throughout the night with peaceful and restful sleep.  May tomorrow brings happiness and rezeki yang halal dan diberkati Allah... amiiinnn... Wassalamualaikum....

.... yellowrose....