Probably in 2 years (June 2015) just before my 55th birthday. DH two years later, unless there are some early retirement opportunities. Savings plans and investments, as well as a pension (about 50% of my current salary) make for a soft landing, as does a continuation of my health benefits. (That's the biggie...and DH is covered under my plan, too!)

Wow, retiring at 55! I have never even considered it a possibility. I guess I should have but in my mind I have always thought of at least 65. That gives me about 17 years to pay off the house (If I keep it once the kids move out).

I am a restless type and just weekends sometimes drive me a little batty trying to find things to do (note, teenage kids who don't want to do anything and thus I feel stuck at home with them, and restless). I fear that retirement will be similar. 7 days a week where, yes I can be in the forest for many hours but, eventually have to come home and do '.....what?

retirement is one of those words that makes me uncomfortable, like the word divorce does to many others.

My husband and I are both card-carrying members of Generation X. It's unlikely we will ever be able to retire, whether we want to or not.

Honestly, though, retirement is far from my mind right now, as I feel like I'm just starting. I went to university immediately after high school, then got a teaching job immediately after university. It was the first and only "real" job I'd ever had (the jobs you do on the side to put yourself through school don't count -- not toward your career, anyway). Soon realized that while I quite liked science, and I quite liked some aspects of teaching it, it wasn't fulfilling enough to carry on with for a lifetime. And it was becoming increasingly clear to me that I'd better find a career that I truly enjoyed, because I'd seen too many of my parents' friends work their butts off at jobs they resented with retirement as the light at the end of the tunnel, and then guess what happens? Well, some retire and seem happy enough. But too many retire only to find that their health doesn't permit them to do all those wonderful things they'd put off for so long. Or, they retire and within a year they find they miss it, but it is too late to go back. Or, for two people I knew fairly well, they died within a year of retirement. Those two cases hit me like a brick.

But then all too soon we were 30 and it was time to decide about babies. So we went for it. I have two great kids, but it has been a long slog. When I set out on this parenthood gig, I had no idea it would feel so much like SINGLE parenthood. Don't get me wrong; my husband is a great dad. But he works long, long hours -- in the film industry, you don't really have a choice. And he's always been very supportive of me going back to school. But how could I do that when my kids were tots?

So I've given our kids a good start in life. I have been available all through early childhood, and I'm grateful for the opportunity. Many cannot afford not to work. But am I ready to go back to school and start again? Hell yeah.

And yet we have saved very little. The kids' education funds, yes, but not much beyond that. Which probably means I'll never get to retire. And that's probably OK. All I want is a meaningful career and a decent work-life balance, and, if I'm very lucky, health that permits me to keep working into old age.