About Me — Dodie Schadlich
I don’t have a niche. I have sixty years of stories.
Apparently, I’m supposed to introduce myself before they’ll let me loose in here.
I’m Dodie. I’m sixty years old and new at this retirement thing. I’ve been living in Ecuador since 2012 and working remotely since long before it became trendy.
For more than 23 years, I worked as a manager for a travel nurse agency. Before that, I was a floor nurse, and before that, a construction surveyor, mostly building roads. Prior to the responsible version of me, I was a directionless teen with a history of misspent youth.
I’ve also been writing for years, although I never really called myself a writer.
I wrote a weekly column called Off the Beaten Path for a short time about life in Ecuador. I wrote for expat publications and my own charity-work blogs, and I was once even paid by an expat magazine for my article about the coastal town where I lived.
But life got real busy. My work took up 40+ hours a week. Our non-profit foundation took up another 40 hours, and we also ran an Airbnb on the coast of Ecuador. Writing became one of those things I would get back to someday, when I could breathe again.
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I was able to retire at sixty after spending more than two decades with the same company. That sounds freeing, and it is, but it’s also strange when you’ve spent most of your adult life measuring time in workweeks, paydays, deadlines and vacations.
These days, I live in the Andes Mountains of Ecuador with my husband, Randy, five dogs, four cats and a long history of rescuing street strays. Most often you will find me barefoot — it’s my thing.
Some of what I write is about retirement and aging. Some is about living in Ecuador. Some is about the animals we’ve rescued, the people I’ve met, places I’ve travelled and things about life that I understand differently at sixty than I did at thirty.
I’m also spending more time doing the things I always said I didn’t have time for. Yoga, meditation, journaling, walking… and writing. Learning to just sit has been the most challenging of all.
I started Morning Spot on Substack because I wanted somewhere to write again without deciding exactly what kind of writer I was supposed to be. I don’t really have a niche, but I do have sixty years of stories to share. I have a couple book ideas rolling around in my head, a few chapters written, and I hope writing here will inspire me, challenge me and help me get these through the finish line.
Some of what I share is funny, even if it wasn’t at the time. I write from a place of my truth, sharing my experiences. Some is more reflective. Some happened yesterday, and others have been around for decades, waiting for me to have time to get them out.
My current life motto is: Be where your feet are. I’m not great at it yet, but I keep trying.
My feet happen to be in the mountains of Ecuador right now, and for once, I have time to pay attention to where they take me next.
So, hello. I’m Dodie.
Let’s see what happens next.
