Orien Family News

I guess we knew this day would come sometime, after all it is what he worked for all those years. But now that it is here we are wondering how it all happened and where did the time go. We still remember as if it were yesterday when he put on that JC Penny baby-blue suit with checked pants to head off for his first day at Ernst and Ernst. Ooops, I guess it couldn’t possibly be yesterday if he wore a suit like that. It is such a hoot that it was retired to the Halloween costume drawer years ago.

Orie will be retiring at the end of this year, so in the tradition of his firm they had a nice dinner and congratulatory party for him on Saturday night. After dinner they showed a power-point-presentation on his life that was fun and cute. It was entitled “The Secret Life of Orie” because they decided that very few people at the firm knew the “real” Orie. It wasn’t until after they got some photos and a sketch of his life from his sneaky wife (that would be me) that they started to realize there was a whole other side to him…thus the title of the slide show.

The slide show was divided into a dozen or so chapters of his life, such as “The Stud Muffin”, “The Family Man”, “Military Career”, “The Accountant”, “The Athlete”, “The Sportsman”, “The Mentor”, etc. etc. There were some great long forgotten photos that I dug out of some deep dark places that surprised even Orie as he hadn’t seen them in many years. I sent them via email to the kids who were shocked and surprised by their stud muffin dad. Hmmm…perhaps beneath that conservative accountant exterior lies a pretty cool guy! Who knew?

At the conclusion of the slide show Orie and I were invited to come up front and accept a most generous gift of a cruise. Yea! Can’t wait! (Hmmm…I hope he takes me with him.) Then Orie gave a short speech that I’m sure was different from any other speech given by a retiring accounting partner. He talked about the Old Testament Joseph who was sold into Egypt by his brothers. He said there were several lessons to be learned from Joseph. 1) Don’t give up on your family. 2) Work your way up the ladder by doing good, working hard and hanging in there. And, 3)Save some of your money. All good advice for those young staff accountants just starting out.

He got some good laughs when he asked me the question of how many weeks he worked out of town one year as a new staff accountant. I replied “48”. I know because I crossed them off one by one on the calendar that year as three little ones hung onto my legs. He then asked how many children we have. After I replied to that question (6 at last count) he pointed out that one could be out of town a lot and still have time for important things. That got a good laugh, especially as most folks at the firm view Orie as very quiet and not prone to say something like that and also because they all know none of them have ever spent that many weeks out of town.

Congratulations Orie on a great career. Plans for retirement are being worked on, coming along nicely and will be announced later on. I can assure you his plans won’t involve sitting around. One thing he hopes is that it will involve play time with lots of grandchildren. Come on kids. Time to do your part for our retirement!!!