Retiring Near Your Grandchildren

Last week, I asked readers to E-mail me recommendations for great places to retire. One reader from Kansas wrote me to say that the actual town was irrelevant.

"Retire near your grandchildren if you are lucky enough to have them," she said. "If you are in the North, get a new furnace. If you are in the South, get a new air conditioner. Stay near an airport so you can travel to South America where you can still afford to visit." But the most import thing to her was to watch her grandchildren grow up.

Appropriately, this Sunday is Grandparents Day, a holiday I never knew existed until I started writing about retirement. President Jimmy Carter signed a presidential proclamation in 1978 designating the holiday as the first Sunday after Labor Day. You can read about the woman who championed this cause, Marian McQuade, 91, of Fayette County, W. Va., here.

In my family, we never celebrated this holiday—instead, we honored our grandparents on Mother's and Father's Day. Tell us, do you celebrate Grandparents Day?