There are days in retirement that are the waking equivalent of a dreamless sleep, if you know what I mean.

Brault likens certain stretches of retirement to “the waking equivalent of a dreamless sleep”: time that passes without memorable events, purpose, or even distinct feeling—pleasantly blank for some, unsettlingly empty for others. The aside “if you know what I mean” invites complicity, suggesting this is a common but rarely confessed experience: not dramatic sadness, but a kind of low-grade numbness or drift. The line also plays on retirement’s cultural promise of freedom and fulfillment, complicating it with the reality that unstructured days can blur together. Implicitly, it raises questions about how meaning is made when external schedules and roles fall away.