Retirement card quotes are harder to choose than they look. You want something warmer than “Enjoy your retirement!”, funnier than a pension joke, and shorter than a speech. Most of all you want words that sound like you, even if someone else wrote them first. If you’ve ever stood in the card aisle unable to think of anything, this list is for you.
Below are 20 quotes about time for a retirement card. They’re grouped by mood, with a few notes on what to write around them. Where a quote is often pinned on the wrong famous name, we say so. A card gets read aloud at the leaving do, and nobody wants to be corrected over the cake.
Funny retirement card quotes
Light is usually right for a colleague, especially if the card goes round the whole office.
- “Retired! I’m off the clock!” (No Hands Art)
- “Retired? No hands on the clock!” (No Hands Art)
- “It’s never too late to be what you want to be. Unless you want to be younger. Then you’re screwed.” (unattributed)
- “The trouble with retirement is that you never get a day off.” (Abe Lemons, basketball coach)
- “You don’t stop having fun when you get old, you get old when you stop having fun.” (unattributed)
Retired! I’m Off the Clock
The simplest line in the collection, and the one people laugh at first. Set under an antique clock face with no hands, it looks like it has hung in a study for years rather than coming from a party shop. See the print.
Retired? No Hands on the Clock
A clock-face pun that suits the gift perfectly: the hours belong to them now. Parchment, letterpress type and brass, so it sits happily with oak and old books. See the print.
Quotes about time and adventure
For the retiree with a dusty passport and a long list, a card that pushes them out of the door is the best kind.
- “Don’t be afraid of spending money on silly adventures. Be afraid of getting old and realising the only place you went was work.” (unattributed)
- “Everything you do today is something your 80 year old self will wish you could go back and do. So take the trip.” (unattributed)
- “There is no way to rewind life. Take the trip, chase the dream, take the photo. Say yes to the memories.” (unattributed)
- “Trips are important! They break routines, clear out minds, and remind us that life is bigger than our daily worries.” (unattributed)
- “Don’t simply retire from something; have something to retire to.” (Harry Emerson Fosdick)
Spend Money on Silly Adventures
Permission, framed. It’s a gentle push for someone who has spent forty years saying “one day”, in a style that looks collected rather than bought. See the print.
You Get Old When You Stop Having Fun
Turns the usual worry on its head. It works for a retirement or for a big birthday, and the antique look keeps it the right side of a joke mug. See the print.
Thoughtful quotes about time
For a mentor, a long-serving manager or a parent, a quieter line often means more.
- “Time you enjoy wasting is not wasted time.” (Marthe Troly-Curtin, 1912, though it’s often pinned on John Lennon; we looked into who really said it)
- “Lost time is never found again.” (Benjamin Franklin)
- “Do not count the days, make the days count.” (usually credited to Muhammad Ali)
- “The future starts today, not tomorrow.” (Pope John Paul II)
- “Yesterday is gone. Tomorrow has not yet come. We have only today. Let us begin.” (Mother Teresa)
- “How beautiful the leaves grow old. How full of light and color are their last days.” (John Burroughs)
- “You are never too old to set another goal or to dream a new dream.” (widely credited to C. S. Lewis, but there’s no evidence he wrote it; best left unattributed)
- “Find a job you like and you add five days to every week.” (H. Jackson Brown Jr.)
- “One clock counts the hours; the other counts what the hours were for.” (Time’s Richest Harvest, Book I)
- “A life is not measured by what the years added up, but by what they were spent becoming.” (Time’s Richest Harvest, Book I)
Time You Enjoy Wasting Is Not Wasted Time
The perfect line for someone about to spend whole afternoons in the garden without apology. Warm parchment and a brass clock give it the look of something that was always on the wall. See the print.
What to write around the quote
A quote does the heavy lifting, but a card still needs a line from you. Three simple patterns work every time:
- Thank, then wish. “Thank you for [one specific thing]. Now go and [one specific plan they’ve mentioned].”
- Remember, then release. “We’ll miss [habit or phrase]. The office clock won’t, but we will.”
- Quote, then sign off. Put the quote at the top, then simply: “Here’s to the time that’s all yours now.”
Keep it to two or three sentences. People remember the specific detail far more than the length.
Why these lines are about time
Every No Hands Art print carries one line under a clock with no hands, because the question in retirement is never really “what time is it?” but “what will I do with it?” The two closing quotes above come from Time’s Richest Harvest, the book behind the posters. If a print has ever stopped you mid-stride, the book is the full argument behind it, in short chapters you can read over a coffee.
If the card isn’t quite enough, any of these prints can be sent as an instant download to print tonight, or printed to order in A4 or US Letter and shipped worldwide. All eight designs are together on our retirement gift prints page.